An American tank destroyer team awaits German targets - 19 August 1944. texag57

Falaise Gap, France

On the night of July 11 after the Battle of Biazza Ridge, many men of the 505 bore witness to a horrifying incident involving the 504th PIR. Bill recorded what he saw in a letter to his sister:

“[On July 11 at night]…our own navy… shot down 27 transport planes killing 410 paratroopers, who were coming in to reinforce us.” Source: William Clark, letter dated June 13, 1945

Years later, in an interview after the War Bill told his  friend, Herd Bennett about the incident:

“He was lying in a fox hole watching the 504th make the jump. He states that he laid on the ground and saw many of the C-47 transport planes (they were bringing the paratroops in) blasted out of the air by American artillery that thought they were German airplanes.” Source: Herd L. Bennett as told to him by William Clark, August 19, 1999.

For Bill, the worst thing next to witnessing his friend’s death, was the shooting down of planes from 504 by the US navy. Bill had seen a lot of good men and close friends die that day, but the SNAFU by his own forces was overwhelming. It could have been avoided in his opinion, and now Bill was to watch as they needlessly died.

These were sentiments shared by other troopers who occupied his position on the ridge that night:

“Sergeant Raymond Hart, with Company H, and his men watching from Biazzo Ridge could see ‘troopers jumping out of burning planes. Needless to say, we felt like we had lost the war. More than one man cried that night.’” Source: “Four Stars of Valor: The Combat History of the 505th Parachute Infantry Regiment in World War II”, Nordyke, P.,  2006 p. 

504th killed by friendly fire

An American soldier crouches behind one of the hedgerows  that crisscrossed the Normandy countryside in France, 1944.  