Saint-Pierre-du-Mont Travel Guide

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The 11th Infantry Ranger Commandos at great cost of life took the Pointe from the Germans who were well entrenched here. A simple memorial states the bare particulars. This is a real battlefield. The cliff they scaled looks like an impossible feat but they did it.

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It is remarkable that as many as 135 of the 225 Rangers made it physically onto the plateau. The attack certainly protected a flank of the Omaha landing. Obviously this expanse provided no invasion are.

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On the furthest tip of the cliff a stone needle rises up to the sky. This is the official monument commemorating the heroic task that the Rangers forfilled here. Remember the 135 of 225 that fell in this battle for Pointe-du-Hoc. Now-a-days on cannot reach the needle anymore, as the runnig tides and waves, slowly erode the cliffs below, through which the cliff has become extremely instabile. One suspects that the cliff will - one of these years - collaps and disappear into the sea. Of course the monument will be replaced before that happens.

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The landscape on top of Pointe-du-Hoc is deformed for a long long time. One can see how much shelling has been done here, by bomber command and can wonder what miracle spared the structures that the Nazi's built here. Enormous craters are to be found all over the area and the remains of bunkers that have been blown to pieces, either by a full hit by a dropped bomb or by heavy grenades thrown inside by one of the heroic Rangers.

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To imagine the impossible task that the Rangers had to forfill, you might gaze down from the cliffs to the small strip of stony beach where they landed in little rubber boats. If you have a vivid fantasy, you can maybe imagine how deadly it must have been enduring this under heavy enemy fire and grenades exploding over your head. Sometimes you truly wonder what army commanders think, finding out these killing fields. I guess they just do not think at all. The only strategic brilliance I see in this, is the fact that they stay safely on a distance (some call - as I do too - that cowardous).
Anyway ... the fact is that the Rangers made the impossible possible, even though with enormous casualties. Hip hip hooray for them!

Favorite thing: Pointe du Hoc was the site of a large battery in WW2, and was captured by the Rangers who had to scale cliffs to reach it during the D Day landings. It is very moving to see the craters and buildings still there