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SULLIVAN, Bernard James
British 553 Flotilla
Box 23, #9
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THE ASSAULT LANDINGS IN NORMANDY
D DAY: MIDNIGHT JUNE 5 — MIDNIGHT JUNE 6
What is your full name? Bernard James Sullivan
What is your present address? 77 Kingsway Pettswood, Kent
Telephone number: Orpington 30065
What was your unit, division, corps? 553 Assault Flotilla (15 LCAs carried on S.S. Empire Crossbow.)
Where did you land and at what time? Approx. 6.25 am 6.6.44 Le Hammel
What was your rank and age on June 6, 1944? Lieut. R.N.V.R. Age 24
Were you married at that time? No
What is your wife’s name? Rosabel Jennie (was a "Wren")
Did you have any children at that time? No
When did you know that you were going to be part of the invasion? I had trained for "D" Days for some 18 months. Know for certain would be in initial assault some six weeks before.
What was the trip like during the crossing of the Channel? Do you remember, for example, any conversations you had or how you passed the time? Dark - roughish. Impressed by the twilight on 5th June when we were leaving English coast. Remember that we were confident nothing could stop up.
Were there any rumours aboard ship? (Some people remember hearing that the Germans had poured gasoline on the water and planned to set it afire when the troops came in.) No.
Did you by any chance keep a diary of what happened to you that day? No.
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2.
Were any of your friends killed or wounded either during the landing or during the day? None of my crew(s) [inserted] I was in charge of 5 L.C.A.'s each carrying crews of 3 and I think 35 soldiers.[end inserted] but several very fine men from the Hampshire's and Sherwood Forests were killed soon after we put them ashore.
Do you remember any conversations you had with them before they became casualties?
Were you wounded?
No
How were you wounded?
Do you remember what it was like -- that is, do you remember whether you felt any pain or were you so surprised that you felt nothing? No
Do you remember seeing or hearing anything that seems funny now, even though it may not have seemed amusing at the time? Or anything unexpected or out- of-place? One of the sailors (but not a single soldier!) vomited during the rather rough last few miles.
Do you recall any incident, sad or heroic, or simply memorable, that struck you more than anything else? The great discipline of the soldiers, they had a terrible job landing on a beach and fighting a battle after such a rotten crossing and lesser men would, have in the face of death, have let courtesies go a bit. These boys asked me for permission to smoke [inserted]a few minutes before landing[end inserted]. It made me feel choked up.
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3. In times cf great crisis, people generally show either great ingenuity or self-reliance; others do incredibly strange or stupid things. Do you remember any examples of either? The marine who steered his damaged L.C.A. with his foot - on the rudder. (Well known fact).
Do you know of anybody else who landed within the 24 hours ( midnight 5 June to midnight 6 June) either as infantry, glider or airborne troops, whom we should write to? Robert Bradolans Esq. 76 Hilleross Avenue Morden. Surrey.
What do you do now? Senior Clerk. Bank of England.
Please let us have this questionnaire as soon as possible, so that we can include your experiences in the book. We hope that you will continue your story on separate sheets if we have not left sufficient room. Full acknowledgement will be given in a chapter called "Where They Are Now."
Cornelius Ryan Joan 0. Isaacs The Reader's Digest
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Our L.C.A.s after initial assault, ferried betwen the shore and the transports / L.C. Ts. Some of the soldiers came from the great nothing 7000 ton ships on to the violently rocking 200 ton L.C.Ts and then later on to our bouncing L.C.A's enroute, so that by the time they reached the shore they were so sick they had to be carried off - to fight! I'm glad I was a sailor.
On one of these trips we took so long carrying the poor devils off {this was at about 11 a.m (?)} that the L.C.A. "broached to". We were stranded temporarily so I took a quick look round for survivors I dashed into a concrete full box and grabbed some papers from the table. They turned out to be the outside coverings of a German toilet roll!!! One of my ratings picked up a picture from the same table; it showed all the Germans manning the post, with their great Alsatian dog. As he looked around he could pick them out from the picture - all dead. The dog too - nearly cut in half by a piece of shrapnel on the tiki On the way in I was to take a line from the skeleton of an odd ship wrecked on the beach and was to land my assault troops a couple of hundred yards to the West of it. As we neared the beach I saw through the smoke etc. that we were coming in (PTO)