I’ve long been fascinated with the Atlantic Wall fortifications, especially those in Normandy. They are usually viewed through the prism of the D-Day landings – but the fortifications there were mainly small tactical strongpoints, and not the big, fortified gun batteries. The Atlantic Wall is usually examined from the perspective of the amphibious landings. I thought it would be intriguing to examine how the big coastal gun batteries performed in engagements with Allied warships in a classic “big gun” duel.

There were a few obvious choices. HMS Warspite against several batteries around Brest was one of them. Another was the engagement between Allied warships and the Crisbecq batteries near Utah Beach on D-Day, one of the few times a German battery claimed to have sunk an Allied warship. In the end, I decided on USS Texas vs. Batterie Hamburg near Cherbourg at the end of June 1944.

The choice was due to several factors. Books such as these need a lot of resources: an interesting story, good documentation, ample photos. I knew that the Cherbourg gun duel met these needs because I had done an earlier Osprey Campaign on the battle for Cherbourg. One of the important criteria was that there was a rich assortment of photos, since these books are heavily illustrated. In this case, I knew that there was a very good selection of aerial photos of Batterie Hamburg showing the layout of the battery, as well as ground views taken immediately after the fighting. Coverage of the Texas was also good, including photos taken during the engagement, and photos from onboard the Texas showing battle damage. I also knew that there was excellent documentation of the gun duel from the US Navy perspective, and I was able to find the war diaries of all the major ships involved. Texas is still preserved as a museum ship, so there are many published accounts. Coverage from the German side was a bit spotty, but I did have a reasonable amount of detail.

There were still a few mysteries. For example, only one of the German guns at Batterie Hamburg was knocked out. It was always presumed it was knocked out during the duel with Texas. Was it Texas that hit it, or another ship from the task force?

I was surprised to learn that it was not hit on the day of the big-gun duel. German records indicated that it was hit the day before. Nobody had bothered looking at the German records before. So, this mystery had to be solved. I discovered that a small minesweeping flotilla had been operating offshore from Batterie Hamburg the day before the gun duel to clear passages for the warships. During this operation, Batterie Hamburg had fired on the minesweepers. In return, accompanying destroyers had returned fire. It was gunfire from one of the destroyers that knocked out one of Batterie Hamburg’s four guns. This engagement had been overlooked in previous accounts of the gun duel, so that added an interesting twist to the story!

You can find out more in the book here.