“They’re acting as if they’d won the war already,” muttered Wittmann’s gunner, Corporal Balthazar “Bobby” Woll. And now the British appeared to be relaxing, even settling down for the day. True, he had been told to expect a British probe in the area towards the direction of the strategically-important city of Caen about a dozen miles to the east, but not so quickly and not without warning. SS Oberstrumfuhrer (Lieutenant) Michael Wittmann was furious. Even as they watched, a sea of khaki figures enveloped the highway, smoking insouciantly and brewing up tea. Nearby, barely two hundred yards away, sheltered beyond a tall line of trees and hedgerows, the crew of a German Tiger tank gaped in astonishment. The long column of British tanks and light armor crept up along the gently slanting Norman highway under the stiff early-morning sun and came to a gentle stop by the side of the highway. Even as the “Desert Rats” occupied the town and prepared to consolidate their gains, the Germans attacked - setting the stage for one of the most controversial battles of the Normandy Campaign. Initially, all went as planned but when the British came upon the unremarkable town of Villers-Bocage, 12 miles from Caen and 20 miles from the beaches, fortune began to turn against them.
In the lead was the veteran British 7th Armored Division, famed as the “Desert Rats” for having cut their teeth in North Africa.
Frustrated, British Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery planned to outflank the enemy using his best divisions. Unfortunately, the frontal advance was held up a German Panzer division on D-Day and so a murderous slog began. Apart the symbolic victory to be had from seizing Normandy’s capital city, Caen offered the Allies a base from where they could launch deeper offensives into France.
When the British landed in Normandy on D-Day, June 6, 1944, they had one primary objective: seize the key city of Caen from where William the conqueror had sailed for England nine centuries ago.
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