(war-substantive), and also to the temporary rank of major-general. The plan for the Allied invasion of Normandy was for five Allied divisions (two US, two British and one Canadian) to land on designated beaches between Varreville in the west, on the Cotentin Peninsula, and Ouistreham, by the mouth of the river Orne, in the east. Airborne troops were to secure each flank of the beachhead, with the US 82nd and 101st Airborne Divisions landing on the western flank, and the British 6th Airborne Division, under Gale, on the eastern flank. The 6th Airborne Division was to capture a number of bridges over the river Orne and the Caen Canal and hold the nearby surrounding areas, to destroy the bridges over the river Dives, and, finally, to destroy the Merville Gun Battery by the coast. Shortly after midnight on 6 June 1944, known otherwise as D-Day, men of Major John Howard's 'D' Company of the 2nd Battalion, Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry (2 OBLI), a glider infantry unit forming part of the 6th Airlanding Brigade, landed in glider and captured the Caen canal and Orne river bridges (now known as Pegasus Bridge and Horsa Bridge) via coup de main. It was achieved with light casualties. The two parachute brigades, the 3rd and 5th, landed soon after and landed, for the most part, where intended, although numbers of paratroopers dropped in the flooded countryside. The Merville Gun Battery also fell, although with heavy losses to Lieutenant-Colonel Jock Pearson's 8th Parachute Battalion. At dawn, Gale himself landed in Normandy by a glider piloted by Billy Griffith. By midday on D-Day elements of Brigadier Lord Lovat's 1st Special Service Brigade had landed at Sword Beach, with the British 3rd Infantry Division following, and began to relieve the airborne troops at the bridges. The arrival of the rest of the 6th Airlanding Brigade in the evening, in Operation Mallard, completed the 6th Airborne Division's concentration in Normandy. The next week saw the 6th Airborne Division, serving as part of Lieutenant-General John Crocker's I Corps, engaged in almost constant fighting, notably at Bréville, in an attempt to prevent the Germans from driving the Allies back into the sea. After mid-June, when German counterattacks ceased, the division, reinforced by the 1st and 4th Special Service Brigades, spent the next two months in a static defence role, holding a nine thousand yard front southwards from the sea. In