Barneville Carteret
Barneville N49 22.24.4 W001 45.050 Carteret N49 22.244 W00 48.246 Map1211O
Barneville WN329 Carteret WN326
Just after the Germans captured the Cotentin Peninsular on June 18th 1940, they placed two railway guns in Carteret. These were possibly of the Kanone 5 type, and they later saw service in Calais and Cherbourg. They were situated near the crossing of the railway and road into Carteret. Because railway guns have no traverse they either have to be placed on turntables or on a curve in the track. They were only fired once, resulting in the windows of the church being blown out. The defences built here did not conform to the normal pattern, as the smaller guns protecting the big guns were some distance away. The first installations were on the beach at Barneville which is just to the south of Carteret and was numbered W329. The guns were installed here to protect the port of Carteret and were an assortment of anti aircraft, mortars and machine gun posts. There were plans to install big guns on the Cap du Carteret, but by D-day work on these had hardly begun. The guns to be installed were Russian (Type K390/2) in origin and were most likely to have been captured on the eastern front. There were plans to house the guns in Casemates of the R669 type. The guns had arrived some time before D-day but had not been installed. On the 9th of June two were moved to Quineville to the north of Utah beach. What happened to the other two is not recorded. Near the lighthouse is a small lightly built bunker and a little to the east is what looks like an entrance to an underground shelter. On the headland at Carteret the Germans also installed a Seekat Fume type 27 radar station, together with an anti aircraft batterie. This set of anti aircraft guns, the western end of the outer ring of guns protecting Cherbourg. Several days before D-day a British Pathfinder was parachuted into the sand dunes north of Carteret and remained hidden until the night of June 5th. He then activated a radio beacon to enable the C47 transport aircraft to navigate a left turn on their way to the drop zones around St Mere Eglise. At Barneville the gun emplacements are still visible but the sand dunes are reclaiming the efforts of the Todt Organisation The Barneville, Carteret and Baubiny gun emplacements were among the first to see action on the morning of D-day firing on the C47’s. This gun emplacement was the last in the area to hold out against the American advance on June 18th 1944. It was manned by the 206th Panzer Regiment who were equipped with tanks that came from a variety of countries, including France and Russia and of course Germany. After the Americans arrived in the area they headed off towards Cherbourg.
