On 6th June 1944, 156,000 Allied soldiers took part in the biggest amphibious invasion in history, to reclaim mainland Europe from the Germans. However, very little is known about the secret D-day rehearsals that took place in Devon in the months leading up to this invasion. The exercises were designed to simulate the conditions that the troops would face on Utah beach, in Normandy, and were so realistic that live ammunition was used. However, the success of these exercises was plagued by the events of Exercise Tiger. On 28th April, a German patrol found these secret rehearsals, and in the ensuing attack, 639 men lost their lives.
In November 1943, the British government issued a compulsory evacuation order for an area of 30,000 acres in the South Hams, an area in South Devon, which was going to be used for the ensuring rehearsals. 3000 villagers, along with 6,000 cattle, 12,000 sheep and 10,000 tons of crops were moved over a period of 6 weeks, and replaced with a team of engineers, who converted the area around Slapton Sands into a replica of German defences on Utah beach, in Normandy.
On 19th April 1944, Allied Supreme Headquarters finalised the plans for two full scale D-day rehearsal: Exercise Smash in Studland Bay (for British troops) and Exercise Tiger on Slapton Sands. The latter was handed over to the US navy to coordinate, and Rear Admiral John E Wilkes was placed in charge.
In this article, I will primarily refer to the events of 28th April. This was actually the convoy for the second phase of Operation Tiger, landing reinforcements. However, I will briefly discuss the first day. On 27th April, 30,000 assembled of the coast of Slapton Sands, in the full D-day rehearsal. After 4 hours of live artillery bombardment, the plan was to begin the landings at 07:30. However, this time was delayed because some of the assault convoy was running behind schedule. However, communication errors resulted in some teams landing whilst the bombardment was still happening, and 110 troops lost their life. Despite this, the rehearsal was a considered a success.
Whilst all this was going on 8 ships set sail from Plymouth and Brixham. They would make their way over the course of the day a point in Lyme Bay, where they would form a convoy and head back to Slapton Sands. This return journey was the same distance as the journey to the beaches in Normandy. However, this journey was destined to go wrong.
In November 1943, Adolf Hitler issued Directive no.51, in which the German military shifted its focus from the USSR to the UK. This resulted in a series of suicide missions being implemented by the Germans to prevent an allied invasion. The admiral of the German navy, Karl Dönitz said, on 10th April, that the ‘every serviceman of the navy to [should] take risks without consideration for the survival of the ship itself’. As a result, S boats attacks on Allied ships became a significant factor. The convoy itself was supposed to have an escort of a corvette, HMS Azalea, and a destroyer, HMS Scimitar. The first problem occurred when HMS Scimitar was rammed by an American LCT (Landing Craft for Tanks), putting it out of action. This meant that the convoy would only have a single escort boat.
As a result of directive no.51, all convoys for D-Day exercises had to observe radio silence, to keep the operations secret. Despite their best efforts though, the convoy was found. Although there is no way of truly knowing how the convoy was found, the most convincing theory is that a Luftwaffe reconnaissance plane, which flew a mission on 25th April, may have recorded a built up in troop activity in the staging area (around Portsmouth). Radio silence would prove to be problematic because incorrect instructions had been given to the American crews, including the wrong channel to use in the event of an attack. This meant that the crews would have no warning of the ensuing attack.
Sources conflict between two different sets of timings. For the sake of this, I shall assume the timings generally accepted by the US Navy.
In the middle of the night, around 1:00 on 28th April, the 8 LSTs form up into a convoy in Lyme Bay and begin their return leg to Slapton Sands
At around the same time, British radar picks up S-boats in the vicinity of the convoy. One of the LSTs also picked these up on radar, but they did not report it. The accepted reason for this was that they assumed it was a British convoy.
Shortly after this, British coastal gunner stations saw the same fleet of S-boats approaching the convoy. They alerted the crew of HMS Azalea, but nothing came of this report. The costal gunners themselves were banned from firing on the boats for fear of alerting the Germans of the rehearsals.
At 1:30, the night-watch aboard the LST’s first caught sight of the S-boat. Alerted by green tracers, the general quarters alert was sounded, calling all the sleeping men to their positions. Despite this call, it would already be too late. At that moment, the bow gunner of LST-515 saw a torpedo skim the bottom of the ship’s hull. The LSTs had very shallow draughts, so that they could get into the shallow waters of a beach. LST-507 would not be so lucky. Within minutes a direct hit found the engine room of this doomed ship, killing the lights. In the dark, soldiers panicked, only lit up by the constant explosions of the tanks as the fire spread down the parking deck. The ship sank at around 2:00. Inexplicably, the convoy carried on, as though nothing had occurred, leaving some 500 men drowning in an oil-slicked ocean.
At 2:17, the second ship suffered the same fate. LST-531 scored two hits simultaneously. It took the boat less than 10 minutes to sink. 467 of the 496 men aboard died.
Finally, fully aware of the situation, the remaining six ships began to zigzag towards the shallow waters nearer the coast, in a vague attempt to save themselves from the fate of their colleagues, leaving behind some 1000 men in the water (although it is not known of them how many would have already been dead from the blasts). There would be one more casualty from the night, as a torpedo found the rudder of LST-289, rendering it paralysed. However, the boat survived, and was towed into Dartmouth harbour by a tug, leaving behind the remnants of this ill-fated attack.
Some two hours later, as the dawn began to break, one of the ships returned to the scene of the wreckage, against their orders. Remarkably, they rescued 134 men from among the debris and dead alike. There was no certain death total, but the number is likely either 639 or 749 men. This latter number is likely the death toll with the 110 men who died the previous day.
This event, however terrible, is one of the biggest reasons why D-day was so successful. D-day has a less than 3% fatality rate. Most notably, Utah beach, where the men training on Slapton Sands were due, only had 60 fatalities from the 23,250 men landed (0.26%).
Yet, remarkably, you have probably never heard of this terrible story. With D-day still approaching, the story was withheld under the official secrets act. All soldiers were threatened with court martial if they so much as spoke of it. And the story of Exercise Tiger was lost to history for 30 years.
The below is the story of Ken Small, a fisherman living in Torcross – the village at the end of Slapton Sands – as told by his family:
In 1969, during a severe storm, he began to find antique coins and broken pieces of jewellery, along with large amounts of shrapnel, bullet cases, and tunic buttons, etc. He wondered why these items were on the beach and began to ask the local residents about it. They told him of the live fire exercises that had taken place in 1944 during WWII.
A close friend and local fisherman told Ken of an object sitting on the seabed about three-quarters of a mile offshore 60 feet below the surface. Ken persuaded his friend to dive down and investigate. When he and the other divers came up, they told him there was an American Sherman Tank on the seabed almost completely covered in fishing nets. This discovery eventually led to him finding out about the tragedy of Exercise Tiger. He became determined to recover the tank and create a lasting memorial to honour those who perished.
After years of unending bureaucracy, he finally purchased the tank from the American government for $50 USD. It would be another 10 years (1984) of determination and personal sacrifice before Ken achieved his dream to raise the tank and place where it stands today in Torcross near the sea.
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https://exercisetigermemorial.co.uk/story-exercise-tiger
https://www.historic-uk.com/HistoryUK/HistoryofBritain/Exercise-Tiger