Operation Perch was a British offensive of the Second World War which took place from 7 to 14 June 1944, during the early stages of the Battle of Normandy. The operation was intended to encircle and seize the German occupied city of Caen, which was a D-Day objective for the British 3rd Infantry Division in the early phases of Operation Overlord. Operation Perch was to begin immediately after the British beach landings with an advance to the south-east of Caen by XXX Corps. Three days after the invasion the city was still in German hands and the operation was amended. The operation was expanded to include I Corps for a pincer attack on Caen.
On the next day, XXX Corps in the west pushed south to Tilly-sur-Seulles, which was occupied by the Panzer-Lehr Division; the village was captured and re-captured several times. I Corps began the eastern thrust two days later from the Orne bridgehead, which had been secured in Operation Tonga on D-Day. I Corps was also delayed by constant counter-attacks of the 21st Panzer Division. With mounting casualties and no sign of a German collapse, the offensive east of Caen was suspended on 13 June.
Further west in the US First Army area, American attacks forced a gap in the German defences. Part of the 7th Armoured Division was diverted from Tilly-sur-Seulles, to advance through the gap in a flanking manoeuvre and force the Panzer Lehr Division to fall back, to avoid encirclement. On 14 June, after two days of battle including the Battle of Villers-Bocage, the 7th Armoured Division was ordered to withdraw towards Caumont. Plans were made to resume the offensive once the 7th Armoured Division had been reinforced but the plans came to nothing when a storm in the English Channel seriously delayed the landing of supplies and reinforcements.
The battle is controversial because many historians and writers have concluded that it was failures by British divisional and corps commanders that squandered an opportunity to capture Caen, rather than the Germans achieving a defensive success. To resist the offensive, the Germans had committed their most powerful armoured reserves, which deprived them of the fighting power for a counter-offensive and forfeited the initiative to the Allies.
Background
Operation Overlord
The Norman town of Caen was a D-Day objective for the 3rd Infantry Division, which landed on Sword Beach on 6 June 1944. The capture of Caen was the most ambitious objective of I Corps (Lieutenant-General John Crocker). The Overlord plan called for the Second Army (Lieutenant-General Miles Dempsey) to secure the city and then form a front line from Caumont-l'Éventé to the south-east of Caen, acquiring airfields and protecting the left flank of the US First Army while it moved on Cherbourg. Possession of Caen and its surroundings would give the Second Army a suitable staging area for a push south to capture Falaise, which could be used as the pivot for a swing left of the Allied front to advance on Argentan and then towards the Touques River. The terrain between Caen and Vimont was especially promising, being open, dry and conducive to swift offensive operations. The Allies greatly outnumbered the Germans in tanks and mobile units and a battle of manoeuvre would be to their advantage.
Operation Perch
Operation Perch was intended to create the threat of a British break-out to the south-east of Caen by XXX Corps. The 50th (Northumbrian) Infantry Division landed on Gold Beach on 6 June and was to rapidly move inland and capture Bayeux and the road to Tilly-sur-Seulles. The 7th Armoured Division and the 8th Armoured Brigade would then take over from the 50th Northumbrian Division and advance from Tilly-sur-Seulles to Mont Pinçon. XXX Corps landed on Gold Beach at 07:30 on 6 June, cleared seven exits off the beach and advanced 5 mi (8.0 km) inland. German resistance at Le Hamel delayed the division and prevented the achievement of all of the D-Day objectives before dark. Patrols had reached Bayeux and made contact with the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division, which had landed on Juno Beach to the east. The 47 Royal Marine Commando advanced westwards along the coast, to link up with the American forces moving inland from Omaha Beach but fell short of Port-en-Bessin-Huppain by 3 mi (4.8 km).
