MODANE
313 Lancasters of 5 and 8 Groups to attack the railway yards on the main line to Italy. The Pathfinder marking, in difficult conditions, was slightly beyond the target but 200 aircraft brought back photographs to show that their bombs fell within 1 mile of the target and the railway system was seriously damaged. No report is available from France.
Minor Operations: 2 Mosquitoes to Dortmund, 7 Stirlings minelaying in the River Gironde and off La Pallice, 20 O.T.U. flights.
No aircraft were lost from the 342 sorties flown on this night.
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CANNES
124 Halifaxes and 10 Lancasters of 4, 6 and 8 Groups to bomb the marshalling yards and railway installations on the main coastal line to Italy. 4 Halifaxes lost.
The night was clear and the Pathfinders marked the target from 5,000 ft but the railway yards were not hit at all and the railway workshops suffered only blast damage. A report from Cannes states that the local people were at first thrilled to see the 'firework display' of the Pathfinders and could even see the R.A.F. aircraft in the moonlight, but the bombing, 'like a typhoon', mainly fell in the working-class suburb of La Bocca, where 39 people were killed, and in the village of d'Agay, where the casualties were not recorded. A local newspaper, under German control, writes of the resentment of the local French people at the inaccurate bombing, particularly as the British had been such popular pre-war visitors to Cannes. The British were, writes the newspaper, 'pure savages' and the raid was 'nothing but murder for British glory … too much like a sport'.
Anthor Viaduct
617 Squadron resumed operations after its period of high-level training with the new 'Stabilizing Automatic Bomb Sight'. 10 Lancasters each dropped one 12,000-lb bomb but could not hit the viaduct. No aircraft lost.
Minor Operations: 29 Mosquitoes to Berlin, Hannover and the Ruhr, 45 aircraft minelaying from Brest to the Frisian Islands, 6 O.T.U. sorties. 1 Halifax and 1 Wellington lost from the minelaying force.
