WWII On This Day: August 10

Allied landing craft off the Île d'Or at Le Dramont, Camel Beach, during the landing in Provence, August 1944. — Landing craft off the Île d'Or at Le Dramont, Camel sector, August 1944 · Public domain · Source

August 10, 1944 Operation Dragoon

The fleet sails

Around 880 warships and transports with over 1,300 landing craft sailed from ports across the Mediterranean, carrying the assault divisions of VI Corps and the leading elements of French Army B. Nine escort carriers and the heavy ships of the bombardment force went with them, including the American battleships Nevada, Texas and Arkansas, the British Ramillies, and the French Lorraine, which had been interned at Alexandria in 1940 and had rejoined the war in 1943.

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OSS officers with Draža Mihailović at Pranjani on 6 September 1944 during Operation Halyard. — Unknown photographer · Pranjani, 6 September 1944 · Public domain (PD-Yugoslavia)

August 10, 1944 · 06:00 Operation Halyard

Daylight C-47 waves turn the strip into an air bridge

Just after dawn six C-47s arrived with twenty-five P-51s overhead. The fighters attacked local targets to make the activity resemble a conventional air strike while the transports landed and loaded. A second wave repeated the operation about an hour later. Leary records 177 American airmen removed in the morning, plus other Allied personnel. The first night and morning established the pattern that made Halyard possible: a short window, concentrated ground organization and transports on the ground only long enough to load.

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Tanks and half-tracks of the French 2e Division Blindée pass the Arc de Triomphe through crowds on the Champs-Élysées, 26 August 1944. — Jack Downey, US Office of War Information · Library of Congress · Public domain · Source

August 10, 1944 · 06:00 The Liberation of Paris

The railwaymen strike

Railway workers across the Paris region stopped work. The strike closed the network the German army needed to move troops and supplies through the city, and it was the first open act of the rising that followed. The Resistance had been arguing for months about whether to call a general strike or wait for the Allies. The railwaymen settled the argument by going first.

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