"CB" Fireflies

[John Tapsell]

I'm looking for information relating to four(?) Sherman Fireflies that were landed on Juno Beach with the engineer assault teams at (or near) H-Hour on D-Day.

They belonged "officially" to a composite Troop of six Fireflies of 259 delivery squadron but were assigned to 2nd Canadian Armoured Brigade (and were probably crewed by men from one or more of the Canadian DD regiments). My guess is that two were assigned to each of the assault brigades.

Their role was to shoot up concrete bunkers and obstacles on the run-in to the beach (CB = concrete buster).

Two Fireflies were landed on Sword Beach via LCT (CB) 2337 at H+5 minutes. They belonged to 13/18 Hussars.

What I'm trying to do is trace the activities of the four Canadian Fireflies.

Any thoughts?

Cheers,
John