WW2 Exercise Tiger

Date: 22 Apr 1944 to 30 Apr 1944
Location: Slapton, Devon, England, United Kingdom
Surnames/tags: 1st_Engineer_Special_Brigade Miltary_and_War World_War_II

The details below have been gleaned, assessed, and analyzed from multiple varied sources (listed below). These sources present a variety of timelines for Exercise Tiger's events, as well as conflicting facts and casualty numbers. I assert these inconsistencies are in part due to the secrecy surrounding Operation Overlord plans and preparations, but I've done my best to present a logical scenario and chain of events. I welcome any correction of events or their facts, because I am in no way a WW2 or military expert. - CWright

Summary

Exercise Tiger, also known as Operation Tiger, was one in a series of Allied training events and dress rehearsals executed in England; around South Devon, across its beaches, and on the waters of nearby Lyme Bay in preparation for the Operation Overlord D-Day invasion of Normandy, France. It was the final major training event for the VII Corp's 4th Infantry Division and its attached units, as they prepared for the assault on Utah Beach.

The first echelon of the exercise assault, landing at Slapton Sands on the morning of 27 Apr 1944, saw training forces came under friendly fire. Then, in the dark hours after midnight on 28 Apr 1944, a second echelon convoy of eight LSTs (Landing Ship, Tank) loaded with troops and equipment assigned or attached to the 1st Engineer Special Brigade were attacked by nine German S-Boat torpedo boats.

The loss of well over 700 servicemen during Exercise Tiger's tragic events was immediately classified and went relatively unacknowledged until long after the D-Day invasions, in part to maintain secrecy about the impending Allied operations, but also to allow the U.S. Department of Defense to assess and spin the disastrous outcome.

Planning and Build-up

In late 1943, Allied senior leaders chose 30,000 acres in and around South Devon, England to stand in for the rocky beach of the objective - codenamed Utah Beach - and the inland regions of Northern France during training and rehearsal exercises for an Allied offensive. Once the village of Slapton was selected as the exercise epicenter, government officials gave residents of the South Ham District in South Devon six weeks to evacuate their homes, farms, pubs and shops. The displacement of over 3000 locals (750 families) was necessary to ensure secrecy, to allow the bivouac of several thousand troops, and to establish an extensive training area to be used by the American forces, dubbed "Force U”, tasked with landing at Utah Beach. Slapton and its surrounding area became the focus for intensive military activity; all local people apart from civil defense officials were barred, US troops were banned from talking to outsiders and all outgoing mail was heavily censored.

Training Operations Area

The 4th Infantry Division of the VII Corps, chosen to spearhead the amphibious assault on Utah Beach, arrived in South Devon in late January 1944 to train and prepare. While about 10% of the forces attached to the newly reorganized 4th Infantry Division had combat experience, many of the American troops staged at Slapton were young, green GIs in need of extensive training. The area hosted a full range of combat and combat support units, each assigned to assault, secure, resupply, or sustain operations. The sheer scope of functions amid the scale of the operation required an extensive wargame plan and training schedule, enhanced to improve the coordination, readiness, cohesion, and fortitude of the Army and Navy elements which comprised "Force U".

English Channel Ops Area

LSTs and shallow water operations were new concepts employed during WW2. Originally conceived in the U.K., the LST design was brought to the U.S., and aided by the Lend-Lease Act, submitted to the U.S. Navy’s Bureau of Ships in Nov. 1941. By late 1943, LSTs had proved invaluable to Pacific and Mediterranean operations; 90 LSTs alone were employed during the invasion of Italy, and Gen. Eisenhower had calculated a requirement of 277 LSTs in the planning for Operation Overlord. Unfortunately, there weren’t that many available. U.S. shipyards were producing about 24 new LSTs every month. Through compromise and creativity, senior leaders agreed to get the LSTs to England, but like the vessels, many of the crewmembers were “new” and in need of training.

