22nd Independent Parachute Company

The 22nd Independent Parachute Company was formed on 4th October 1943, as the second of the Parachute Regiment’s wartime 'pathfinder' units. The pathfinders' role was to parachute onto drop zones ahead of the parachute battalions. They would mark the drop zone and establish radio contact with the incoming parachute battalions, enabling the transport aircraft to home in. The Company also acted as an early warning if the selected drop zone was heavily defended, possibly enabling diversion to an alternative. Once the main force was down the pathfinders were usually employed as a small reserve or reconnaissance force.

The Company was intended to serve the 6th Airborne Division, which had only formed earlier that year. But in the beginning, it had to rely on the 7th Parachute Battalion for pay, accommodation and rations, as they had no quarters of their own. Its first Commanding Officer, Major Francis Lennox-Boyd, had only passed his jump training a month earlier on September 2nd. The 34-year-old was described as “awkwardly built but determination got him through”. Like its sister unit the 21st, the Company consisted of a Company Headquarters and three platoons, each with one officer and 32 men. Each platoon was sub-divided into three sticks, commanded by a sergeant or Corporal.

On October 26th, 1943, the Company finally moved into permanent accommodation at 20 Married Quarters, the Packway, Larkhill. In its early months of existence, the Company was involved in the testing of experimental equipment which included homing beacons, flares and containers with delayed chutes. On November 9th it completed its first drop with the Eureka transponder, which was to become a key piece of pathfinding technology. It dropped from Whitley, Albemarle and Halifax bombers, with varying results; on December 15, 1943, a drop from a Halifax went wrong when Private James Lawrence was killed in a parachuting accident. The 22nd was considered to be the cutting edge of parachute techniques, with five of its men going to Ringway’s Parachute Training School to teach other men how to drop with a kitbag, at that time a new invention. Moreover, two American officers visited the 22nd in December to learn British pathfinder methods, including the use of the Rebecca-Eureka device. Although the men didn’t yet know it, the information sharing was an early sign that an invasion of Europe was on the horizon. On January 7, 1944, the Company was ordered to be mobile by the start of February.

Briefings for the invasion of Normandy began on June 1st. The pathfinders of the 22nd were to jump half an hour before the main divisional drop. Two sticks were assigned to each DZ, though they also had to mark an LZ for gliders later on. Their objectives were to light them up with battery-powered fluorescent tubes, which were known as Holophane lights. These lights would flash the DZ letter in morse code, and each zone also had a colour-coded companion light. Then they were to set up the Eureka homing beacon, and switch it on fifteen minutes before the Battalions began to arrive (the narrow window was to prevent the Germans intercepting the message). Each DZ also had its own radio frequency to prevent overlapping signals and ensure the planes arrived at the right place. Needless to say, not all of them did. Brigadier James Hill stated prophetically “gentlemen, in spite of your excellent training and orders, do not be daunted if chaos reigns. It undoubtedly will”. Finally, the Company had additional orders to prevent the Eureka beacons falling into enemy hands, and they were fitted with explosive charges to self-destruct if necessary. 

Normandy

The 22nd took off for Normandy at 11.15 pm on the 5th June, 1944. They were composed of six sticks of ten men in Albemarles, plus a reinforcement stick of twenty in a Stirling, for a total of 80. They began to jump as scheduled at 20 minutes past midnight on the 6th June.

At drop zone V near the Merville battery, Lieutenant Don Wells and his stick managed to set up two green Holophane lights into a T shape, which indicated the direction in which the planes had to land. Whilst they had also set up their Eureka beacon at the right time, it had been damaged as result of a heavy drop, and there is debate about whether it was actually working. Several of their Holophane lights had also been damaged or destroyed. An equipment glider meant for drop zone V, failing to see the lights, later landed on drop zone N as a result of this. It was also discovered that some of the Holophane lights had been set up in fields of standing crops, hiding them from the pilots. The operational report noted: "All eqpt of one stick damaged or lost in flooded area. Second stick arrived at time of main drop. They had landed 1000 yds N of DZ". This report mentions the two lights set up by Don Wells' stick, but Otway later noted that "few crews saw them". 

