Killed in action on 7th June 1944 A Tribute:

Private Edsel A. Malone’s Contribution to World War II

Information compiled from sited sources and formatted by Robert Houston

Edsel Malone entered the service on 17 March 1942. Malone, of Okolona, Arkansas was an athletic young man who liked playing baseball, hunting and fishing prior to the war. By the time Private Edsel A. Malone trained and had earned his jump wings at Camp Mackall, North Carolina in order to join the 82nd Airborne Division for the upcoming assault on Hitler’s “Fortress Europa”, the 82nd was a seasoned combat division.

The Division had already proven itself with Combat Jumps in North Africa, Sicily and in Italy around Anzio. Unlike the other recently formed Airborne Divisions and Regiments, the 82nd was the only one that had been tested in combat. Due to the months of combat, not to mention the three campaigns fought by the 82nd, the Division had lost many men and while the combat veterans were fighting in the aforementioned campaigns, replacement troops such as Private Malone were training “back in the states” to fill the boots of those lost.

While these trainees learned the skills they would need in combat, none of them had any illusion that they would be sitting out the war in a rear area. They knew they would be in the “thick of it” soon; so all effort was made by the trainers and trainees to get it right. In airborne doctrine, the mantra “the more you sweat in training, the less you bleed on the battlefield”, and this mantra was enforced daily for the replacement troopers.

*Extract from Robert Houston's well researched document - which you can read on the 508th PIR website > https://www.508thpir.org (Search for WW2, Edsel's Story)

The Night of Nights:

On 4 June 1944, Operation Neptune was scheduled to go off at around midnight. Private Malone and his comrades were transported by truck from their nearby “Sausage Base”. “Sausage Bases” were tightly packed camps, surrounded by barbed wire and armed guards placed near the airfield where the Paratroopers were temporarily housed awaiting the invasion. Security was very high and the men could not leave the “Sausage” nor communicate with anyone from the outside. The men were crammed in them, hence the nickname “Sausage Base” and were nowhere near as comfortable as the their pre-invasion base near Wollaton Park, Nottinghamshire. The Paratroopers were then taken by truck to Saltby Airfield near Melton Mowbray, Leicestershire County. Due to bad weather, the invasion was cancelled. The next day, Eisenhower’s meteorologist found a slight break in the weather, and the troops were hauled back to Saltby where they boarded their planes for the invasion.

Only a few records remain of who was on what plane that night, but the 2nd Battalion, 508th PIR was allotted 36 planes for the jump. Headquarters Company, to whom Private Malone was assigned, climbed into 9 of the planes. Operation Boston was the code name given to the drop of the 82nd Airborne Division by the 314th Troop Carrier Group. Private Malone’s Aircraft was in the 62nd Troop Carrier Squadron of the 314th TCG, Serial 20. It may be of interest to Arkansans that the 314th Troop Carrier Group is presently the 314th Airlift Wing, stationed at Little Rock Air Force Base in Jacksonville, Arkansas.

At a little before midnight 5 June 1944, 2nd Battalion took off in their assigned C-47’s into the darkness in which the enemy awaited them. The Germans had no idea that this was the night. Many German officers were away at Rheims, France for war games detailing them in how to handle and allied airborne invasion. Field Marshall Erwin Rommel had gone home to Germany to celebrate his wife’s birthday with her, stopping by Paris on the way out to buy her some elegant shoes as a gift. According to Rommel’s meteorologist, there was nothing to worry about as the weather in the channel was going to be bad… no invasion would come now.

For the most of the flight, the sky was clear over the English Channel. One Paratrooper from the 82nd later recalled, “I didn’t think we had that many ships” regarding the invasion armada beneath them. About 1-½ hours into the flight and after the planes had made a sharp, easterly turn; a thick cloudbank arose over the western coast of the Cotentin Peninsula. The flight formations, due to very poor visibility began to scatter. This was the very beginning of the confusion that was cause of the misdrops for most of the airborne troops that night. Almost as quickly as the cloudbank had appeared, it disappeared. With better visibility though came another threat: German Anti-Aircraft Artillery.

Tracers from the German A-A-A batteries were so thick in some places; Paratroopers said it looked like they could walk on them. Flak cannons also joined in the fray, unleashing horrible and deadly aerial shrapnel that not only crippled and destroyed the aircraft, but also all those within her. The inexperienced Troop Carrier Group pilots sped up their planes, took evasive actions and pretty much forgot about keeping formations together. Fifteen minutes before the main body of Paratroopers took off, a special unit known as Pathfinders (see picture next page) left, so they could jump in ahead of the main Divisions and “mark” the Drop Zones (DZ’s) (see Map 1). They did so with electronic radar “homing” beacons and lights that would be set up in “T” formation. Some of the Pathfinder’s work was successful, however, where the 2nd Battalion was to land: (Drop Zone “N”), the beacon was in place, however, due to the German presence in the area, the lights could not be utilized without drawing devastating fire. Serial 20 dropped her troops about 1000 yards south of where they were supposed to land. Out of the nine planes carrying 2nd Battalion, only one was shot down, however several were damaged, injuring crew members and Paratroopers alike. At some time between 0205 and 0210 hours, Edsel made his jump into Normandy.

