June 6, 1944 – 80 years ago this week, more than 150,000 U.S., British and Canadian troops attacked the beaches of Normandy, France. A handful of people spoke to NPR about their experiences.
Zhang Aisha, host:
Eighty years ago this week, Allied forces attacked the beaches of Nazi-occupied Normandy, France during World War II. General Dwight D. Eisenhower delivers a speech to the Allied forces on the eve of D-Day.
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Dwight Dysenhower: Soldiers, sailors, and airmen of the Allied Expeditionary Force, you are about to embark on the great expedition for which we have been fighting for months. The eyes of the world are on you.
CHANG: Over the years, NPR has interviewed D-Day veterans. NPR’s Jack Mitchell scoured our archives to share their voices.
JAKE MITCHELL, BYLINE: For Army Sergeant Thelma Jester, D-Day began with a knock on the door.
Therma Clown: Some people came knocking on our door and we went out and the whole sky was filled with the lights of planes and gliders leading troops towards the invasion.
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Richard Dimbleby: I am Richard Dimbleby, speaking from an airport in England on the evening of June 5th, reporting the fact that the first plane carrying the first paratroopers will be at Landing on Fortress Europe tomorrow morning as we begin our big offensive.
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Mitchell: On June 6, 1944, there were more than 11,000 airplanes in the sky. Bombers weakened German defenses from the air, and more than 6,000 ships and landing craft sailed toward the French coast. Jim McLaughlin watched the invasion unfold from the turret of a B-26 bomber.
Jim McLaughlin: I couldn’t believe there were so many boats all over the world, all heading in the same direction – and within minutes I saw that beach.
MITCHELL: Troops were crammed into small, narrow landing craft. Captain Frank Walker remembers encountering strong winds and rough seas.
Frank Walker: It was bouncing. Waves blew by. Before long, everyone in our little boat became seasick.
MITCHELL: The landing craft lowered their ramps, and more than 150,000 American, British and Canadian troops charged head-on into Nazi artillery fire, mines and barbed wire.
Harold Baumgarten: We finally got to the point where they lowered the ramp and got us into neck-deep water.
William Dabney: We were scared, I think actually probably too scared to be afraid. We saw someone crying. We got out of the car and saw someone vomiting.
WALKER: Some of the guys I came out with were actually hit before they even came ashore. I managed to find my superior, who was my colonel, and he had landed early. He can no longer work. He was stunned.
McLaughlin: A bullet hit my rifle. I turned it around and saw a clean hole in front of the trigger guard. Half an inch on each side will go through my chest.
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MITCHELL: These are the voices of U.S. Army veterans Harold Baumgarten and Corporal William Dabney. There were also reporters covering the invasion. CBS’s Larry LeSueur lands on Utah Beach with the Army’s 4th Infantry Division. He carries a typewriter. In 1994, he was interviewed by NPR’s Noah Adams.
NOAH ADAMS, BYLINE: Do you find yourself avoiding the truth and the horror of what you saw because it was too horrific to tell the American people?
Larry LeSueur: Well, yeah, I think so, because I never thought about telling them some of the things that I witnessed. This is not what I should do. I mean, everybody thinks it’s their son. I don’t have his name. If someone is injured or killed, next of kin must be notified regardless. That’s not my place.
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UNIDENTIFIED MAN: Now we have taken the most decisive step of the war, the invasion of Western Europe.
Mitchell: D-Day was an Allied victory and a key turning point during World War II, but it came at a huge cost. More than 4,000 Allied soldiers died during the invasion, including 2,501 Americans. Thousands of Germans were killed or wounded. D-Day remains the largest amphibious invasion in history. Jack Mitchell, NPR News.
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