Loustalot from Franklin, Louisiana. The Americans found themselves fighting to exit the beach with their commando brethren. Once atop the cliffs, they were quickly overwhelmed by sheer numbers of German troops and had to withdraw. Raising up to cover men attempting to return to the beach, Lt. Loustalot was cut down by German machine gun fire, becoming the first American killed in action by German forces on the ground in Europe.
In the confusion of the landings, two other Americans were killed during the raid. Not much is known about the specifics of their death. They were strangers in units they had been attached to just days prior. In addition, most of the men they would have interacted with were killed, wounded, or captured during the bloodbath created by German defenses on the main landing beaches.
The four rangers assigned to Number 4 Commando were more fortunate. Tasked with attacking batteries to the east of Dieppe near a town called Varengeville, they were able to neutralize the gun batteries and pull most of the force off the beaches. Exit from yellow beach at Berneval. Roughly commandos and rangers moved up this exit in an attempt to take the batteries at Berneval.
Loustalot was killed not far from this marker as he attempted to cover fellow commandos and rangers as they withdrew to the beach. Loustalot was the first American killed in ground combat by German forces in Europe. Image by Kali Martin. Wreckage of the landing beaches of Dieppe.
Taken by a German photographer, this image captures the beach after the end of the battle. The soldier closest to the tank in the background is believed to be either Lt. Captured Canadian troops are marched through Dieppe after the raid. The losses during the raid were staggering.
Canada at D-Day. The Normandy Campaign. Liberating Northwest Europe. The War against Japan. Forced Relocation: the Japanese-Canadian Story. Going Home. The Camerons intended to go almost eight kilometres inland to attack an airfield, a German headquarters, and destroy a coastal battery. The floating reserve was the Fusiliers Mont-Royal. The intention of the raid was to take the town of Dieppe, establish a defensive perimeter, and hold it just long enough to permit the destruction of harbour facilities.
The raiders were then to depart by sea. There were no heavy bombers to soften up the defences, and the Royal Navy declined to assign battleships to support the assault — the English Channel was too risky for that with the Luftwaffe nearby.
The German defences at Dieppe were in the hands of the nd Infantry Division, and ample reserves were close by. The raiders boarded their landing craft on August 18 and set sail that night. Very quickly, everything unravelled, starting with the flotilla running into a German coastal convoy.
The firing alerted the coastal defences, removing the element of surprise on which the entire plan depended. Attackers from the Royal Regiment of Canada were cut to pieces by German machine guns and mortars, and only a few made it to the top of the cliff.
Those still alive on the beach surrendered at about a. Only sixty-five Royals out of almost six hundred made it back to England. The South Saskatchewan Regiment landed on time in darkness and achieved an element of surprise, but the Royal Navy landed part of the unit in the wrong place.
One company, properly landed, took its objective. The rest, trying to cross the River Scie on a bridge, faced withering fire from the Germans perched on the cliffs on both sides of the landing beach. Merritt then led attacks up the hill with his troops, joined by part of the Cameron Highlanders who had landed with their pipers playing.
The remainder of the Camerons moved inland some two thousand metres until they encountered very heavy opposition and withdrew to the beach. The landing craft to pick them up were there, as planned, but very few of the survivors could reach them through the hail of machine-gun fire the Germans laid down. Merritt stayed to organize the defences that let those who made it get away.
He was taken prisoner and soon received the Victoria Cross. The real disaster was in front of Dieppe on the Red and White Beaches.
The enemy heard the firing from Puys and Pourville and was at the alert, so there was no surprise, and without surprise there was no chance of good luck. The only advantage had by the attackers was the air attack on the cliffs to the east of the beaches and the strafing of the beach defences by British Hurricane fighter planes.
Without immediate fire support, the infantry took heavy casualties from the defenders perched on the cliffs that overlooked the beach and from the fortified casino at the west end of the beach.
Like most of the RHLI, the Essex Scottish, raked by fire from the east and west headlands, died or fell wounded where they had landed. The carnage was compounded when garbled messages that suggested success led General Roberts to send in his reserve battalion.
I managed to get up when I was hit for the third time, this time in my right wrist. I began to pray. Captain Whitaker was trying to lead his surviving men back from the casino, toward the beach, to pull out. Apart from trying to help the wounded, it was every man for himself. I expected every step to be my last. Whitaker made it back to the boats, the only Canadian officer to survive unscathed. Menard was pulled to safety by his men to boat and survived his five bullet wounds.
The Royal Navy managed to rescue several hundred men. Another 2,, almost all of them Canadian, watch helplessly as the last British naval vessel disappeared over the horizon. They became prisoners of war. At home, headlines proclaimed the success of Dieppe. But casualty lists provided a telling rebuke. Of the 5, Canadians who landed at Dieppe, were dead, wounded. Canadians had been victims of bad military planning as much as German bullets in the disaster at Dieppe.
Historians debate the value of Dieppe. Some say it provided an invaluable lesson for subsequent coastal assaults on North Africa, Sicily and Italy in the years to come. Others say it was a military debacle undertaken for political reasons and yielded little that was new in terms of military strategy. In England, Albert Kirby and other Canadian survivors were left to deal with the aftermath of Dieppe.
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