The 22nd’s war diary stated that there were numerous issues which complicated their work on drop zone V. This included the extremely heavy load the men had to carry, which took up extra space in the fuselage of the cramped Albemarle. There were also water-filled dykes on the edge of drop zone V, and a wayward RAF bombing run which overshot and hit the Sallenelles/Gonneville-en-Auge area (1376) and only narrowly missed the pathfinders, causing massive amounts of confusion. Across all the drop zones, some kitbags broke away under the shock of the chute developing and were damaged or lost.

In the end, Lt Col Otway only managed to gather 150 men of his 9th Battalion out of a possible 700, a return of just 21 percent. Despite the massive setbacks, Otway’s 9th Battalion still persevered to put the Merville battery out of action, preventing it from firing on the Normandy beaches in the coming hours.

At drop zone N near the Caen Canal and Orne River, the bridges had actually already been taken when the pathfinders dropped in. This was thanks to a coup de main glider assault which arrived shortly before the 22nd, and was so accurate that one glider actually landed on the Germans’ barbed wire defences. But the pathfinders still had  to mark the drop zones for reinforcements to come in. Corporal Henry Dodwell recorded the drop of his stick led by Captain Tait:

“Jumped 0020 hours. Slipped on edge of aperture, swept out head-first, ‘rang the bell’ and cut my forehead open. Average landing. Got organised and waited for Captain Tait who came up in about 3 minutes…Had only reached the edge of the drop zone by the time we were due to open up, so set up the Eureka there. Hid in a ditch and under a hedge while a jerry patrol led by a French civilian came up the lane. They stopped and looked at me in the open with the Eureka but moved on after a bit. Luckily the moon stayed behind the clouds and the field was full of big clumps of thistles and nettles”

They had actually been dropped slightly to the southeast of their intended target, which explains their delay in marking the drop zone. To his surprise, when he got there Corporal Dodwell later encountered a Pathfinder officer from the wrong stick. He recalled:

“Main drop (5 Bde) now coming in – a bit of a shambles. Picked up several people, all of whom were lost, and many of them on the wrong DZ. Found Vischer’s stick with Eureka and lights out thinking they were on Varaville, where they ought to have been, and coding the Varaville DZ [K] on the Holophane set”.

Because Lieutenant Vischer had been dropped wayward and was now coding the wrong signal, 14 sticks of the 8th Battalion who should have arrived at drop zone K actually dropped on N. On the other hand, Vischer had at least ensured that drop zone N was especially well lit. The operational report noted: "Stick from "K" Pathfinders arrived first and operated until "N" party took over. Reinforcement stick of 20 men arrived after ldg of main force, as they were dropped off the DZ. Glider lanes marked after para drop with green lights, and one red light per lane coding "N"". 

In the end, around 40 percent of the 7th Parachute Battalion and 60 percent of the 12th and 13th Battalions managed to rendezvous on drop zone N, which was actually pretty good for the time. Nonetheless, at least three Eureka devices had again been damaged by the drop. But tragically the 22nd’s Commanding Officer Major Lennox-Boyd had made a quote “premature and accidental” exit from the aircraft over drop zone N, and was not seen thereafter. He had in fact been killed, leaving the 22nd without a Commanding Officer on D-Day.

At drop zone K, things had been thrown into disarray by the loss of Vischer’s stick. Only Lieutenant Midwood’s stick remained, but it “came under heavy fire almost immediately after landing”. They managed to set up a single Eureka and a single lamp on the drop zone. This was despite the fact that five men in the stick had failed to appear. Corporal Bob Stoodley remembered the Eureka beacon linking up with the Rebecca device in the aircraft:

“Suddenly I got a beep; I could hear it hitting. I got a beep back. I knew I’d got the plane…Anyway, it got worse, the signal got louder and louder, and suddenly I could see the planes. Out of the blue, out they came. It was a joy to see it. And they were everywhere. One moment you’re just four, and the next moment you’ve got a mass of soldiers dropping around you". 

