The cradle of invasion is Cape Cod. We can boast without conceit for we were only onlookers when the Army took over our shore and countryside for invasion practice. At first we weren’t even supposed to know what was going on. And then we weren’t supposed to tell. Invasion was a hush-word in Cape Cod in summers of 1942 and 1943.
Now there is nothing we saw or knew that hasn’t been demonstrated on beaches at Oran, Salerno and Normandy. The news from France tells us, as did the news from Africa and Italy, that invasion was achieved as we saw it practiced along the Cape Cod shore.
Naturally Cape Codders feel the thrill of having been on the inside of something big when it was distinctly and imperatively “inside” stuff. That thrill is nothing lasting. Invasion was practiced by the Marines down in North Carolina. Invasion was practiced on the Gulf of Mexico and on the California shore of the Pacific. Other neighborhoods shared early acquaintance with landing craft and ducks.
But consider! In the first invasion, when Americans landed on the coast of North Africa there were Cape Cod trained amphibians in the vanguard. When Americans landed at Salerno and made the landing stick with their blood, the men who did it were Texas infantrymen trained in amphibious warfare on Cape Cod.
Now the greatest landing of all is made in Normandy. Spearhead of the landing by sea is the American First Infantry Division and the British South Northumbrian Division. First Infantry learned amphibious fighting on Cape Cod. This division was activated at Fort Devens, January 10, 1941. It held peace-time maneuvers over the farms and fields of central Massachusetts. Then it came to Cape Cod for training from a Camp Edwards base. That would, of course, be training from Washburn’s island.
Associated Press asserts the First Division was first infantry division ever trained to storm a land objective from the sea. Later the First went south to engage in amphibious maneuvers with Marines at New River, N. C. Men of the First were in the African invasion at Oran. They fought in Tunis and Sicily. In November, 1943, the division was moved secretly from Sicily to England to prepare for the climax of amphibious assaults.
Since the First was the first infantry division to go through amphibious training and land and water training began on Cape Cod in the spring of 1942 we can be sure that was when the invaders of Normandy were with us. Men of the division were pupils of Brig. Gen. Frank A. Keating who headed our Amphibious Training Command. The Amphibians who were being developed by Brig. Gen. Daniel Noce put the infantrymen ashore for their practice assaults on Cape and Vineyard beaches.
Ground on which successful invaders of Africa, Italy and France learned their stuff is certainly the invasion cradle. Washburn’s island becomes a name and a place of far more than local significance. In mood of exhilaration stimulated by news of progress in Normandy we suggest Washburn’s island ought to become a Falmouth park. Inhere some day we might well erect a memorial to the men who made invasion stick—in Africa, in Italy, in Normandy. They were men who set out from Cape Cod for their great adventure.
Falmouth Enterprise, Falmouth, MA, June 16, 1944