The château is located on the west side of the Canal de Caen à la Mer, on the southeast edge of the town of Bénouville, and just southwest of the Pegasus Bridge, made memorable on D-Day. During World War II the château/maternity hospital was run since 1935 by Madame Lea Vion surnamed 'la comtesse', director (from 1947-1953 she was even mayor of Benouville) who also led a resistance group of the GMO belonging to the réseau 'Centurie'. The maternity hospital became a hearth of resistance for the region. Fugitive Allied pilots and French youth unwilling to work for the Germans found a safe haven here. Weapons and a maquis-wireless transmitter were hidden here. Vion was in frequent contact with resistance activists Leonard Gille, Rene Duchez and Henri Leveille. One of her informants was Georges Gondrée, the café owner near the bridge over the Caen Canal, who secretly collected information on German defences there for the benefit of D Company 2nd Ox and Bucks under Major John Howard who would storm the bridge successfully in the night before D-Day. Via Madame Vion this important information from Gondree was sent through to England. On D-Day morning soldier Wally Parr, a sniper from the Ox and Bucks, fired some rounds from a German 5 cm anti tank-gun towards and over the château, because he erroneously thought German snipers to be present upon the roof of the building after he had seen 'something flickering'(most probably the field binoculars of an observing German Lieutenant). Major Howard made him stop this dangerous activity. Howard told Parr there were women in labour inside the chateau. At this very same moment, however, German Lieutenant Hans Hoeller, artillery officer from 8. Kompanie (Schwere Waffen), 192. Panzergrenadierregiment, Kampfgruppe Rauch, 21st Panzerdivision was standing on top of the château together with a sergeant and soldier in order to observe the canal bridge. Earlier Hans Hoeller had frustratingly found that his anti-tank troop could not pass through Benouville, because of too heavy resistance from British parachutists belonging to A Company, 7th Para Battalion under command of Nigel Taylor. He sought a suitable place to set up his batteries. Madame Vion had tried in vain to stop Lt. Hoeller from entering the "chateau". Hoeller and his colleagues were subsequently forced by Wally Parr's shelling to retreat downstairs immediately before opening their own fire on the Ox and Bucks defending the canal bridge nearby.