At sixteen minutes past midnight on 6 June 1944, Allied soldiers set foot on French soil near the village of Ranville.

British airborne troops were among the first Allied forces to arrive in France. At 00.16 on D-Day gliders landed beside two vital crossings over the Orne River and the Caen Canal, the latter known as ‘Pegasus Bridge’. Soldiers of the Oxford and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry overcame the German guards and sent out the radio signal “Ham and Jam”, a code phrase confirming that the bridges had been taken.

This remarkable feat of courage and skill did not come without cost. Along the back wall of Ranville Churchyard are the graves of glider pilots and paratroopers who died on 6 and 7 June 1944, buried alongside the ancestors of local people they had fought to liberate.

Pegasus Bridge with the assault force gliders in the background.

The soldiers at the bridges near Ranville were just the first of thousands of troops of the 6th Airborne Division who arrived by parachute and glider in the early hours of D-Day. Exceptionally trained, equipped, motivated and led, they were an elite formation tasked with securing the eastern flank of the Allied invasion. They faced many dangers when they arrived behind enemy lines, and casualties were high. Nearly 20% were killed or wounded during the first few hours of battle.

SWORD, JUNO, GOLD

Commandos of 1st Special Service Brigade land on Sword Beach.

A vast Allied invasion fleet of nearly 7,000 ships arrived off the Normandy coast in the early hours of 6 June.

The landings would take place across five beaches codenamed Utah, Omaha, Gold, Juno and Sword, and the German positions defending them were blasted by naval gunfire and bombed by aircraft as the assault boats approached. While American forces landed on Utah and Omaha to the west, British and Canadian troops assaulted Gold, Juno and Sword, between Arromanches and Ouistreham.

Sword Beach

At 7.25am on 6 June, the British 3rd Infantry Division landed on Sword Beach, the most easterly of the landing areas. First ashore were soldiers of the 1st South Lancashire and 2nd East Yorkshire battalions. Allied planners expected them to suffer 70% casualties.

Despite German resistance, casualties were far lighter than expected. The 3rd Division suffered 630 killed, wounded and missing on 6 June, and by the end of the day almost 29,000 troops had come ashore on Sword.

Juno Beach

At 7.45 am, around 15 minutes after the landings on Sword Beach, the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division launched its assault on Juno.

The German defences were formidable on this stretch of coast and soldiers of the Royal Winnipeg Rifles, the Regina Rifles, the Queen’s Own Rifles of Canada and the North Shore (New Brunswick) Regiment, suffered terrible casualties as they attempted to cross the sand and push inland. Testament to their determination, the Canadians overcame the German defences and by the end of the day they had advanced further than any other Allied formation.

Gold Beach

The most westerly of the three Commonwealth beaches, Gold was assaulted by the 50th (Northumbrian) Infantry Division. The first assault troops of the Hampshire, Dorset, East Yorkshire and Yorkshire regiments landed at 7.25 am, along with amphibious tanks of the 8th Armoured Brigade. Fighting together, the tanks and infantry broke through the German beach defences and pushed inland.

In the days that followed, the 50th Division advanced, liberating several French villages. A medical aid station was established near the village of Bazenville, and a small cemetery was close by, then known as ‘Gold Beach Cemetery’. It was later expanded with graves brought from elsewhere and is now the final resting place of more than 870 servicemen, including over 270 Germans.

D-Day in the Air

Supermarine Spitfire Mark IXs flying to Normandy to provide a cover patrol over the beachhead.

D-Day and the Invasion of Normandy required a complicated plan involving all three military arms from the Allied nations. Air power was vital for protecting the invasion flotilla, supporting the beach landings, and delivering airborne troops to their drop zones.

British forces took part in an air assault, dropping troops into France via parachute and glider.

The operation was dangerous for all involved, the gliders were heavily overladen, giving the pilots of the ‘tug’ aircraft little chance of avoiding anti-air fire or escaping enemy night fighters.

Despite this, the operation was broadly successful, including the famous capture of Pegasus Bridge, an important crossing over that Caen canal. Similar operations by American and Canadian forces also proved successful despite stiff opposition, and the airborne forces of the Allies helped prepare the way for the landings at the beaches.

Countless sorties were flown throughout D-Day with aircraft providing air cover for ground forces, attacking vital German transport links and defences, or carrying out diversionary raids, including dropping the ‘window’ – bundles of tin foil slips that would confuse enemy radar.

D-Day at Sea

LSTs (Landing Ship Tank) and LCTs (Landing Craft Tank) off the Normandy coast, 6 June 1944.

The flotilla of Allied ships that crossed the channel on the morning of 6 June was the largest naval fleet ever assembled.

While the utmost was done to protect the fleet from both sea and air attacks, some losses were inevitable.

The most well known of the D-Day naval losses was the Norwegian destroyer Svenner which was sank after being hit by torpedoes fired by German Navy torpedo boats, making it the only Allied ship to be sank by the German navy during the landings. 32 Norwegian crewmen were killed, alongside one British sailor serving onboard: Ordinary Signalman Kenneth Holbrook, who is commemorated on the Plymouth Naval Memorial.

Alongside Svenner, a number of Allied ships and landing craft were damaged or destroyed on 6 June by enemy mines or by fire from, the beach defences. These losses would continue throughout the rest of the campaign, with many sunk by mines or by enemy action.

While those who stormed the beaches of Normandy are honoured, the skill and bravery of the men who got them there can’t be forgotten.

All images © IWM unless otherwise indicated.

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