Crisbecq Battery

About

The Crisbecq battery also known as the Saint-Marcouf battery is one of the German coastal batteries of the Atlantic Wall that was active during the Normandy landing in June 1944. Of all the forces engaged this morning on June 6, 1944, the Crisbecq battery was the first to open fire on all the beaches of Operation Overlord, marking at exactly 0552 hours the beginning of the landing of the Allied forces on the Normandy coast. Located north of the beach of Utah Beach, in the commune of Saint-Marcouf in the department of the English Channel, northeast of the Cotentin peninsula, it opposed strong resistance and was taken by the Americans only several days after D-Day. Another coastal battery, the smaller Azeville battery, was located nearby in the commune of Azeville and had its firing station on the site of the Crisbecq battery (hence the name sometimes given to the two Marcouf cannon batteries).