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Memories of D-Day, Replayed on the Normandy Coast On 70th Anniversary, the Memories of D-Day Are Replayed at Normandy
(about 17 hours later)
VIERVILLE-SUR-MER , France — At Camp Dog Green, recreated just a few miles inland from where combat raged on and around the Normandy beaches in June 1944, soldiers in American uniforms and nurses with the Red Cross insignia on their breast pockets mill among the drab green tents, tuning their tinny radios to the music of Glenn Miller. They appear to be just waiting for orders. VIERVILLE-SUR-MER, France — At Camp Dog Green, recreated just a few miles inland from where combat raged on and around the Normandy beaches in June 1944, soldiers in American uniforms and nurses with the Red Cross insignia on their breast pockets mill among the drab green tents, tuning their tinny radios to the music of Glenn Miller. They appear to be just waiting for orders.
For these “troops,” death is a remote idea: They are all re-enactors from France, Belgium, Holland and elsewhere who have a passion for recreating the environment that surrounded D-Day, complete with vintage cars and trucks. The women have swept their hair back into buns and wear the bright red lipstick favored in the ‘40s. For their off-duty hours, some have even brought period polka-dot dresses. For these “troops,” death is a remote idea: They are all re-enactors from France, Belgium, the Netherlands and elsewhere who have a passion for recreating the environment that surrounded D-Day, complete with vintage cars and trucks. The women have swept their hair into buns and wear the bright red lipstick favored in the ’40s. For their off-duty hours, some have even brought period polka-dot dresses.
The goal, said Serge Balleux, the president of a Belgian association called Duty First, which staged another re-enactment camp on the Normandy coast, is to make the environment exactly like “what happened here 70 years ago.”The goal, said Serge Balleux, the president of a Belgian association called Duty First, which staged another re-enactment camp on the Normandy coast, is to make the environment exactly like “what happened here 70 years ago.”
That camp, Cecil Breeden, named for a medic who treated many soldiers during the invasion, is a reproduction of a makeshift base that American soldiers set up as battle raged in the surrounding countryside. Mr. Balleux has spared no detail to make the camp look authentic. The soldier re-enactors stand in line to receive their pay and in their spare time play dice in their tents, which are restored from the era. That camp, Cecil Breeden, named for a medic who treated many soldiers during the invasion, is a reproduction of a makeshift base that American soldiers set up as battle raged in the surrounding countryside. Mr. Balleux has spared no detail to make the camp look authentic. The soldier re-enactors stand in line to receive their pay, and in their spare time play dice in their tents, which are restored from the era.
“I want to show the public how the G.I. lived here,” Mr. Balleux said. “I want to show the public how the G.I.s lived here,” Mr. Balleux said.
Seventy years after D-Day, the huge invasion has long since taken on the aura of myth. The heroism and sacrifice have become the stuff of history books, novels and movies, and they have now inspired the transformation of this part of Normandy into a sort of history theme park. It has become a touchstone for the leaders of the United States, Britain, France and the other Allies, who again gathered here Friday under sunny skies to invoke the heroism of the day. In the 70 years since June 6, 1944, the invasion has taken on the aura of myth, and become a touchstone for the leaders of the United States, Britain, France and the other Allies, who gathered here Friday under sunny skies to invoke the heroism of the day. It has also inspired the transformation of this part of Normandy into a sort of history theme park.
Many villages on this small stretch of coast along the English Channel are participating in the commemoration of the Allied landing and eventual liberation of France from Nazi Germany. Just one of the celebrations, the annual D-Day Festival, which will be held in Arromanches, Isigny-sur-Mer and Grandcamp-Maisy among other villages, will last two weeks and will feature fireworks, swing music concerts and Liberation balls this year. In Sainte-Mère-Église, the celebrations include the re-enactment of a parachute drop. Many villages on this small stretch of coast along the English Channel are participating in the commemoration of the Allied landing, and the liberation of France that it began. One celebration, the annual D-Day Festival, will last two weeks, with fireworks, swing music concerts and Liberation balls. Another in Sainte-Mère-Église will include the re-enactment of the famous parachute drop on the town.
Yet D-Day has not yet faded entirely into nostalgia and tourism. Seventy years on, the annual commemoration still draws veterans who stormed the beaches and fought their way inland amid chaos, fear and death. For them, the contrasts between what was and what has been reimagined can be jarring. What has been sanitized and mythologized for most of those who have come to celebrate what the Allied forces achieved that day is for the surviving soldiers who landed at Omaha, Utah, Sword, Juno and Gold beaches still very real and very messy. The most prominent commemorations were held on Friday, a day of fireworks and flyovers, with President Obama and other leaders from Europe and around the world. Overlooking Omaha Beach, where American soldiers faced their hardest fight to get ashore. Mr. Obama called the invasion the most “powerful manifestation of America’s commitment to human freedom” and singled out the veterans on hand.
“Fewer of us have parents and grandparents to tell us about what the veterans of D-Day did here 70 years ago,” Mr. Obama said. “So we have to tell their stories for them.” After he finished, one gray-haired veteran in a wheelchair forced himself to his feet and made his way unsteadily across the stage to shake the president’s hand, clasping it with emotion.
Later at a more elaborate ceremony at Sword Beach, where British troops came ashore, world leaders watched an interpretive dance performance, punctuated by the roar of cannons and flames on the beach. While black-and-white images from the war, including an execution, played on jumbo screens behind them, performers in menacing black uniforms knocked down others in gray overalls, followed by performers mimicking soldiers dying on the beaches.
