Leonard Chandler testimony
D-Day veteran – Royal Naval Reserve
In December 1943, Leonard Chandler reported to a Royal Naval Reserve (RNR) boarding school where, in addition to a formal education, students received naval training: navigation, maneuvers, signals, etc. The following month, he became a boatswain. He then spent six weeks at the Royal Naval College in Greenwich, followed by another 6 weeks at the naval base in Chatham. Some time later, he joined his first warship: HMS HEMERALD. It was a light cruiser armed with seven 20-millimeter turrets, installed in 1918.
Here is her D-Day account:
“In early June 1944, on June 4th to be precise, we sailed along the River Clyde, accompanied by another warship. After an hour of maneuvering, the captain of HMS HEMERALD announced to the crew that we were taking part in the invasion of Europe in Normandy.
We were heading south when, off the south coast of Wales, the ship made a 180-degree turn and we were back where we started: the invasion had just been postponed for a day due to the appalling weather in the English Channel.
On June 5th, 1944, when we rounded Land’s End, we headed east, parallel to the English coast. Near Plymouth, We received the order: “Battle Station!” and each crew member reported to their position. I was on an anti-aircraft gun platform located at foremast level, just above the ship’s bridge. A Royal Marine captain commanded all the anti-aircraft guns on one side of the ship; I manned the other side.
From the anti-aircraft gun turret, we had a superb view of what was happening around the ship and could hear the loudspeaker from the bridge (where we were to live for about two weeks).
After Plymouth, we began to see hundreds of landing craft, all different. Upon reaching the Isle of Wight, we turned south. From then until before daybreak, the warships navigated between the lines of landing craft, and finally, we led the way.
Our role was to protect the landing troops destined for the beach. from Gold Beach. We sailed through a passage cleared by minesweepers, which, or perhaps other boats, had marked the channel we were to take across the English Channel. There were two other similar channels to our left (leading to Juno and Sword beaches), as well as two more to our right (for Omaha Beach and Utah Beach), but we couldn’t see any of them from where we were. There were colored lights of blue, green, red… set by the scouts to indicate targets to the incoming bombers. Some time before daybreak, we were in sight of the French coast, and the warships deployed. There were six cruisers, which anchored about nine kilometers offshore, keeping one to one and a half kilometers between them. Thirteen destroyers, meanwhile, positioned themselves about seven kilometers from the shore. HMS HEMERALD was opposite Arromanches-les-Bains, but at At the time, I didn’t know it yet.
We had dropped anchor, and we were all silent for perhaps over an hour. Then the naval bombardment began and continued for about two hours. There wasn’t much for us to see except for the passing of landing craft. On the coast, the morning mist gave way to dust and then smoke, but in any case, we could still see the shore between Port-en-Bessin and Arromanches-les-Bains.
During the bombardment, I remember seeing small figures falling from the cliffs. In the fields beyond, we could see other small figures running away and, occasionally, stopping and opening fire to cover their escape (gun fire was indicated by sudden escaping smoke). I believed that the shots from HMS HEMERALD were aimed at a barn, and I learned a few years later, when I researched this barn, that our target was in fact the coastal artillery battery located at Longues-sur-Mer. Perhaps this is where the small fleeing figures were bombarded.
Pilots flying Seafires (a Spitfire derivative) were tracking the impact points of our gunfire. At one point, while the pilot’s conversation was being relayed to the entire crew over the loudspeaker, he reported that we were hitting a target and that he could see German soldiers running for cover. We immediately received a call from an officer on the beach asking us to cease fire because our fire was actually directed at our own troops. Today, we call these errors “friendly fire.”
HMS AJAX, directly west of our position, was under enemy fire at the time and had to weigh anchor to change position. Fortunately, the cruiser AJAX was not hit. It was luckier than a Norwegian destroyer, which was sunk by German E-boats from the Le Havre base.
The Allied planes flying overhead had black and white stripes painted on the underside of their wings to facilitate recognition of anti-aircraft positions, and they were required to perform a wing movement when passing over a convoy. If they didn’t, we were ordered to shoot them down, but I never once witnessed such a scene unfold, although I have since heard that a few aircraft were mistakenly shot down: another example of “Friendly Fire.”
On D-Day + 5 (June 11, 1944), we were bombed by a German aircraft, which flew over the Allied squadron just above the masts. The Captain of the Royal Marines, who was directing the anti-aircraft fire from his side of the ship, opened fire. For my part, I picked up the telephone and contacted all the anti-aircraft positions under my responsibility to warn them that an aircraft would be visible on board us. The German plane dropped its bomb, which bounced off the water and exploded. We weren’t able to bring down the enemy aircraft—but it didn’t hit us either! Later, the crew was somewhat upset to learn that our sister ship, the HMS Enterprise, had been sunk during a German air attack off Utah Beach.
Strangely, the German gunners didn’t fire on us all day on D-Day, probably because our guns were much larger than theirs.
Each ship was equipped with a smoke generator, which, in our case, was mounted on the deck. As twilight gradually set in, the generators were started, and the entire ship was covered in thick smoke. During the day, the Germans would locate the position of one or more ships, and at night, they would fire at the target they had identified during the day. But at dusk, we would abandon our position and drift with the tide for 30 to 40 minutes before dropping anchor again. From the anti-aircraft gun platform, I was above the smoke screen created by the generator, and I could see, when the moonlight permitted, the immense armada around HMS HEMERALD. We could also see the shells exploding in the water.
I remember a little joker, on the platform with me, clasping his hands as if in prayer and saying, “Please don’t miss Nelson, don’t miss Nelson!” (HMS Nelson was a battleship and therefore a much bigger target than a simple cruiser like HMS HEMERALD).
