The Battle of Ranville - A Brief History

I had two battalions at the time, not mustering more than about 800 men between them. The troops tails were well up, and the ground was favourable to the defence. I knew it would be several hours before i could expect to get any artillery support from west of the awne. And at the rate things seemed to be going, that certainly not before the morrow. My own reserve was in ronville. It consisted of about 60 men of the independent parachute company. In my appreciation of the german reactions to the invasion, i had always considered the most likely course that he would pursue would be to launch a series of small, but rather violent, immediate counter attacks