(Image: National Archives)
The horrors of D-Day and the Normandy Landings, which signalled the beginning of Operation Overlord, are almost impossible to comprehend. On the 71st anniversary of the Allied invasion of Normandy, we’ve compiled a series of moments, thoughts and reflections on the monumental, historic event from those who stormed the beaches on June 6, 1944. They risked – and in many cases gave – their lives in a desperate struggle for freedom which is so often now taken for granted.
Jack Beasley, 24th Lancers
Diary entry from June 7, 1944:
“War is hell. For sheer madness of mind my imagination us left cold with incredibility at the immensity of brutal war. Life is unreal in this world of fantastic figures. I am sure that one day we will all awaken to end a most disturbed nightmare.”
Tank wireless operator Jack Beasley, aged 21 on D-Day, survived the war. He does not want to remember it.
Private George E. Burr, 29th Infantry Division
“The night before the landing, we all met with our priest, or chaplain, and said prayers and received communion. On the way to the beach, the men were mostly quiet, keeping thoughts to themselves. I prayed and thought about my home and my family. I asked God to keep watch over me.”
Private Burr was hit 11 days later, wounded by a shell or mortar and taken to a beach hospital where part of his left hand was removed. He was sent to England on a hospital ship, eventually returning home to Connecticut and getting his official discharge papers on Christmas Eve, 1944.
Lt. Gerald Vincent Moran, Canadian Army
Gerald Moran wrote in a letter to his mother:
“By the way, I was one of the first officers hit and don’t know much about what went on among the fellows, although the odd fellow dropped by and gave me a scrap of news here and there. There’s no need in writing it down anyway, I’d never forget the first few hours if I lived centuries. I didn’t get off the beach at all. Got as far as the wall when a sniper got me sort of from the left front through the left upper arm, in my chest and out the back not quite half way over to the middle.”
According to the family, after the invasion, one of the men in Moran’s regiment presented him with the rifle that had been used to shoot him. They took it off the German sniper and saved it for him.
(Image: Erikh; Canadian troops in the vicinity of Juno Beach)
Corporal Ernest Doucette, 293rd Joint Assault Signal Company
Said Ernest Doucette’s daughter, Louise Johnson:
“He shared a story with one of my brothers once, telling him that when he finally had a chance to sit down for a minute, there was not a part of the beach that you didn’t see a dead body or a body part on it. ‘When I sat down, I leaned my hand on the sand for support to rest a minute, and saw blood running up between my fingers.'”
Corporal Doucette survived the war, having landed on Omaha Beach and later fighting in the Pacific theater. He died on November 14, 2002, remembered by his family as a true member of the Greatest Generation.
James Hollis Bearden, Botswain, US Navy
“After the tide came back in, we pulled out ship off the beach and went back to the Merchant Marine ship to reload. Some of the landing crafts would hit sandbars. Thinking they were on the beach, they hurriedly jumped out. Many sailors were drowned. On the third wave, we carried a ship that General George S. Patton was on. […] After the beachhead was secured, we went through these tunnels. One soldier had his left arm shot off above the elbow. Still, he helped us load the wounded.”
James Bearden survived the landing. Wanting to see Paris, he and some friends stole a box from one of their ships. There was a jeep in the box – they put it together and headed into Paris, where they were stopped and asked for identification. He was returned to the ship by military police, and served there for the rest of the war.
Private Jack Port, 4th Infantry Division
“As kids, most of us had a BB gun or a .22 rifle. I used to cry to own one, but my father would not permit us to shoot a gun or use one. He told us we should not ever kill anything. The war came along, and at the age of 20 I was drafted into the army. In 12 short weeks I was converted from a little boy to a combat soldier. […] I landed as a private… no stripes but went to a First Sergeant three stripes above and three stripes below… not because I was brave, but it was due to the process of elimination.”
Private Port survived the landing on Utah Beach, and moved on through the liberation of France from Cherbourg, to Sainte Mere Eglise to Mortain and on to Paris.
