6th Airborne Division (United Kingdom)

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6th Airborne Division
ActiveWorld War II
3rd May 1943 - 1st April 1948
CountryGreat Britain
BranchBritish Army
TypeAirborne
EngagementsOperation Overlord
Operation Varsity
Battle honoursD-Day
Normandy
Commanders
Notable
commanders		Maj.Gen. Richard Nelson Gale


The 6th Airborne Division was an airborne unit of the British Army during World War II.

Formation

On 23 April 1943 the British War Office ordered that a second airborne division be raised to supplement the original British 1st Airborne Division. The new division consisted initially of key personnel reassigned from 1st Airborne. This included several officers who had fought in North Africa with the 1st Parachute Brigade. For example, Richard Gale had raised and commanded the 1st Parachute Brigade. James Hill had commanded 1st Parachute Battalion. Alastair Pearson had been his second-in-command. Geoffrey Pine-Coffin had been second-in-command of 2nd Battalion.

The core of the new 6th Airborne Division was formed from the 3rd Parachute Brigade and 1st Airlanding Brigade. Both were reassigned from 1st Airborne. Lieutenant Colonel James Hill assumed command of 3rd Paracute Brigade while he was recovering from wounds received in North Africa. At 31, Hill was one of the youngest Brigadiers in the British army. The 3rd Parachute Brigade included the 7th, 8th and 9th Parachute Battalions. Each battalion had been recruited regionally. The 7th had been formed from the Somerset Light Infantry. Many paratroopers of the 8th were from the Midlands. The 9th was formed from the 10th Holding Battalion, The Essex Regiment. Lieutenant Colonels Pine-Coffin, Pearson, and Otway were the commanders the 7th, 8th, and 9th Battalions, respectively.

The 1st Airlanding Brigade was renamed the 6th Airlanding Brigade. It included two glider-borne, light infantry battalions: 1st Battalion the Royal Ulster Rifles (Lieutenant Colonel Jack Carson) and 2nd Battalion the Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry (Lieutenant Colonel Michael Roberts). Later, the 12th Battalion The Devonshire Regiment (Lieutenant Colonel Dick Stephens), which had been formed recently from coastal defence units, was attached to the 6th Airlanding Brigade.

In June 1943, the 5th Parachute Brigade, commanded by Brigadier Nigel Poett, was added. It included the 12th and 13th Parachute Battalions. The 12th Battalion (Lieutenant Colonel Reginald Parker) was formed from a Yorkshire battalion, the 10th Battalion, the Green Howards. The 13th was formed from the 2nd and 4th Battalions of the South Lancashire Regiment. It was led by Lieutenant Colonel Peter Luard. Lieutenant-Colonel George Bradbrooke's 1st Canadian Parachute Battalion arrived in July 1943. Other units attached to the division included pathfinders, engineers, anti-tank, reconnaissance, medical, and signals untis.

In August 1943, the division was reorganized. The Canadians were attached to 3rd Parachute Brigade and the 7th Battalion was assigned to 5th Parachute Brigade. In September 1943, the 6th Airborne Division was almost at its full complement of about 8,500 men. Each parachute battalion consisted of about 650 men. The airlanding battalions were slightly larger with about 750 men each. In February 1944, Parker was made second-in-command of the 6th Airlanding Brigade and Lieutenant Colonel A.P. "Johnny" Johnson assumed command of the 12th Parachute Battalion.

D-Day

British Pathfinders synchronising their watches in front of an Armstrong Whitworth Albemarle.

During the last hours of 5 June 1944 as part of Operation Tonga, transport aircraft and towed gliders carried units of the 6th Airborne to Normandy where they would land just prior to the D-Day landings that took place on the morning of 6 June. They were to land behind Sword Beach and secure the eastern flank. Some of the objectives included the seizure of the Caen Canal Bridge (later renamed as Pegasus Bridge and the Orne Bridge (renamed later as Horsa Bridge)by D Company, 2nd Ox & Bucks (commanded by Major John Howard) and the destruction of the Merville Battery by Lieutenant-Colonel Terence Otway's 9 PARA, both of whom were some of the first units to land and achieve their objectives. The landings proved successful, though many units were scattered across much of Normandy. The area around Pegasus and Horsa were successfully defended until they were eventually relieved, having repulsed numerous counter-attacks by the Germans, later on 6 June by Lord Lovat's 1 Special Service Brigade, followed later by elements of the British 3rd Infantry Division.

