Qualla: Exercise Tiger

Exercise Tiger: Introduction

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit CC BY-SA 3.0. On a tank recovered from the seabed and lifted onto a plinth at Slapton Sands, the rust still shows. The tank belonged to the 70th Tank Battalion. It sank in the early hours of 28 April 1944, six weeks before D-Day, when German E-boats slipped through the dark of Lyme Bay and tore into a convoy of American landing ships that should not have been there alone. Within minutes, hundreds of soldiers and sailors were in the water. Within six minutes, one ship was gone. By dawn, 749 American servicemen were dead, and their families would not be told the truth for years.

Read more: Exercise Tiger on Qualla

Image: CC BY-SA 3.0

Exercise Tiger: A Beach That Looked Like Utah

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Jebulon, CC0. Slapton Sands was chosen because it lied so well. A gravel beach, a strip of low land, a freshwater lake behind - the topography matched Utah Beach in Normandy with a fidelity that would later make Hitler suspicious. In late 1943 the British government cleared the area of its civ...

Read more: Exercise Tiger on Qualla

Image: Jebulon | CC0

Exercise Tiger: Friendly Fire at Dawn

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit CC BY-SA 3.0. The first practice assault, on 27 April, went wrong before the second one became a catastrophe. H-hour was set for 07:30, with naval guns firing live shells over the heads of the incoming troops. When several landing ships were late, the commanding admiral delayed H-hour by an ho...

Read more: Exercise Tiger on Qualla

Image: CC BY-SA 3.0

Exercise Tiger: Lyme Bay, Half Past One

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit CC BY-SA 3.0. Convoy T-4 left for the rehearsal landing late on 27 April with eight LSTs full of vehicles and combat engineers from the 1st Engineer Special Brigade. The convoy had been promised two escorts. Only one was actually with them. A British corvette led the ships in a straight line -...

Read more: Exercise Tiger on Qualla

Image: CC BY-SA 3.0

Exercise Tiger: The Forgotten Dead

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Gravesg.ca, CC BY-SA 3.0. By dawn, 551 American soldiers and 198 sailors were dead - 749 men in a single rehearsal, more than would die taking Utah Beach itself on D-Day. The survivors were sworn to silence. Eisenhower, briefed on 29 April, was less troubled by the body count than by ten BIGOT-cleared off...

Read more: Exercise Tiger on Qualla

Image: Gravesg.ca | CC BY-SA 3.0

Exercise Tiger: A Tank Comes Home

Sat, 23 May 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit CC BY-SA 3.0. In 1974 a local Devon hotelier named Ken Small began noticing what local fishermen had been pulling up in their nets for years - shell casings, fragments, military debris. Diving offshore, he found a Sherman tank from the 70th Tank Battalion sitting upright on the seabed. He spen...

Read more: Exercise Tiger on Qualla

Image: CC BY-SA 3.0