D-Day has not yet faded entirely into nostalgia and tourism. The annual commemoration still draws veterans who stormed the beaches and fought their way inland amid chaos, fear and death. For them, the contrasts between what was and what has been reimagined can be jarring. What has been sanitized and mythologized for most of those who come to celebrate can still be, for the survivors with firsthand memories of Omaha, Utah, Sword, Juno and Gold beaches, very real and very messy.
John Trippon, 92, of Sun City West, Ariz., who served as a technical sergeant with what he referred to as the “landing craft infantry,” walked through Camp Dog Green, hardly seeming to notice the re-enactors. In his mind’s eye, he was once again a confused young soldier trying to make it to shore.John Trippon, 92, of Sun City West, Ariz., who served as a technical sergeant with what he referred to as the “landing craft infantry,” walked through Camp Dog Green, hardly seeming to notice the re-enactors. In his mind’s eye, he was once again a confused young soldier trying to make it to shore.
“What happened should have never happened to anybody,” Mr. Trippon said.“What happened should have never happened to anybody,” Mr. Trippon said.
“I came in the second wave,” he said. His landing craft had to nose its way through the floating bodies of soldiers who had not made it to the beach.“I came in the second wave,” he said. His landing craft had to nose its way through the floating bodies of soldiers who had not made it to the beach.
The German fire was so relentless that rather than approach the shore, the boats dropped his unit in the sea, about 350 feet from land. The German fire was so relentless that rather than venture any closer to shore, the landing boats dropped his unit in the sea about 350 feet from land.
“And so we went down in the water,” he said. “It kept going over my head because the Americans had been bombing the coast line here for about six weeks prior to the invasion and there were a lot of craters under the water, and the one I went into was way over my head. And I had a Browning automatic rifle across my shoulders and bandoleers of ammo, hand grenades and a gas mask, and I had to get rid of all that otherwise I would be drowned. “And so we went down in the water,” he said. “It kept going over my head, because the Americans had been bombing the coastline here for about six weeks prior to the invasion, and there were a lot of craters under the water. And the one I went into was way over my head. And I had a Browning automatic rifle across my shoulders and bandoleers of ammo, hand grenades and a gas mask, and I had to get rid of all that. Otherwise I would be drowned.
“When I got on the shore, all I had left was my helmet and my gas mask, no gun. “When I got on the shore, all I had left was my helmet and my gas mask — no gun,” he said.
“I picked up a gun off the beach because there were so many guys that had been killed so the guns were lying on the beach. And a friend of mine who was from Oshkosh, Wis., hollered to me to come over and have shelter from the machine guns,” he said, tears in his eyes. “I picked up a gun off the beach, because there were so many guys that had been killed, so the guns were lying on the beach. And a friend of mine who was from Oshkosh, Wis., hollered to me to come over and have shelter from the machine guns,” he said, tears in his eyes.
“Of the 560 of us who landed that day, only 240 of us were alive,” at the end of it, he said. “Of the 560 of us who landed that day, only 240 of us were alive” at the end of it, he said.
“Then, when we went home, there was only 120 of us, and now there are only three,” he said, tears covering his face. “Then, when we went home, there was only 120 of us. And now there are only three.” Tears covered his face. “That’s my story.”
“That’s my story.” This year has a special poignancy because it is likely to be one of the last for many aging veterans who witnessed what the war correspondent Ernie Pyle called the “long thin line of personal anguish” — the things left behind by the thousands who were killed.
This year’s celebration has a special poignancy because it is likely to be one of the last attended by large numbers of those who witnessed what the war correspondent Ernie Pyle called the “long thin line of personal anguish,” referring to the belongings left behind by the thousands who were killed that day. Mr. Pyle wrote of their “socks and shoe polish, sewing kits and diaries, Bibles and hand grenades” strewn on the beaches, as still more Allied troops poured in from across the English Channel.
Mr. Pyle described their “socks and shoe polish, sewing kits and diaries, Bibles and hand grenades” strewn on the beaches as still more Allied troops poured in from across the English Channel. Arthur Boon, an 89-year-old Canadian veteran who joined the 19th Royal Regiment of Canadian Artillery in 1940 and participated in D-Day, was walking in Sainte-Mère-Église when he saw three men in German uniforms. Startled, he said he found himself thrown back to the days of the invasion, when German enemies were as close as the woods that loom over the beaches.
Arthur Boon, an 89-year-old Canadian veteran who joined the 19th Royal Regiment of Canadian Artillery in 1940 and participated in D-Day, was walking in Sainte-Mère-Église when he saw three men in German uniforms. Startled, he said he found himself thrown back to the days of the landing, when Germans were as close as the woods that loom over the beaches. The sight, he said, brought back the noise of that day, the artillery booming from sea and land, so loud that he could not hear his comrades speak.
The sight, he said, brought back the terrible noise of that day, the artillery booming from sea and land so that he and his comrades could not hear each other.
“It was noise, noise, noise, all day long,” he recalled. “It’s the only day of the 12 months we fought from here to Germany that I ever heard that much noise. Just unbearable.”“It was noise, noise, noise, all day long,” he recalled. “It’s the only day of the 12 months we fought from here to Germany that I ever heard that much noise. Just unbearable.”