On the ground:

Private Malone as well as the rest of 2nd Battalion was under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Thomas J.B. Shanley. Lt. Col. Shanley had landed just east of the village of Picauville (see map B), which according to Military Intelligence would be lightly defended, perhaps only a small garrison of Germans there. M.I. predicted that the German 91st Infantry Regiment (Luftlande “Fallschermjager”-German Airborne Troops) was approximately 15 miles west of Picauville in the town of La Haye du Puits. Lt. Col. Shanley gathered approximately 35 men and began sending out patrols to round up other Paratroopers and gather equipment bundles as the men had very little other than a few infantry weapons in which to fight with. Once a sufficient number of men had been gathered, a push toward Picauville revealed that the German 91st Infantry Division was not in La Haye du Puits, but in fact was in Picauville. Lt. Col. Shanley’s group had recovered a SCR-300 Radio, along with one M1919 Browning Machine Gun and a few 60mm mortars and scant ammunition for these weapons. The godsend in this recovery was the radio, which was rapidly put into action. After speaking with Col. Lindquist, Shanley was told to gather his wounded, collect troops and equipment and evacuate the area. He was ordered by Lindquist to take Hill 30, and to hold it at all costs.

Throughout the dark morning hours, Shanley sent men out to recover other paratroopers and equipment. While more men and equipment were gathered, some sharp firefights took place. There were virtually none of the young American Paratroopers that did not fight their first night in Normandy. Darkness saved many of the Paratroopers that night, most likely many Germans as well, but by the same token, mistaken identity, the thick hedgerows and concentration of opposing force took many lives as well.

Weighing his odds, and the odds of his troops against a vastly superior number of the enemy, who had the means to fight, Shanley ordered his men to nearby Hill 30. Hill 30 (see Lt. Col. Shanley’s Maps B and C) was a small hill by most measures, but was the only high ground in the area. The hill was on the west side of the Merderet River where it converged with the Douve River. Northwest of the hill on the Merderet near St. Come Du Mont was a bridge that was an 82nd D-Day objective and to the south of the hill was the La Fiere Bridge, another important objective for the initial invasion.

Closing on the hill with approximately 200 troops in the early morning light, Private Malone amongst them, they found Hill 30 to be occupied by yet another group of enemy soldiers from the 1058th German Infantry, supported by two or three small but lethal French Renault Tanks and 2 Self Propelled (SP’s) artillery pieces. The tactical importance of the hill, especially in light of the enemy forces and equipment surrounding it, Shanley knew his troops had to destroy the enemy there. During the journey through the darkness, more weapons and supplies had been gathered, including several Bazookas and Mortars with ammunition. Shanley ordered his troopers to attack. With relatively light weapons, the 2nd Battalion destroyed the enemy tanks and artillery, killed and captured a large number of enemy troops, and incurred some casualties, but far fewer than the enemy. The hill was cleared of German forces, and Shanley ordered his men to dig in. Another 200 or so Paratroopers made their way to the hill to reinforce and resupply the beleaguered Paratroopers there.

Several fierce counterattacks by German forces went on throughout D-Day in and around the hill, but the gallant effort of the men holding that hill allowed other elements of the 508th to begin attacking the objectives assigned them. Soon, when the Germans had figured out where Shanley and 2nd Battalion were holding, German Artillery was put into play and began plastering the hill. After each artillery barrage, a ground attack was sure to follow, vicious and at close range, the fighting at several points was hand-to-hand combat, but the brave Paratroopers, dug in and repelled each attack. By this time, American artillery was operational, and the radio that had been recovered in the darkness was put into action to call in fire missions on the German artillery and armor that threatened the men on and around Hill 30.

The German attacks went on all night into the 7th of June. At some point on 7 June 1944, Private Edsel A. Malone lost his life in the battle. The details of his death are as such: under the command of 1st Lt. Chester E. “Chet” Graham, he volunteered to go out to retrieve weapons bundles, as so many other Paratroopers had to, in order to have desperately needed equipment and supplies to fight with. Edsel and a friend of his, Private Alton H. “Buddy” Webster (see picture) were in a field retrieving an equipment bundle. They came under heavy German Machine gunfire and both men were fatally wounded. He gave his life alongside his comrades doing a job that had to be done at all costs. Many historians believe that the effort by Lt. Col. Shanley and the men of the 2nd Battalion 508th PIR was paramount in the success of defeating the Germans in the Normandy offensive. It is a given that without their interdiction of the German forces, the objective bridgeheads and towns near them may have eventually been taken, but the cost in American lives would have been much higher.