225th AAA Searchlight Battalion

Activated on 15 November 1942 at Fort Sheridan, Illinois, as the 3rd battalion of the 510th Coast Artillery Regiment, the unit was redesignated the 225th Searchlight Battalion on 20 January 1943. Well trained and technically proficient, the 225th boarded HMS Queen Mary and sailed for Great Britain in December of 1943. At Newcastle-on-Tyne, the battalion shared in the air defense of Great Britain under the operational control of the 30th AAA Battalion (British) and continued rigorous training in the interdiction of enemy targets and provision of homing illumination for Allied aircraft. On 11 June 1944 an advance party from the battalion landed on Omaha Beach to reconnoiter battery positions, and the battalion landed en echelons in the days that followed, deploying in hedgerows around St. Laurent, Isigny, Ste. Mère Eglise, and Carentan. Under tactical control of the 49th AAA Brigade and the 18th AAA Group, the battalion had the mission of protecting six beachhead airstrips by tracking and illuminating enemy aircraft firing automatic weapons. During the Battle of Normandy, the 225th AAA Searchlight Battalion engaged seventy-six aircraft with lights and several with organic machine guns, thereby all but neutralizing the enemy's aerial threat in the battalion's area of operations. As the front moved east, the homing and illuminated canopy techniques honed during the battalion's last months in England facilitated the night landing of returning Allied aircraft. By intersecting the beams of three or more lights above landing fields, the battalion gave pilots a reference point that they could find even during periods of inclement weather. As the Germans retreated eastward, the battalion supported the pursuit and by VE Day had provided some 2,000 homings and 4,000 safe landings for Allied aircraft. Between D+5 and VE Day, the battalion received or shared credit for downing thirty-nine enemy airplanes and rockets. Following brief service in the Army of Occupation, the 225th AAA Searchlight Battalion redeployed to the United States in December of 1945, two years after first boarding HMS Queen Mary.

Bedford, Virginia · United States