(Image: US Army Signal Corps; French Resistance chat with Allied paratroopers)
Captain John R. Armellino, 1st Infantry Division
“The soldiers, fully equipped, climbed down these ladders into the landing craft, which were rolling and turning in the rough waters of the English Channel. We started towards Omaha Beach. One of my landing craft was swamped by the violent seas and sank. To this day, I don’t know how many of those men were lost. Since we were the first combat wave, there was complete silence on the way to the beach. You could hear a pin drop. We didn’t know what to expect when we landed. We soon found out.”
One of Captain Armellino‘s officers, Lieutenant Monteith, succeeded in taking out a German pillbox and taking several prisoners, before being killed by automatic fire. Armellino nominated him for the Congressional Medal of Honor, which he was given posthumously.
Jacques Lazare Julius, French Resistance
“One day we were ordered to cause as much disruption as possible to communication. We had to cut telephone lines, destroy bridges, railway tunnels and railway lines as well as block roads by blowing them up. What was unusual about this (on this day) is that we were ordered to do this in broad daylight. Up until then actions of this sort were done at night under the cover of darkness. Later that evening we heard that the Allies landed in Normandy, 6 June 1944.”
Jacques Julius, who was 22-years-old on D-Day, moved to London after the war and became a tailor for the Royal Household. He passed away in 2013.
William Jennings Arnett, 5th Infantry Division and 26th Infantry Division
“And when we got there, we stayed where we first got off, and we could see there the night like heat lightning, but what it was, was the artillery. And it was continuous, and all night long it was, didn’t worry me any because I knew I would never get hurt. And then the next day we moved up and moved into a field, and one of those Normandy fields, and there were some cows there. And the neighbor, the man who owned the farm, he came in and got his two cows out. And I said we are not going to steal his milk or anything, leave them alone. He knew what he was doing. I didn’t know why he was moving them. I found out a little while later when they started.”
Sergeant Arnett was wounded not long after landing on the beaches of Normandy, but remained with his unit. When VE Day was announced a little less than a year later, it was on the eve of what would have been a planned attack on a village in Czechoslovakia. The attack was called off with the announcement that the war had ended, but Arnett said there was no celebration, only a sigh of relief and a feeling of disbelief that it was all over.
(Image: US National Archives; approaching Omaha Beach)
Pierre Gauthier, Royal Canadian Legion
“I always reminisce about a lot of things. It’s something that you never forget, no matter what age you are. You go through a war and you go to serve in combat and it’s very traumatic, Something stays with you for the rest of your life. […] When we came here and started liberating towns and villages, damn sure we were welcome. We went into villages and girls hugged us and gave us flowers and bottles of wine.”
The French girls may have been glad to see him, but Pierre Gauthier had already met the love of his life, an English girl named Helen. After the war, he would ask her to marry him – it took 10 requests to get her to leave her homeland for him, but she did. As of 2013 they’d been together nearly 70 years.
Roy Aaron Ford, 111th Naval Construction Battalion (Seabees)
“After the bluff above the beach had been secured, a camp area was established and a mess tent set up, which served hot C-rations. Heat didn’t improve the flavor but the hot food was much appreciated. […] One day, we were coming off duty, we discovered a barge with canned goods in cases – six gallons each. I stole a case of fruit cocktail and Howard got a case of peaches. And we supplemented out hot C-rations with delicious canned fruit and shared them with a number of our neighbors and we were very popular for a couple of weeks afterwards.”
After assisting in the securing of the beaches at Normandy, Roy Ford briefly went home for Christmas of 1944. Returning to the Pacific theater, he was part of he invasion of Borneo and then, on the decommissioning of his battalion, was transferred to Guam before being honorably discharged.
August Leo Thomas, LCT 633
“As we got closer to the beach, we could see the sand being kicked up by exploding shells. The skipper altered course slightly to starboard and was immediately ordered to return to our original course. There was smoke rising along the beach from burning vehicles. By this time, Ensign Edwards, who was on Flotilla staff and standing next to the Skipper and I on the conning tower, said to me, ‘Thomas, it looks like they are playing for keeps.’ I said, ‘Yes sir, they are.’ A few minutes after this Ensign Edwards was killed.”
August Leo Thomas was also wounded, receiving a Purple Heart while still deployed overseas. But the citations and medals meant little to him – keeping and enjoying freedom, on the other hand, meant everything.