On 12 June, during the attack on Bréville, British artillery was bombarding it when a stray shell fell short and hit a group of British officers, killing Lieutenant-Colonel A.P. "Johnny" Johnson (CO 12 PARA) and badly wounding Brigadiers Kindersley (CO 6 Airlanding Brigade) and Lord Lovat (CO 1 Special Service Brigade).

From June to August the Division successfully defended the area to the east of the Orne river. On 2 August 1944 the division became part of the First Allied Airborne Army. In mid-August the division took part in the advance towards the Seine and early in September it returned to Britain to recuperate and reorganise, having suffered over 4,000 casualties (killed, wounded, and missing).

The Battle of the Bulge

On 16 December the Germans launched the Battle of the Bulge a last-gasp offensive against the Allies in the Ardennes forest. The 6th Airborne was rushed to Belgium shortly afterward to assist in repulsing the attack. The fighting took place in awful weather conditions, ending in mid-January 1945.

The Rhine Crossings

On 24 March the 6th Airborne took part in the airborne crossing of the Rhine (known as Operation Varsity), taking place a day after the crossing of the Rhine by ground forces. The Germans had expected them and the division suffered significant casualties in the air and on the ground. The operation was a success, if a costly one, and the 6th Airborne subsequently advanced east, eventually linking up with the Soviets near the Baltic port of Wismar in late April. The Second World War ended in Europe on 8 May 1945.

Later Operations

The war, however, continued elsewhere and the 5th Parachute Brigade was deployed to the Far East in July to take part in the campaign against the Japanese, with the intention of the rest of the division following it. The war ended suddenly in August with the atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki and the Japanese formally surrendered on 2 September. Thus, the Division's move was halted and the 5th Brigade was employed in operations in Malaya and Singapore to assist in the disarmament of the Japanese occupation forces there. The Brigade subsequently moved to Java, Dutch East Indies, where it attempted to assist in maintaining order against hostile nationalist forces intent on preventing the Dutch from returning to the colony. The division left with the arrival of substantial forces from the Royal Netherlands Army in April 1946.

Elsewhere, the rest of the division had moved to Palestine in September 1945, taking part in internal security duties against Zionist organisations known as Irgun, Haganah and the Lehi (group) who were trying to expel the British. The 6th Airborne continued to carry out operations against the groups in difficult circumstances until they were disbanded on 1 April 1948 just before the British left Palestine.

In the present-day British Army the 16 Air Assault Brigade (named to perpuate the 16 Parachute Brigade) is numbered in honour of the 1st Airborne and 6th Airborne divisions.

Commanders

Constituent Units

This is the composition of the division at the time of the Normandy invasion.

3rd Parachute Brigade (Brigadier James Hill)

5th Parachute Brigade (Brigadier Nigel Poett)

6th Airlanding Brigade (Brigadier The Honourable Hugh Kindersley)

Divisional Units

Attached Units

In the Media

  • Call of Duty - a first-person shooter game for PC. Gamers play as Sgt. Evans; a member of the British 6th Airborne Division. Your task is to assault the Bénouville Bridge and hold it until relieved. Some characters from the actual event are portrayed, however with different names. The order of events is dramatised somewhat and is not historically accurate.

See also

External links

Sources

Bernage, Georges (2002). Red Devils In Normandy. Heimdal. p. 9. ISBN 2840481596.

Hickman, Mark. "Pegasus Archive". Retrieved 2006-12-07.

Mills, T.F. "Land Forces of Britain, the Empire, and Commonwealth". Retrieved 2006-12-09.

Saunders, Hilary (1985). The red beret: The story of the parachute regiment at war 1940-1945. Battery Press. ISBN 0898390877.

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