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This story is transcribed by me Graham Shepherd , from documents and discussions with Harry Langford , and will be added to the site with his permission . He understands the sites terms and conditions .

The Battalion was ordered to advance to the village of Baron , which was under observation by German gunners observing from Hill 112 , and the Germans were determined to dislodge the British troops .

Moving forward on foot after dark on 27th June , we saw first hand the destruction that had been wrought on the troops ahead of us in the advance . We crossed the River Odon in the dark and made for Baron . As we approached we began to see casualties coming back in jeeps - blood everywhere . There were British and German bodies , and burned out tanks and Bren carriers at the side of the road . It brought us down to earth .

We dug in at Baron and the German counter attacked us very hard . Our artillery did a very good job of breaking up the attacks . After one there were many German bodies in front of the position . The Germans shelled us constantly . It was very draining .

But worse was to come , as the reality of war began to hit home .

On the second day we lost our first man killed in the mortar platoon . It was Freddie Heath We stood to at dawn and he was hit by shrapnel from an air burst( shell timed to explode above the ground) . He was still alive when they got him to the regimental aid post , but he died before he got back to Britain . He’s buried at Bayeux War Cemetery .

It was a shock. Freddie was a Shrewsbury lad and I’d known him since before we joined up . You can’t believe somebody you knew so well could be killed like that , but there was so much going on around us you had to put it to one side .

One of my great friends was Cooky ( Ron Cookson ) , a stretcher bearer , who only died in 2002 . The stretcher bearers were so brave . They would tent the wounded while under fire and open to anything the Germans could throw at them .

The early casualties made the men of the KSLI acutely aware that the war was not going to be a walkover . Facing them were the men of three SS divisions , and their position was at the head of a corridor over the river Odon stretching into enemy-held territory . Ahead of us was a cornfield through which the Germans mounted many counter attacks , while the positions in Baron were shelled and mortared constantly . Any movement during the day would attract a barrage of shell fire .

On 30th June the SS attacked at night and nearly succeeded in dislodging the men of the KSLI . The following morning the bodies of 25 Germans were found within our perimeter , and 10 prisoners were taken . Some of the Germans , from the SS Hitler Youth Division , were just 16 year - old boys .

Baron was also the first place the 4th KSLI experienced the Nebelwerfer rocket launcher . This six-barrelled rocket artillery had a terrifying effect on those on the receiving end of it , thanks to the screaming noise they made in flight . Allied soldiers christened it ‘ Moaning Minnies ‘ . We first heard them as we drove into Baron in our carriers . The noise was indescribable as we heard this screaming sound and said to each other ‘ what the hell was that ? As the first ones came I cringed in the carrier .

The noise was terrifying - it felt like they were aiming at you . Then there were six explosions all around . But once you got used to the noise they weren’t so bad .
Everyone remembers the first time they heard Moaning Minnies , but after a while you got used to them .

We held Baron until we were relieved on 4/5th July , holding the line on a battlefield that seemed more akin to the horrors of the First World War trenches than the mobile battlefields of World War Two . In that time the battalion lost 23 men killed and 77 wounded - a quarter of their fighting strength . Yet amongst the death and destruction there remained humanity .

Around our positions were several cattle and a donkey , farm animals that found themselves caught up in the fighting . All veterans of the battle of Normandy remember the terrible toll the fighting took on livestock . The regions countryside was littered with the carcasses of many cattle and farm animals killed in the crossfire , as well as the unburied bodies of both German and Allied soldiers .

It only got worse as the battle ground on in the hot summer . At Baron , though , a handful of these animals had survived the constant shelling and the German counterattacks . I remember a donkey and a couple of cows wandering around a field near our positions in Baron and it amazed me how they had managed to survive so long in all that shelling .

One of my section , Butch Morgan , was a country lad and was most concerned . The cows need milking and were crying out with pain and he used to run out in the shelling and milk the cows onto the ground just to ease the pressure !

See Part 3 - The Germans on the run

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