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MALTOT
Calvados
- 6 km south of Caen
Raging battle around hill 112 and Maltot
On
10 July 1944, Caen was nearly liberated, but the river Orne was not
crossed west of the city, that was the aim of the Operation Jupiter.
The objective was also to attract the bulk of the Panzer-Gruppe West
in the front of the 2nd British Army. The attack started on 10 July
at 5:00 am, the 43rd Wessex Infantry Division and two Armoured Brigades
took Baron. But at hill 112, the Tiger tanks and the grenadiere of
the Panzer-Abteilung 102 stopped dead the 5th Battalion Duke of Cornwall’s
Light Infantry. In Maltot the British of the 4th and 5th Dorsetshire
Regiments and the 7th Battalion Hampshire Regiment were kept in check.
On 18 July, the Operation Goodwood is launched east of Caen.
On 22 July the 43rd Wessex Infantry Division renewed the assault of
hill 112 and Maltot. The 129th Brigade and the 7th Royal Tank Regiment
were under heavy artillery German fire, the Royal Artillery striked
back. The 5th Battalion Wiltshire Regiment fought hand to hand to
capture Maltot. On 23rd July in the evening, the 4th Battalion Wiltshire
Regiment took the ruins of the castle where they found all around
corpses of the Leibstandarte Aldolph Hitler soldiers.
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Dorsetshire Regiment stele
