Operation Jupiter (1944)

Operation Jupiter

Memorial to the 43rd (Wessex) Division on Hill 112.

Date	10–11 July 1944
Location	West of Caen, Normandy, France 49°7′25″N 0°27′36″W / 49.12361°N 0.46000°W / 49.12361; -0.46000Coordinates: 49°7′25″N 0°27′36″W / 49.12361°N 0.46000°W / 49.12361; -0.46000
Result	British victory

Belligerents

United Kingdom

Nazi Germany

Commanders and leaders

Richard O'Connor

Wilhelm Bittrich

Casualties and losses

c. 2,000 casualties

unknown

Operation Jupiter was an offensive launched by VIII Corps of the British Second Army on 10 July 1944 during the Battle of Normandy in the Second World War. The objective of the 43rd (Wessex) Infantry Division, commanded by Major-General Ivo Thomas, was to capture the villages of Baron-sur-Odon, Fontaine-Étoupefour, Chateau de Fontaine and to recapture Hill 112. An attached brigade of the 15th (Scottish) Infantry Division would take Éterville, Maltot and the ground up to the River Orne and then the tanks of the 4th Armoured Brigade, supported by infantry, would advance through the captured ground and secure several villages to the west of the River Orne. It was hoped that the initial objectives could be captured by 9:00 a.m., after which the 4th Armoured Brigade would exploit the success.

The British advance went well at first but fighting for Hill 112 took all day and Maltot changed hands several times. On 11 July, counter-attacks by the 10th SS Panzer Division Frundsberg and the 102nd SS Heavy Panzer Battalion in the afternoon, forced the British off the top of Hill 112, to positions on the north-facing slope. The operation was a tactical failure for VIII Corps but a strategic success for the Allies, attrition having reduced the II SS Panzer Corps to a condition from which it never recovered. British operations of the Second Battle of the Odon conducted in the Odon valley continued in July and the 53rd (Welsh) Infantry Division occupied Hill 112 almost unopposed on 4 August, after the Germans withdrew during Operation Cobra and Operation Bluecoat further west. A stone memorial to the 43rd Division was built on the hill in the late 1940s.

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