(Image: IWM; Royal Marines of 47 Commando storm Gold Beach)
Dr. Samuel N. Grundfast, US Navy
“A few minutes thereafter, when we were almost a line abreast, we hit what I later learned was a mine, powerful enough to destroy a ship, let alone a small boat. It literally, I found out later, blew us sky high. The other officer in the boat was killed. All the men were killed except two men and myself. The four tanks were lost and all of the Navy personnel except the motor mach, Richard Abernathy, and the signalman, whose name I can’t recall. But I can recall that I met him on a hospital ship and he just had a band-aid. He wasn’t even scratched.”
After spending several months in hospital and undergoing numerous surgeries, skin grafts, and facial reconstruction, Dr. Samuel Grundfast was eventually put on the USS Hope and sent home to the States. He was met by his parents, who didn’t recognize him – until he spoke.
Sergeant Dalmain H. Estes, 467th Automatic Weapon Battalion, Battery C
“The landing beach was a mess, dead men, knocked out equipment, and other trying to land behind us. It was mass confusion – landing crafts were landing too far off shore, some where landing in the wrong zones, men were being separated from their units, many men were hit in the water and either died of the wounds or drowned. […] Our radio man had both legs blown off within fifteen minutes after we hit the beach, our medic was blown away. […] We took cover under a tank and then it was hit. There were no atheists on the beach that day. We all looked to God for help.”
Sergeant Estes took a Nazi flag from a concrete bunker on the beach at Saint Laurent-sur-Mer. When he returned with his son, 50 years later, for the anniversary of D-Day, he took the flag back and gave it to the mayor of the French town.
(Image: IWM; British soldiers move inland from Sword Beach)
George Rarey, 379th Fighter Squadron
Letter, June 10, 1944:
“Betty Lou, I know how you must feel about old Hugh. I can’t quite believe it myself yet. Doc Finn has already written Janie and I will write her, too – I’m afraid I can’t offer much hope. We were pretty low – busting an airdome – we think he caught some 20mm – think he went in – that’s all I know. It’s a dirty business. I know these things are rougher on you gals than they are on us – but you mustn’t let it bother you too much. Fatalism isn’t the answer, but it’s as good as any other I know of. Try not to worry, old gal, that’s a big order, but that’s the way I want it.”
George Rarey, a cartoonist and commercial artist before the war, kept a sketchbook throughout the war, which can be purchased through the family. Several weeks after D-Day, he was killed in action over France.
Kenneth Trott, No. 146 Wing RAF
“As soon as the pilots had climbed down, we all wanted to know what it was like over the beachhead. Any enemy aircraft seen? How much flak? The weather conditions? What targets had been attacked? Meanwhile, the Squadron Intelligence Officer was hovering around, wanting to speak to each pilot who had taken part in this, our first operation of D-Day. Having slung their parachutes over their shoulders, many walked away to light a cigarette before giving way to the countless questions still coming from all sides.”
Kenneth Trott, from Ilford, London, survived the war, after being taken prisoner; on D-Day +2, he lost his best friend in the operations over St. Lo.
Fritz Weinshank, 293rd Joint Assault Signal Company
“I did not take it as a monumental thing, something that the entire world would be watching. Quite on the contrary. We were concerned with the thing at hand and we didn’t give it a second thought. […] I’m sure that if God had made me an Aryan, my bones would be resting somewhere in Russia, like those of my friends with whom I grew up. There was a friend in Gonsenheim, I take it that he was killed in Russia as a tank commander. My attitude toward the Germans was one of very intense curiosity. I wondered what had happened to them since I left and how the Nazi thing had developed and what they were like. It wasn’t hate exactly, but it wasn’t that I was crazy about them.”
Born and raised in Germany, Fritz Weinshank and his family moved to the United States in 1935. Originally turned down by the Navy because of his German birth, Weinshank served with Allied troops in both the European and Pacific theaters. He was discharged in February 1946 after serving in Manila deciphering Japanese communications.