Three large-scale wargames featuring exercise beach assults, plus an untold number of smaller 'dry-runs', were conducted covertly along the English coast.

After two early landing exercises (Exercises Duck and Beaver) revealed readiness shortfalls, and in the face of the approaching invasion offensive, a frustrated Supreme Allied Commander, General Dwight D. Eisenhower, amended the EXOrd (exercise order). On 19 Apr, he ordered that the final phase of training (Exercise Tiger) include live-fire, with Air Corps bombs, Navy artillery, and small-arms fired over the heads and in front of the troops to acclimate them to the sights, sounds, and smells of battle conditions.

Per the ExOrd, Rear Admiral Don P. Moon, commander of the task group of naval forces assigned to support Utah Beach, and Major General J. Lawton “Lightning Joe” Collins, commander of VII Corps ground forces, finalized plans for Exercise Tiger incorporating live-fire. The exercise plans called for Moon’s amphibians to put the bulk of Collins’ VII Corps ashore at Slapton Sands, from there VII Corps/4th ID would advance to “capture” the town of Okehampton, 25 miles inland. In order to simulate as closely as possible the actual Utah Beach landings, now only five weeks away, the beach at Slapton Sands was prepared with two lines of steel tetrahedra and barbed wire. Even live mines were put in place outside the assigned ops area.

Exercise Tiger was to be the last and the most comprehensive of the "Force U" exercises. Scheduled to span 22-30 Apr 1944, it was designed to hammer out every possible detail related to the vast undertaking that lay ahead.

'Exercise Tiger Begins

The first five days of the Exercise Tiger full-dress rehearsal were focused on marshaling and embarkation drills, the loading of large numbers of soldiers and equipment on LSTs at various embarkation points along the English Channel (simulated by Lyme Bay) then ferrying them to their assigned landing zones in a timely manner. Mastering this challenge was vital to the success of Operation Overlord, so it needed to be accomplished without being detected by the enemy.

3 LSTs,incl LST-515, offload, invasion rehearsal

Two British Royal Navy destroyers, three torpedo boats, and two motor gunboats armed with machine guns, depth charges, and quick-firing 57mm cannons put to sea to keep the waterways leading in and out of Lyme Bay out of the prying eyes of the Germans. The focus of their mission was to keep a sharp lookout for any sign of the dreaded Nazi S-boats (short for the German word schnellboote, meaning “fast boats), also known to the Allies as E-boats (enemy boats), that regularly operated from their base near the French port of Cherbourg on the other side of the English Channel, a distance of barely 21 miles at its narrowest point.

Meanwhile at Cherbourg, the Kriegsmarine 5. Schnellbootsflottille (5th S-Boat Flotilla), commanded by Korvettenkapitan Bernd Klug, was alerted by heavy Allied radio traffic. Klug ordered stepped up patrol operations. The S-Boats were very fast, highly agile small ships that carried torpedoes and two 20mm guns. Many were equipped with supercharged engines that gave them a top speed of 40 knots if the conditions were good. They routinely patrolled the English Channel and attacked any ship they came across, military and commercial, working on the theory that the speed and maneuverability of the S-boats would get them out of trouble.

Lürssen S 100 Group Schnellboote (like those that attacked Convoy T4)

First Assault Echelon

On the night of 26 April, the first contingent of VII Corps/4th ID assault troops formed up in its assigned embarkation depots and marched up the gangplanks to load aboard the LSTs that would ferry them to Lyme Bay. To get the GIs used to the rigors of a genuine Channel crossing, the LSTs proceeded to chug their way around the bay in a wide arc simulating the journey to the Normandy coast. Then the vessels made for the objective, the waters just off Slapton Sands. They planned to arrive there near dawn on the morning of 27 April.