During the afternoon, the German LXXXIV Corps ordered its reserve, 12th SS Panzer Division Hitlerjugend (Kampfgruppe Meyer), to strike into the flank of the 50th Division north of Bayeux. While advancing to the attack, a battalion was ordered towards Omaha beach, weakening the counter-attack which was a costly failure. On 7 June, the bulk of the 7th Armoured Division landed on schedule and XXX Corps secured its remaining D-Day objectives, including Bayeux and Port-en-Bessin-Huppain. The German LXXXIV Corps sent its last reserve unit, Mobile Brigade 30, towards Gold Beach to repeat the counter-attack, which also failed and the brigade was destroyed north of Bayeux. The survivors of the two counter-attacks were driven into a pocket north of the city by the Anglo-American advance, although the Americans did not discover that this had happened. From Sword Beach, the 3rd Infantry Division of I Corps had advanced towards Caen but diverted units to capture German positions along the 9.3 mi (15.0 km) route, which reduced the strength of the infantry attack and the accompanying 27th Armoured Brigade was delayed by congestion in the beachhead. The division was stopped short of Caen by the 21st Panzer Division.
Prelude
Operation Wild Oats
On 9 June the Allied ground forces commander, General Bernard Montgomery, met Dempsey and Omar Bradley (US First Army commander) and it was decided that Caen would be taken by a pincer movement, Operation Wild Oats. From the east the 51st (Highland) Infantry Division and the 4th Armoured Brigade of I Corps, would cross east into the 6th Airborne Division bridgehead over the Orne and attack towards Cagny, 6 mi (9.7 km) to the south-east of Caen. XXX Corps to the west would send the 7th Armoured Division across the Odon River to take Évrecy and Hill 112. The 1st Airborne Division would then drop between the pincers but Air Chief Marshal Sir Trafford Leigh-Mallory, the Allied air commander exercised a veto of the airborne plan as too risky for the transport aircraft.
German preparations
Late on 7 June, the I SS-Panzer Corps was transferred from the command of the 7th Army to Panzergruppe West (Armoured Group West, General Geyr von Schweppenburg). Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt, the supreme commander in the west (OB West), ordered Panzergruppe West to plan a counter-attack for 10 June. This attack was cancelled by Field Marshal Erwin Rommel the commander of Army Group B, due to lack of troops. German units were rushed to Normandy to contain the invasion. The I SS-Panzer Corps consisted of the Panzer-Lehr-Division, one of the strongest divisions in the German army, the 12th SS-Panzer Division Hitlerjugend and the 21st Panzer Division. The leading elements of the Panzer-Lehr Division arrived during the night of 9 June at Tilly-sur-Seulles, having lost up to 200 vehicles to aerial attacks during its 90 mi (140 km) drive from Chartres, having been diverted from facing the British I Corps north of Caen due to the success of the 50th Northumbrian Division. Parts of the 12th SS-Panzer Division, the 21st Panzer Division and the remains of the 716th Static Infantry Division were moved to Caen, facing I Corps. Several attacks were launched against the Anglo-Canadian beachhead north of Caen. In the early hours of 9 June, the survivors of Kampfgruppe Meyer and Mobile Brigade 30 broke out of the pocket north of Bayeux. Later in the day, XXX Corps linked with the Americans while the 50th (Northumbrian) Infantry Division reached the north-east outskirts of Tilly-sur-Seulles and encountered the tanks of the Panzer-Lehr Division. During the evening, Panzer-Lehr and the 12th SS-Panzer Division counter-attacked and overran a British infantry company, before being forced back the next morning.
Battle
XXX Corps
On 10 June, the 7th Armoured Division took over parts of the 50th Northumbrian Division front with the 56th Infantry Brigade under command. By nightfall, the 7th Armoured Division had reached the north-western fringe of Tilly-sur-Seulles and next day penetrated the village, capturing the central crossroads. The Panzer-Lehr Division made several counter-attacks, which forced the British out and attacks by the 50th (Northumbrian) Division bogged down in the bocage. Army Group B planned to relieve the armoured divisions facing the Second Army from 11 June and replace them with infantry divisions, to concentrate the tanks in the Carentan area and avert the danger to Cherbourg. Adolf Hitler over-ruled Rommel and the next day ordered him not to retreat and instead to roll up the Allied beachhead from east to west, starting with the Orne bridgehead.
