The Longues Sur Mer battery is strategically situated on the cliffs between Arromanches and Port en Bessin overlooking the D-Day Normandy Landing beaches. The four 155mm guns with a range of eight miles were in a position to threaten either the Americans landing on OMAHA Beach or the British Landing on GOLD Beach. The guns were naval guns taken from a decomissioned destroyer, therefore the battery was manned by 143 German Navy personnel. On [...]
Pvte John Steele of F Company 505th PIR 82nd Airborne Division jumped into Normandy on the night of 5th-6th June 1944. Poor weather conditions led to a scattered drop and 36 men of Steele's company came down into the Church square of St Mere Eglise where they were captured or killed. Some buildings in the village were on fire and the fires illuminated the night sky, making easy targets of the descending paratroopers. Steele's [...]
Lt. Richard Winters Statue, Utah beach Offically dedicated to all the Allied leaders who saw action on D-Day and in the Normandy Campaign. The statue is unmistakably one of Lt. Richard Winters. Easy Company, 506th Parachute Infantry Regiment, 101st Airborne Division. Anyone who has seen the HBO Mini-Series 'Band of Brothers' will know instantly who he was. The statue was unveiled in June 2012 shortly after the death of Major Richard Winters the previous [...]
Everyone involved in D Day Tours Normandy is delighted to hear that at long last the British Government has recognised the efforts of the men who sailed the Arctic Convoys during the Second World War. these brave men not only had to fight the enemy, but the harshest of sea conditions. We also acknowledge the long overdue award of the Bomber Command Clasp to U.K. and Commonwealth Bomber aircrews.
D Day Landings. Tetrarch Light Tanks On D Day and before, twenty Tetrarch Light Tanks were deployed by the 6th Airborne Recce Regt in Normandy. They were not very successful; several were destroyed in the transportation and landing. Those that survived were outclassed by German armour. They were mostly used for close support particularly by 8 Para in the Bois de Bavent. From Wikipedia: On 13 December 1943, the War Office decided to [...]
I found this memorial quite by chance, only a few miles from our home. It was placed by the people of St. Anne in memory of Pilot Officer James Alexander Downie aged 23 yrs and Pilot Officer Victor Gwyn Ross aged 21 yrs, who were killed when their unarmed Photo-Reconaissance Mosquito (No. MM352) of 544 Squadron RAF crashed into the field behind on 9th June 1944. Downie & Ross are buried in the communal churchyard [...]