That morning, H-hour, or the commencement of landings, was scheduled for 0730. To meet Eisenhower's live-fire directive, fighter-bombers were tasked to attack beach targets from H(minus)-60, or 0630 to H-45 (0645), and naval vessels, lead by the HMS Hawkins, were to fire artillery at the beach from H-50 (0640) until just prior to H-hour, but with ample time for beach wardens on Slapton Sands to inspect the beach (U-Beach) for unexploded ordnance. All heavy fire was to conclude before troops went ashore, although small arms fire would continue in bursts over their heads.

A network of exercise radio frequencies to be used by commanders on-shore, inland, and on-ship had been carefully planned. Unfortunately, the tactical orders were issued with significant typing errors in frequency numbers; errors that weren't discovered until the exercise commenced. This crucial communication failure snarled already tense coordination between certain command and control elements, the exercise landing forces, and the ships laying down artillery fire. Also, not all troops were even aware they were to be exposed to the live-fire simulation. This combination of miscues proved fatal.

Delay Leads to Disaster

When several of the first echelon LSTs participating in the exercise were delayed, Rear Admiral Moon, in command of the 221 exercise vessels - a mix of American landing craft and Royal Navy warships, decided to delay H-hour for 60 minutes to 0830. Subsequently pushing back all land, sea, and air exercise operations, and allowing the latecomers to catch up. But the command coordination issues and radio frequencies errors unfortunately meant several LSTs didn't receive the vital H-hour update. Unaware, they kept to their schedule, made landfall, and disembarked their men at Slapton Sands just as the now rescheduled naval bombardment began raining shells down on the beach.

Soldiers who hadn’t expected to be placed in harm’s way during what was supposed to be a simulation, albeit an ultra-realistic one, suddenly found themselves in danger of being blasted to pieces. Concurrently, according to plan, machine guns began tearing up the gravel a few yards ahead of the landing zone on U-Beach, firing just above the heads of the disembarking troops as they came ashore. The bewildered GIs scattered seeking cover. Worse still, they had been ordered to return fire at their imaginary enemy as they went forward as part of the simulation. Many did so, apparently under the impression that they had all been issued blank cartridges, except the soldiers on the beach that day had inadvertently loaded up their rifles with real ammunition instead of blanks. Meanwhile, the HMS Hawkins continued to bombard U-Beach, pouring ordnance into a designated section of the shore. In the ensuing chaos and confusion, scores of soldiers desperately attempted to get out of the line of gunfire and strayed across into the bombardment 'kill zone' or into the minefield. The officers on the bridge of the HMS Hawkins looked on in stunned horror and disbelief as these unfortunate GIs were practically vaporized, blown to bits by the ship's big guns and the landmines.

As many as 450 men, but more likely about 200, were killed by friendly fire on 27 Apr 1944, information the U.S. Army immediately scrambled to suppress under the guise of operations security to protect D-Day plans. Almost immediately, rumors of rapid mass burials circulated.

The Exercise Must Go On

Despite the 'bombardment', Exercise Tiger continued on Slapton Sands, aka U-Beach. Waves of LSTs in convoy continued unloading throughout the day and into the night.

As part of the second echelon, a convoy (designated Convoy T-4) of nine LSTs (#’s 58, 496, 511, 515 & 531 originating from Devonport Naval Base, Plymouth and 289, 499, 507 & 508 from Brixham Harbour) merged and began its long, circuitous way around Lyme Bay toward its objective landing zone on Slapton Sands. The convoy bristled with young GIs, in full combat gear, from the VII Corps, 4th Infantry, 1st Amphibious Divisions, and 1st Engineers Special Brigade. The vessels were loaded with smaller amphibious vehicles, tanks, trucks, and all manner of vehicles and equipment. Before leaving their ports, the LSTs’ crews and passengers made sure all vehicles were loaded with fuel and ammunition, in a further nod to the exercise’s aspirations to realism.

Remarkably, exercise leadership and exercise participants continued to operate on different radio frequencies. Each believing the other was strictly observing an order for radio silence. As a result, communication between the entities broke down again.