The operational report noted: "very little pathfinding eqpt as one stick did not arrive and majority of other sticks eqpt was with missing men. (since reported prisoners)." 

Drop zone K had been assigned to the 8th Parachute Battalion, who were supposed to blow up several bridges over the river Dives with the help of the Engineers. As previously mentioned, they had already lost 14 sticks out of 37 who had been guided to the wrong drop zone by the pathfinders of Lieutenant Vischer. After two hours, Lt Col Pearson only managed to collect 140 paratroopers from the 8th Battalion. Despite the overwhelming odds, his men blew two crucial bridges at Bures and increased the damage done to a bridge at Troarn by Roseveare's engineers, preventing German reinforcements from reaching the beaches. The Company fought around Breville and remained as line infantry in Normandy until the break out to the Seine in August.

Losses of the 22nd Independent Parachute Company for the period 6 June to 1 July 1944 were classified as 22 casualties (8 killed, 14 wounded), and 3 missing. For the longer period to 20 August 1944, there were a total of 37 casualties (excluding the missing). There were a number of lessons learnt for the pathfinders from Normandy, as the report noted: 

"On each DZ three sticks were dropped and in each case only one stick was accurately dropped. Lights were however erected on all DZs by the time main bodies arrived: the lights on DZ "N" were slightly to the east of their correction location. The time actually required by the pathfinders to erect their aids varied accordingly to the nature of the country: the margin was only just sufficient on DZ "V" and "K" and on "N" the inaccurate drop and the growing crops made the 30 mins allotted too short. The eqpt carried by each stick was found to be hy and blky and restricted quick mov on the ground

The parachute drops were not as conc as might have been expected. This may have been due to the fact that only half an hour was allowed to the Indep Para Coy for its work. It was desirable to keep this time as short as possible, surprise had been lost by the glider aslt on the brs and it was realised before the op that a risk was being taken; but, since the DZs were comparatively easy to find, the risk was accepted...[as a result]...the 3 Para Bde bns certainly had to carry out their tasks at well below 30% str"

However, the chaos had an unintended benefit in that "one unforeseen repercussion of this unintentional scattering of tps was that the German was mislead [sic] as to the area and extent of the airborne landings". Otway later summarised, "In fact the air plan worked...all tasks allotted to 6 Airborne Division were carried out up to time and such scattering of personnel as there was did not cause failure in any part of the operation of the plan". 

The 22nd later fought in the Ardennes during the winter fighting of 1944-5 and took part in Operation VARSITY, the Rhine Crossing in March 1945. After the war in Europe the Company was attached and accompanied the 5th Parachute Brigade to the Far East in 1945-6.

The 22nd Independent Parachute Company was disbanded in July 1946.

Company Commanders:

1943-4         Maj F Lennox-Boyd
1944             Maj N Stockwell
1944             Maj J de T Vischer
1944-5         Maj MG Dolden
1945-6         Maj JHS Lane
1946             Maj DD Campbell, MC

Compiled with information from:

Airborne Assault Archive (Box 3 F5 4.22.1 and Box 3 F5 4.22.2)

Report on Operations in Normandy 6 June - 27 August 1944, 6th Airborne Division

The Second World War 1939-45, Army, Airborne Forces, official history by Lt. Col. Terence Otway 

The Day the Devils Dropped In (Barnsley, 2002), Neil Barber 

Merville Battery and the Dives Bridges (Barnsley, 2011), Carl Shilleto

"Go To It!", the Illustrated History of the 6th Airborne Division (London, 1990), Peter Harclerode

Article rewritten by Alex Walker (28.05.2024)