Recreating the heroism of the Normandy front line
Ryan traces the extraordinary events leading up to H-Hour of D-Day and the invasion itself. He considers the build-up of armed forces in the south of England, where countless men, supplies, ships and aircraft had assembled to await the signal that the invasion had begun. Meanwhile, in France, members of the Resistance received, via a BBC broadcast, the line of Verlaine poetry they had been waiting for: ‘Blessent mon coeur d’une langueur monotone’ – the invasion would begin in 48 hours. On the night of 5 June, thousands of Allied paratroopers were dropped into the Normandy countryside (one of whom landed in the garden of General Reichert and, on being questioned, informed the general, ‘Awfully sorry old man, but we simply landed here by accident’). The night saw great losses and greater heroism, including the taking of the formidable Merville Battery, but it was a prelude to the great show of the following day. As dawn rose above the Channel, some 5,000 ships were waiting off the Normandy coast – H-Hour of D-Day had arrived. On Omaha Beach American forces encountered withering fire, and at Pointe de Hoc US Rangers clambered up steep cliffs to disable guns that weren’t even operational. Elsewhere, Canadian divisions faced Russian and Polish volunteers, and British forces on Sword Beach were so unopposed they were able to be piped ashore to the strains of ‘Highland Laddie’. At the end of the day great losses had been counted on both sides, and little had gone according to plan, but the Allies had a toehold in Europe and the race for Berlin had begun.