Calamity Unfolds

The night was clear with no moon on 27/28 April as Convoy T-4 proceeded at about five knots per hour. At some point, one of the two Royal Navy escort ships assigned for the convoy’s protection, the World War I-era destroyer HMS Scimitar, collided with LST-508. Both vessels incurred some structural damage and had to break off the rear of the convoy to head back to the naval facility at Plymouth for repairs. It's believed, some personnel and equipment from the damaged LST were transferred to LST-507 before LST-508 returned to port.

T4 Convoy Operations

With only a single corvette, the HMS Azalea under the command of Lieutenant Commander George C. Geddes of the Royal Navy Reserves, to lead and escort Convoy T-4, operations continued. The convoy itself was under the charge of USN Commander Bernard J. Skahill onboard the lead American vessel, LST-515, which was under the command of Lieutenant John H. Doyle. Both CDR Skahill aboard the LST and Lt Cdr Geddes onboard HMS Azalea had been briefed about the danger the convoy faced from German S-boats. Yet despite the intelligence briefings, the Azalea opted to lead the eight LSTs in a 3-mile long straight line rather than in a more defensive zigzag, in part because Lt Cdr Geddes believed the convoy's slow progress would only be complicated by zigzagging. Either way, these slow moving vessels would be easy prey for any S-boat routinely prowling the English Channel.

British radar technicians ashore had noted the S-Boats' departure from Cherbourg around 2200 hrs, but in the flawed communications system, no word of it got to Skahill or Geddes until after midnight. The news did, however, concern the Royal Navy commander at Plymouth Harbor, Rear Admiral Sir Ralph Leatham, who realized belatedly that Convoy T-4 was at sea with only a single escort. At 0137, he dispatched the destroyer HMS Saladin, a sister ship of the damaged Scimitar, as a relief escort.

Allied ships and the coastal shore batteries at nearby Salcombe Harbor had spotted the telltale silhouettes of several S-boats patrolling in the vicinity for some hours, skimming low across the waters. The HMS Azalea was duly informed, but the errors in the radio frequencies meant the LSTs were not.

British radar again spotted vessels in the vicinity of Convoy T-4, 15 miles off the eastern shoreline of Lyme Bay. But onshore, it was assumed and reported that the two unknown vessels were craft belonging to the convoy. British coastal gunners also sighted the S-boats and alerted Azalea but took no further action because they were under orders to hold their fire. Azalea, for its part, took no action. Additionally, the crew of the one radar-equipped LST spotted unverified vessels and didn't react.

The S-boats remained unverified and generally undetected as they circled around to attack the rear of the convoy from behind. Six S-Boats approached Convoy T-4 in pairs. Shortly after 0130, men on several of the LSTs caught sight of green tracers and heard approaching gunfire. Lieutenant James S. Swarts (1916-1944), USNR, skipper of the 507, sounded General Quarters, though most of the sailors who dutifully headed for their combat stations assumed, quite naturally, that this was simply part of the realistic training for the exercise. Shortly after, General Quarters sounded on all the ships, but the LSTs had little fire power and protection against these fast moving boats. Initially, the S-Boat torpedoes missed hitting the LSTs, probably due to the shallow-draft of their flat-bottom hulls.

As three additional S-Boats from the 9. Schnellbootsflottille (9th S-Boat Flotilla) raced to join the attack, the S-Boats corrected their firing solutions.

Attack!

At 0203, S-Boats S-138 and S-136 attacked the tail end of Convoy T-4. LST-507 was struck by a torpedo midship. The hit was devastating. It started a massive fire in the main cargo area as vehicles full of gasoline ignited, creating a blast furnace effect within the ship. The ship crowded with nearly 500 Army troops and over 100 Navy crewmen was pandemonium. Pins holding life rafts were rusted and couldn't be pried off. The smaller LCVP landing craft ("Higgins boats") on the deck couldn't be released because cables and hydraulics were jammed. Many troops on board were trapped in the flames. A second torpedo hit the ship and it began to sink, sending soldiers and sailors weighed down by their gear scrambling over the sides into the frigid waters of the English Channel.

