USS Narragansett (AT-88) - Invasion of Southern France Operations

Invasion of Southern France Operations

On 16 June, the hard working tug, now reclassified ATF-86 (effective 15 May), again departed for Naples, this time to join in the preparations for "Operation Dragoon", the invasion of Southern France. For the next month and a half, she frequently transited the waters between Bizerte, Naples, Sardinia and Corsica, as harbors on the latter island were turned into supply stations, repair facilities and beaching craft convoy staging areas.

By 18 August she was off the Provence coast, assigned to "Delta" area, just outside the Golfe de St. Tropez. She next shifted to the more heavily defended "Carnet" area in the Golfe de Frejus. There the Germans, protecting the centuries old invasion route to the interior along the Argens River and the only airfield and seaplane base on that coast, had mounted impressive coastal batteries along the cliffs heavily mined the waters and beaches. Kept busy in that area until the end of the month. Narragansett then moved on to Toulon and Marseilles. Until mid-October she worked to clear those two harbor for the ships bringing the necessary supplies to the Allied land forces pushing inland toward the heart of the Third Reich.

Read more about this topic:  USS Narragansett (AT-88)

Famous quotes containing the words invasion of, invasion, southern, france and/or operations:

    In our governments the real power lies in the majority of the community, and the invasion of private rights is chiefly to be apprehended, not from the acts of government contrary to the sense of the constituents, but from the acts in which government is the mere instrument of the majority.
    James Madison (1751–1836)

    In our governments the real power lies in the majority of the community, and the invasion of private rights is chiefly to be apprehended, not from the acts of government contrary to the sense of the constituents, but from the acts in which government is the mere instrument of the majority.
    James Madison (1751–1836)

    Southern trees bear a strange fruit
    Blood on the leaf and blood at the root
    Black bodies swingin’ in the southern breeze
    Strange fruit hangin’ in the poplar trees.
    Billie Holiday [Eleanor Fagan] (1915–1959)

    It is not what France gave you but what it did not take from you that was important.
    Gertrude Stein (1874–1946)

    You can’t have operations without screams. Pain and the knife—they’re inseparable.
    —Jean Scott Rogers. Robert Day. Mr. Blount (Frank Pettingell)