Many recalled that day as long and lingering, as if the daylight were afraid to fade. The heat held until late in the afternoon, and despite a few high clouds, the air over much of England was magnificently clear, making distant landscapes seem closer. The sunshine, the droning insects, the idle breeze, it was a day to lull the senses, a day for long walks and casual reflections.
But not for the million Allied servicemen and women tensely waiting for the enemy horde.
“These guys are the hardest on the planet,” General Clay told me as we walked from the Cub across the grass runway near Margate, at the tip of the Thames estuary, an area called the Isle of Thanet. “Don’t accidentally piss off one of them, or not even I’ll be able to save you.”
He strode ahead of me and called out, “Colonel Yates, good to see you again.”
Don Yates saluted smartly and extended his hand to the general. His men had been leaning against their packs and parachutes, hovering in small groups. They wore night field uniforms, black pants and jerseys, and many had already applied burned cork to their faces. They quickly closed around us. The Rangers seemed loathe to part with their weapons, and they brought them as they gathered. They were draped in British sten guns, ammunition belts, knives strapped to legs, BARs and heavier machine guns, grenades, 60mm mortars, the works. I even saw a sawed-off shotgun across one Ranger’s stomach.
These were the soldiers of the 1st Ranger (Infantry) Battalion, formed recently at Carrickfergus in Northern Ireland. They were all triple volunteers: first for the army, then for parachute training, finally for the Rangers. They did nothing but train. Cliff-climbing, demolitions, small arms, unarmed combat, ambush techniques, signal, parachuting, camouflage, all grueling. The dropout rate was high. Those who remained were reduced to human sledgehammers.
I once saw Joe Louis rise from a sofa and walk across a hotel lobby in San Diego. I’ll never forget the economy and vitality and utter confidence of even those simple movements. The Rangers were the same. There was a lupine air to them, a trace of mocking in their smiles, and a boisterous strength derived from their competence. One glance at these soldiers, and you knew they were unbreakable.
General Clay had considered using OSS operatives for the mission. The OSS was trained in behind-the-line insurgency, while the Rangers were typically to be in front of the enemy. But Clay insisted on Rangers when he found he could not assure himself full operational control over the OSS. “Too murky an outfit for my tastes,” he had told me.
Parked near the runway were three transport airplanes, usually called C-47s. The model began service in 1935 as Douglas Sleeper Transport and was known to the British as the Dakota and to the Americans as the Skytrain. Flown commercially, it was called the DC-3, a remarkably durable, well-designed transport. When altered to carry paratroopers, as these three were, the planes were christened C-53 Skytroopers. They were powered by 1200hp Pratt and Whitney Twin Wasp radials. The planes could take an enormous amount of punishment, and new pilots were advised, “Fly the largest piece back.”
“We weren’t expecting you,” Colonel Yates said. “We’d have prepared a salute or something.”
“Horse manure,” Clay replied loudly. “You Rangers don’t have time for that. Leave the parade ground crapola to others.”
There was nodding all around from the 120 soldiers in the group.
General Clay rose to his full height and locked his hands behind his back. “Colonel Yates has fully briefed you men. I don’t have to tell you that you’re in for a hell of a night. Everything you’ve learned and all your guts are going to be called into play in the next few hours.”
The Rangers were rapt. General Clay’s presence meant their assignment, code named Green Thumb, was urgent and critical, not just a fancy of an anonymous, dilettante major general somewhere up the chart.
Clay continued, “You men have gone through hellish training. You’re going to have the chance shortly to use all of it.”
The general took a few steps along the line of Rangers, looking at them right in the eyes, one after another. He roughly grabbed one Ranger’s shoulder, then another, as if testing their mettle. “You soldiers are the best we’ve got, the best in history. I wouldn’t send you in if I didn’t know you will get what I want and come back out. You won’t let me down.”
Clay cleared his throat. “I want you to know how proud I am of you, and that my thoughts and prayers will be with you.”
That was enough. He turned to go, but was stopped by a question yelled from the back of the group.
“Sir, we’re scheduled to jump at four hundred feet. Can we use our parachutes?”
The Rangers roared.
Clay didn’t miss a beat. He faced them again and with a poker face said, “Soldier, with the shortages back in the States, you’d consider wasting all that silk? And here I thought you guys had iron balls.”
They laughed and whistled and applauded. I learned later that the question came from Ranger Sergeant Aaron Hirschorn, whom I interviewed after the war.
The general and I walked back to the Cub. I asked in a flattering way, “Sir, do you wish you were going with them?”
“Not on your goddamn life.”
8
General Clay met with his commanders as a group every other day. For security reasons, the location was changed each time. That evening’s assembly was held at a manor house called Bilswell, near Storrington, fifty miles south of London in Sussex. The house was of the Lutyens style, with diamond-paned windows and numerous tall brick chimneys. Around the house were orchards and farmland.
Corps and division commanders and AEFHQ staff crowded the sitting room. Most had arrived early for informal meetings. General Clay worked the room, speaking with each of his commanders, prodding and encouraging. Voices were surprisingly loud, and I heard a few laughs. Several congratulated him on single-handedly bringing down the Messerschmitt. At the meeting four days before, and again two days before, when the tides had been propitious for a southern invasion, the tension had been more apparent, and the meeting more subdued.
General Clay finally took his place near the east wall, and the room fell silent. I stood to his right, notebook in hand. On his other side was an AEFHQ secretary who would take down verbatim everything said. In a chair near the stairway was British Army Brigadier Arnold Graves, the AACCS liaison officer.
Clay began without prelude, “You’ve received briefings regarding events today, which the prime minister called the Three Blows. In a telephone conversation with him less than an hour ago, he told me that historians will regard this afternoon’s disasters as the ebb tide in the Allies’ war. He said that our fortunes have turned, and the worst is now behind us. Mr. Churchill may be an optimist, but I agree that it is unlikely we’ll hear worse news than today’s.”
There were several nods in the room. In an overstuffed chair on Clay’s left near the secretary was Lieutenant General Alex Hargrave, commander of I Corps. He tamped his pipe with a finger. Hargrave was small-boned, with fine, almost delicate features. He had been one of Clay’s classmates at West Point. His first words to me after I had been introduced as Clay’s aide were, “The stories I could tell about Wilson.”
In the Great War, Hargrave had been an infantry captain and was taken prisoner during the second battle of the Marne. Some said those few months’ exposure to the German military as a POW made him a bit of a Prussian. He was supremely confident in his own abilities, while often affecting a put-upon attitude with his subordinates. He was fastidious in his personal appearance, and his words were clipped. “Damn near a German accent,” Clay once told me. “I’m surprised he doesn’t wear a dueling scar.”