As LST-507 burned, radio operators aboard the other LSTs sent queries but received no reply. (The LSTs were stretched out over several miles at this point.) And so, in radio silence once again, the rest of the convoy continued in line. For now, they were oblivious to the emergency.

Eleven minutes later, two torpedoes in quick succession from S-100 and S-143 hit LST-531. The vessel burst into flames, rolled over and sank in only six minutes. Those on board leaped over the side into the bitter water, trusting their life vests. Unfortunately, the water was so cold it drove the breath from their bodies and the life vests proved worse than useless.

At 0228, the skipper of LST-289, Lieutenant Harry A. Mettler, saw torpedoes inbound from S-Boats S-140 and S-142. He had enough time to react and put the helm hard over to avoid a broadside hit. One torpedo hit the stern, which had crews’ living spaces, setting it ablaze. The burning stern broke off and sank, but the main part of the LST remained afloat and kept hundreds of soldiers out of the water.

One of the S-Boats, S-100, which attacked LST-531 collided with one of the late arriving torpedo boats, S-145, and both had to return to base, but S-143 remained to strafe the area with their 20mm guns.

By this time, however, chaos had gripped the convoy. LSTs were panic firing into the dark. LST-511 was shot up by LST-496 as it returned fire at the enemy boats. Confused soldiers shot at their own boats, believing they were firing at the Germans. GIs aboard other LSTs thought that the explosions and flames around them were part of the exercise, but in the Channel men drowned, while Sherman tanks and trucks sank.

T4 Convoy commander, CDR Skahill, aboard LST-515, gave the order for the convoy to scatter and return to port. The Azalea, which was about 1 mile out front, reversed course when the trailing LSTs started getting hit, but its crew could not tell which direction the attack was coming from. Its skipper, Lt Cdr Geddes, didn’t dare launch illumination rounds for fear of silhouetting the rest of the convoy and aiding the German attack. Of course, the inability to communicate with the LSTs didn’t help. In the end, Azalea never had the chance to fire a shot, not that it had any hope of running down an S-boat.

The S-boats, apparently satisfied, faded away and returned to base around 0330.

Recovery Attempts

As the convoy scattered, there was no attempt to rescue survivors, per standard Navy procedure, in the belief that attempted rescues would only invite more ships to be sunk by torpedoes. Nevertheless, as Skahill’s flagship, LST-515, drew away from the scene there was a borderline mutiny. The skipper of LST-515, Lieutenant John Doyle, argued with Skahill to go back for survivors, knowing that it would not take long for anyone in the water to die from the cold. Skahill initially refused and Doyle put the question to his crew for a “voice vote” about going back, and the crew responded with a rousing affirmative. Skahill gave in and LST-515 returned to the scene along with HMS Saladin which had just arrived, and rescued several hundred soldiers and sailors, many badly burned, and most with advanced hypothermia. Amongst those rescued was LT J.S. Swarts, commander of LST-507. Tragically he succumbed to the effects of hypothermia before they returned to base.

After rescuing survivors, LST-515 and the Saladin began retrieving the lifeless from the water with the intent, no doubt, of giving them a proper burial. Then orders arrived from shore to leave them where they were. There were complaints about that, too, but this time the orders held, and the ships left the scene.

LSTs 507 and 531 were lost. The surviving, damaged LSTs managed to limp back to port; LST-289 missing its stern and still smoldering.

USS LST-289 docking after being torpedoed by German S-Boat

When dawn broke, hundreds of soldiers were found floating upside down in the cold Channel waters. Improperly instructed, they had incorrectly placed their life belts around their waists instead of under their arms. The weight of their packs and equipment had forced their heads down into the water, and they drowned. Burns, shock, and hypothermia also took a toll. Unfortunately, bodies washed ashore in the days following the disaster, though a large number were never recovered. For these untried young American soldiers and seamen, their baptism of fire had come unexpectedly and six weeks early.