(Image: Weintraub; wounded troops brought ashore on Utah Beach)
Joseph Beryle, 3rd Battalion, 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment
“We got the stand-up and hook-up, red light, green light, and jumped at 400 feet and I landed on the church roof at Saint-Come-Du-Mont, taking fire from a church steeple, slid down and made by way through a cemetery surrounding a church, over a wall and headed toward our objective, which was two wooden bridges over the Douave River behind Utah Beach. The Germans had torched a house in the area where I jumped and were firing at the planes that followed us. Tracer bullets were criss-crossing the sky. Many troopers were hit before landing. I was loose for almost 20 hours in which time I blew a power substation in Saint-Come-Du-Mont.”
Joseph Beryle was later captured by German forces. He escaped and was recaptured, eventually held in a monastery in Tessy-Sur-Mer, ominously nicknamed Starvation Hill. Taken to a POW camp outside Berlin, he wintered through freezing temperatures, before escaping and heading for Moscow. Finding his way to the embassy, he discovered that he had been listed as killed in action on June 10, 1944; proving he was still alive, he was put on a ship with other freed POWs heading first for Turkey, then Egypt, Italy, and finally to the United States. After being honorably discharged, he returned home, married his sweetheart in the same church that his parents had conducted his funeral mass, and went on to have a daughter, two sons and seven grandchildren.
Ellison Parfitt, 4th Infantry Division
“There was a lot of…. a lot of the troop…. paratroopers had come down in that area. And we found, hanging in the trees, where they’d been very…. I don’t know… how do you say it? They’d been disemboweled. There’s nothing that makes you more angry. I don’t think there were many paratroopers taken prisoners that day. And that same day, I found an old parachute, a cargo chute. And I just wrapped it up, cut the…. cut the down lines off of it. And that kept me warm for, oh, a week or two. It was good to sleep in. […] Shortly, anyway… I had the… oh, the… how you you…. it’s hard to express. One of our tanks was sitting beside the road and burned. And I’m kind of curious. And I got up. I looked in it. And the boys were still in it. But they had been shrunk down to the size of a doll. A terrific… the smell. Burnt ham. That’s all I could think of.”
Ellison Parfitt served alongside General Teddy Roosevelt, Jr., recording all the places they stopped at and fought in on a piece of discarded parachute that still survives today in the archives of the Library of Congress.
Sherman Baxter, 66th Armored Regiment
“During our stay on the LSTs that night there were many men that were so nervous it was hard to believe they were the same men that we had known for months and some fort years. Some were quiet, some were more talkative. I was concerned with the men in my platoon as they were the ones that I’d be close to in combat. I’d talk to the men that wanted to talk and pray with those that wanted to pray. It was hard to not show too much worry of what we had to do. I tried to give courage to all, especially the men who had not seen combat.”
After the D-Day landings, Sherman Baxter was wounded in combat in August of 1944, when a bazooka hit his tank. He returned to his unit a few months later, was promoted to Staff Sergeant, and was eventually discharged to return home.
(Image: Normandy Archives; Allied landing craft unloading supplies onto the Normandy beaches)
Kenneth T. Delaney, 1st Infantry Division
“I tried to take care of my own wound. Some GI helped me fix my foot. All the medics were shot; most were killed. I also helped a few GI’s that were wounded and bandaged them up as best I could. I laid up against a cliff and watched them come in, wave after wave. We watched them being shot and killed right in the water. They were floating all around. It was a really bad scene. […] I was awarded the Bronze Star Medal for helping the wounded while still under fire and wounded myself. That was my part of the invasion of Omaha Beach which I’ll never forget. I was wounded three more times after that, and I made all five campaigns in Europe. At the end of the war there was just three of us left, who originally landed on D-Day in my company.”
Kenneth Delaney recovered from his wounds in time to fight in the Battle of the Bulge. He was discharged in January of 1946.
Ernie Pyle, Scripps-Howard Newspapers War Correspondent
“Submerged tanks and upturned boats and burned trucks and shell-shattered jeeps and the sad little personal belongings strewn forever on these bitter sands. That, plus bodies of soldiers lying in rows covered with blankets, the toes of their shoes sticking up in a line as though on drill. And other uncollected bodies still sprawling grotesquely in the sand or lying half-hidden by high grass behind the beach.”
Ernie Pyle would survive D-Day, but he would not survive the war. Still one of the most famous World War Two journalists, he was killed on April 18, 1945, by a machine gun bullet on the island of Ie Shima.
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