A new monument for the 6th Special Engineer Brigade

The cut announced the inauguration, on Saturday, June 6 at 11 a.m., of a monument dedicated to the 6th Special Engineer Brigade of the American Army in Vierville-sur-Mer.

She recalled that a first monument had been built at the end of 1944 on the cliff, on the edge of St. Lawrence, by German prisoners commanded by Captain Henry Simiele, of the 147th Engineer Battalion. After fifty-four years of bad weather and vandalism, it had deteriorated. A new monument had therefore been planned on a land offered by Vierville, on the side of the road connecting the beach to the village.

The previous Thursday, a granite block from Vermont had been placed on its base. His transport had been provided by the companies Shapiro, of Baltimore, and Sotecan, Le Havre.

Colonel George A. Itzel, a former member of the brigade and president of the veterans' association, retraced the action of the unit. According to her account, she had landed at 7:45 a.m. on June 6, 1944 in Omaha, in the Dog Green sector, to remove the German obstacles. The resistance had upset the initial plan and led the brigade to fight alongside the 116th Infantry Regiment of the 29th Division.

Also according to this testimony, the five thousand five hundred men of the brigade had then organized the landing of troops and equipment until December 1, 1944. The cut advanced a total of 8,500,000 tons landed, accompanied by a note from the editorial staff giving an average of 58,000 tons per day, before the relay taken by Cherbourg and Antwerp.

Reconstructed or uncertain passages:
- The tonnages and the daily average are the numbers printed in the source; their consistency and historical accuracy are not certified by this rewriting.

Archive image: https://vierville.cordelle.eu/Photos2008/1998-Stele6BSG-6juin98.jpg