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Lot 190

WORLD WAR TWO - OPERATION NEPTUNE
Top Secret. Operation Neptune: Naval Operation Orders (Short Title: ON), Allied Naval Commander-in-Chief, Expeditionary Force, 10 April 1944; and 3 others (4)

15 June 2016, 14:00 BST
London, Knightsbridge

Sold for £5,000 inc. premium

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WORLD WAR TWO - OPERATION NEPTUNE

Top Secret. Operation Neptune: Naval Operation Orders, manuscript amendments throughout in red, green and blue ink, numerous pasted-on typed addenda, folding charts, secured with wing-nuts between publisher's printed boards, rubbed, folio, Allied Naval Commander-in-Chief, Expeditionary Force, 10 April 1944--Restricted: Issued for Government Use Only. English Channel Handbook, second edition, numerous charts in blue and yellow, coastal views and profiles after photographs, loose-leaf in publisher's buckram ring-binder, rings slightly rusted, lightly rubbed, 4to, Hydrographic Department, 1943 [preface dated March 1944]; together with 2 related typescripts (4)

Footnotes

"The enclosed operation orders... are on no account to fall into the hands of the enemy and are to be destroyed by fire on conclusion of the operation" (upper cover): the naval orders for the D-Day Landings of 6 June 1944, used by Commander Thomas Harland, Staff Officer Operations with the Allied Naval Commander-in-Chief's Expeditionary Force (ANCXF). Harland was awarded the OBE for his work in planning the invasion of Normandy.

Sets of the Naval Operation Orders were issued to all major war vessels, survey ships, repair ships, accommodation ships, LST-class landing ships, and certain senior officers and commanders. The present set is described on the upper cover as "Copy No. 3". Hugely detailed, it includes plans for minelaying and sweeping, diversions, instructions for Task Forces and Assault Forces prior to and after "H Hour", air operations, the establishment of Mulberries and Gooseberries, "Mickey Mouse Diagrams", and Operation Pluto (including Tombola and Amethea). The manuscript amendments were made by I.E.V. Moon (presumably a clerk within the office of the ANCXF), and comprise four main sequences of amendments made between 6 May and 25 May 1944, and eighteen signal amendments from 26 May to 7 August 1944.

Also included in the lot are: Commander (later Captain) Harland's typescript of a lecture he gave on the history of the D-Day planning; typed 13-page memoir of his involvement in the planning of Operation Neptune, sent around Christmas 1944 to Captain Russell Grenfell, Naval Correspondent to the Sunday Times, lightly censored by the office of the Chief of Naval Information.

Provenance: Captain Thomas Harland RN (1900-1967); thence by family descent to the present owners. See illustration on preceding page.

Additional information

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