How 181 British Glider Troops Seized a Vital Nazi Bridge in Just 10 Minutes on D-Day

On the night of June 5th, 1944, 181 men of D Company, 2nd Battalion Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry, boarded six Horsa gliders at RAF Tarrant Rushton and took off into the dark over the English Channel. Their mission was to capture two strategically vital bridges in Normandy intact, the Caen Canal bridge at Benouville and the River Orne bridge at Ranville, before a single Allied soldier set foot on any of the five invasion beaches. Led by Major John Howard and flown by Staff Sergeant Jim Wallwork, the lead glider touched down just 47 yards from the canal bridge at 16 minutes past midnight on June 6th, 1944. Within ten minutes, both bridges were in British hands, secured against demolition and held against German counter-attacks for seventeen hours until commandos led by Lord Lovat arrived from Sword Beach to the sound of Bill Millin's bagpipes. This is the story of Operation Deadstick, the first ground combat action of D-Day, the men who made it possible, and why the success of the entire Normandy invasion depended on what one hundred and eighty one ordinary British soldiers accomplished in the dark in less than ten minutes.