Vengeance and Remembrance: Monuments in France Relating to the Slapton Sands Disaster
Historian’s Blog
Erik Ehrenfeld
On that night of April 28, 1944 off the coast of Slapton Sands England, German E-boat fast attack craft ambushed a convoy of American LST landing ships during Exercise Tiger—a simulated landing for the upcoming invasion of Utah beach on June 6, 1944. The Germans torpedoed three LSTs, sinking two. Overall, almost one thousand American soldiers and sailors lost their lives in the tragedy while the German raiders escaped unscathed.
While in France, I discovered several monuments and displays relating to the Slapton Sands tragedy. Each site reflected the context of its location and highlighted emotions of either vengeance or remembrance. Most of the memorials to the participating units on Utah beach highlighted the invasion and the liberation of France.
Although many of these units also took part in Exercise Tiger, the Slapton Sands memorial consisted of a small plaque that did not mention the German attack and cited the incorrect date in the English section.
Nevertheless, these same honored units later captured the E-boat base at Cherbourg, which suggested that their landing at Utah beach led to a measure of revenge against their previous naval enemies.
In contrast, the visitor center at the American cemetery of Colleville-sur-Mer focused on honoring those lost. The inclusion of a small display on Slapton Sands proved that the curators of the visitor center valued the lives of those lost during Exercise Tiger as much as those who fell during the battle of Normandy.
Finally, the display claimed that the loss of life on April 28th was not in vain, as the Americans learned hard lessons during the exercise that saved lives on D-Day. In short, the memorials in France presented the Slapton Sands tragedy as either a disaster that required vengeance or a somber reminder of the cost of war.