Leadership's Response

Word of the attack reached General Eisenhower and his senior staff at their exercise command and observation post. Eisenhower was enraged, not only about the tragedy, but also that the convoy had been sailing in a straight line and now there were reduced reserves of LSTs – not to mention the events now indicated to the Germans that the Allies were nearly ready to invade. Also, ten American officers who'd been read-in and helped craft the classified D-Day plans were missing. He worried they could compromise the invasion if they’d been captured alive. The invasion was nearly called off, until an extensive search ensured the bodies of all ten officers were found, and their identities verified.

Observing the Slapton Sands landings from an LCI (Landing Craft, Infantry) offshore and unaware of the attack in Lyme Bay, Gen. Omar Bradley was disturbed by the poor showing of the remaining elements (4 LSTs) of the 1st Engineer Special Brigade. For some "unexplained reason" a full report on the loss of the LSTs, which he came later to consider "one of the major tragedies of the European war," did not reach him, and from the sketchy report he received he concluded that the damage had been slight. Thus, attributing the poor performance of the brigade to a breakdown in command, he strongly suggested to Maj. Gen. Collins, in command of VII Corps, that a new brigade commander be assigned. Collins gave the job to Brig. Gen. James E. Wharton, and by a combination of misfortune and misunderstanding, Col. Eugene M. Caffey who had led the 1st Engineer Special Brigade in the Sicily landings, was not to lead it on D-day in Normandy.

It can never be known if the absence of any of the exercise’s chaotic factors would have had any effect on the tragic events, as leadership still believed the tragedy off Slapton Sands was simply one of those cruel happenstances of war.

After Action

--Security:

It was quickly decided that the disastrous events should remain a secret in order to not undermine morale for military or civilian personnel. Leadership concluded this news would be a crushing blow to the Allies’ confidence, and would cast a pall over the other major, and final, rehearsal – Exercise Fabius - scheduled to take place in a matter of days. Indeed, if news of the disaster became public, it might even undermine support for the D-Day landings themselves. And operations security meant there was no point in letting the Germans know what they had accomplished, least of all affording any clue that might link Slapton Sands to Utah Beach, or allowing the Germans the increased confidence from knowing how badly the Allies had been hurt.

Therefore, orders were issued imposing the strictest secrecy on all who knew or might learn of the tragedy. Survivors were driven to sealed camps and warned not to breathe a word about what had happened. Doctors and nurses were told not to ask questions when burned and wounded men reached military hospitals. In the United States, telegrams were issued informing families their loved ones were missing-in-action.

The order of secrecy was never officially lifted. By the time D-Day had passed, the units involved had scattered, and the order no longer had legitimacy after officials issued a press release telling of the tragedy, although the news went largely unnoticed in light of the larger events of the time. In August 1944, another round of telegrams was sent, without explaining the circumstance, alerting families that their loved ones previously designated as missing had indeed been killed.

--Losses:

The losses incurred during Exercise Tiger involved more than manpower and equipment, they were also significant to operational plans, readiness, and morale.

Exercise Tiger was the costliest training exercise in all of World War II. The complete loss of 2 LSTs (507 & 531) was a critical shock for Eisenhower’s order of battle and load plans. Plus, the three damaged LSTs (289, 511, & 508) required varied degrees of repairs, with the associated training deficit.

The manpower loss was a significant blow. The US Navy lost 198 sailors. And the US Army lost well over 550 soldiers from at least 13 units, most were support troops vital to logistics operations who never expected to be in front-line combat. Aboard LST-531 alone, the 3206th Quartermaster Service Company was virtually destroyed; of its 251 personnel, 201 enlisted men and 3 officers were killed, missing, or wounded. And the 557th Quartermaster Railhead Company, aboard LST-507, lost 74 men.