I Corps
While XXX Corps attacked Tilly-sur-Seulles, an attack by I Corps was postponed until 12 June, because of weather delays, which slowed the landing of the 51st (Highland) Infantry Division and the 4th Armoured Brigade. On 10 June, German tanks and infantry made several attacks on the 6th Airborne Division in the Orne bridgehead, which forestalled the British attack. The Germans were repulsed with the help of naval gunfire and then counter-attacked; a captured German officer remarked that his "battalion had been virtually wiped out" during twelve hours of fighting. In the evening, a German attack on Ranville was repulsed with many German casualties. The vanguard of the 51st Highland Division arrived during the evening and attacked Bréville at dawn, which was also a costly failure; other elements of the division quickly secured Touffréville. During the afternoon of 11 June, The Queen's Own Rifles of Canada and 1st Hussars attacked Le Mesnil-Patry to assist the advance of the 69th Brigade of the 50th Northumbrian Division but the attack was another costly failure. On 12 June, German attacks were launched from the Bréville area against the Orne bridgehead. Fighting lasted all day and casualties were severe on both sides but during the evening the Germans pulled back. To close the gap in the British perimeter, the decision was made to secure Bréville and the 12th Battalion the Parachute Regiment captured the village by midnight but had 141 casualties among 160 men in the attack. The 51st Highland Division was opposed by the 21st Panzer Division in its efforts to push south to Saint Honorine and with the Highlanders contained, the offensive east of Caen was called off on 13 June.
Caumont Gap
Although the attempt to envelop Caen had been repulsed, on the right flank of XXX Corps (the junction of the British Second and First US armies) the possibility for a flanking manoeuvre had developed. Since D-Day, the British and Americans had destroyed five German battle groups in this area, including the reserves of LXXXIV Corps, leaving only remnants of the 352nd Infantry Division in the Trévières–Agy sector. The 352nd Division had been in action since its defence of Omaha, on 6 June, and had received few replacements. The 1st US Infantry Division and the 2nd US Infantry Division had forced the collapse of the left flank of the 352nd Division. On the night of 9/10 June, the 352nd Division received permission to retire to Saint-Lô, which created a 7.5 mi (12.1 km) gap in the German lines near Caumont-l'Éventé. Only the reconnaissance battalion of the 17th SS-Panzergrenadier Division, which had been detached when the division was moved west ready for a counter-offensive at Carentan, remained in the area.
The Germans planned to use the 2nd Panzer Division to plug the gap but on 10 June, the bulk of the 2nd Panzer Division was strung out between Amiens and Alençon and was not expected to arrive in strength for another three days. General Hans Freiherr von Funck of XLVII Panzer Corps rushed the divisional reconnaissance battalion to Caumont, with orders to hold the high ground. The I SS-Panzer Corps commander, Sepp Dietrich, ordered his only reserve Schwere SS-Panzerabteilung 101, to move behind the Panzer-Lehr and 12th SS-Panzer divisions to cover the open left flank. The 2nd Company, schwere SS-Panzer Battalion 101, under the command of Michael Wittmann and with five operational Tiger tanks, was ordered to a position south of Point 213 on the Villers-Bocage ridge and arrived on 12 June, after a five-day drive from Beauvais.
On 12 June, Dempsey met with Lieutenant-General Gerard Bucknall (XXX Corps) and Major-General George Erskine (7th Armoured Division) and ordered Erskine to disengage the division from the fighting around Tilly-sur-Seulles. The 7th Armoured Division was to exploit the gap to seize Villers-Bocage and advance behind the left flank of the Panzer-Lehr Division, to a ridge about 1.6 mi (2.6 km) east of the town. It was believed that the appearance of British tanks behind the Panzer-Lehr Division on high ground astride German supply-lines would compel the Panzer-Lehr Division to withdraw or be trapped. To support the flanking move of the 7th Armoured Division, the 50th (Northumbrian) Infantry Division was to continue its attack against the Panzer-Lehr Division around Tilly-sur-Seulles. The US V Corps would push forward at the same time, the 1st US Infantry Division to capture Caumont and the high ground nearby and the 2nd US Infantry Division to advance towards Saint-Lô.