As for equipment lost, each LST was designed to carry 60 vehicles with associated equipment and supplies, and for the exercise, the vessels were packed tight with trucks and landing craft (LCVPs) on the decks, and amphibious DUKWs and Sherman tanks in the holds.

Of note, this was a time before post-traumatic stress was an acknowledged consequence of tragedies like Exercise Tiger, and losses linked to the event could occur weeks afterward. This could be what happened to Rear Admiral Don P. Moon, commander of the amphibious forces (U-Force) who made the decision to delay H-hour on 27 April. It is quite possible that, perfectionist that he was, Moon didn’t deal well with the numerous foul-ups during the rehearsal, although he acted quickly to correct what he could. It is also likely that the loss of so many men under his command troubled him greatly. On 5 August 1944, he took his own life with a .45 caliber pistol in his stateroom aboard his command ship USS Bayfield off Naples on the eve of the invasion of southern France.

--Lessons Learned

1) The mixed-command and control structure during the rehearsals proved dangerous. It lead to the breakdown in escort vessel support, the undiscovered or uncorrected errors in radio frequencies, and the lack of threat validation. After the tragedy, radio frequencies and communication procedures were standardized.

2) The quality of lifejackets and their instruction for use was not standardized for the GIs. Unlike the kapok vests that were standard in the U.S. Navy, the soldiers had been issued something that resembled a bicycle inner tube that wrapped around their chests. Most wore them at their waists so they didn’t interfere with their packs. As a result, when men triggered the CO2 cartridges and inflated the vests, their heads went underwater. This situation was corrected prior to the launch of the Normandy mission with improved life jackets and through training.

3) Following the recovery actions of LT Doyle and the crew of LST-515 to save the lives of 132 soldiers and sailors, leadership reconsidered ‘standard procedure,’ and instead incorporated the U.S. Coast Guard into plans to follow behind the invasion force for the rescue of any floating survivors on D-Day.

4) The disaster also "underscored" the importance of adequate escorts for naval convoys and of quelling the threat from German S-boats. Naval and Air escorts were vital additions to D-Day operations.

After Thoughts

Exactly how many U.S. servicemen were lost remains contentious even today. The number for Navy dead generally appears to be accepted at 198, which is higher than the number of Navy personnel killed during the D-Day landing on 6 June 1944. But the number of Army personnel lost during Exercise Tiger varies, ranging from 441 to 947 GIs, with 749 the current presumed tally. The theories about the inconclusive number of casualties are also varied. Some sources point to lost rosters and logbooks or incomplete manifests for the LSTs, particularly with regard to the LST damaged shortly after leaving port (LST-508). No one seems to know for sure if or how many GIs were able to jump aboard LST-507 before LST-508 returned to port. Also, a fair number of remains recovered in the days following the tragedy lacked identification. Lastly, certain sources assert that all the casualty numbers were grossly undercounted as part of a massive cover-up after the fact. It should be noted that no source seems to know how many men died from friendly fire on 27 April 1944.

Documents released under the Freedom of Information Act appear to validate claims that authorities deliberately sought to minimize the Exercise Tiger casualty reports, and a more valid number means more Americans military personnel actually died over 27-28 April 1944 than in taking the real Utah Beach on D-Day itself. It’s not beyond reason to say, 749 American soldiers and sailors died in the S-Boat attack, 197 died on the beach, for a total of 946 souls lost during Exercise Tiger.

On Friday, 09 Nov 1984, a Sherman Tank was dedicated and placed aboard a seaside plinth as a memorial to the sacrifices of Exercise Tiger. The tank had been assigned to the 70th Tank Battalion and lost aboard one of LSTs. It was recovered from 60 ft of water off Slapton Sands by Torcross, South Devon resident Ken Small (1930 - 15 Mar 2004). Mr. Small worked tirelessly to uncover truths about the disaster, and to ensure that those who died aren't forgotten.

Sherman Tank Memorial

---

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