Frank Hall presented a Normandy Travelogue based on his tour of the Normandy Beaches with his wife, Pat. Frank’s hobby is creating travelogues based on pictures he takes on his trips. As a background, Frank says his favorite place to visit is Italy, probably because of the food, the most beautiful place he has visited is Canadian Lake Louise and the most heart rendering is the American Cemetery at Normandy. The present travelogue was pictorialized on a cruise from Barcelona to London, with a guided tour of the Normandy Beaches.
The Normandy Beaches today do not resemble the war zone on June 6, 1944, D-Day. The beaches are clean and pristine and the cliffs are overgrown with vegetation. At that time, against entrenched German infantry and artillery and machine gun batteries, the allies landed over 160,000 troops on the German occupied Normandy Coast. The casualties that day were horrendous, especially at Omaha Beach and under the cliffs at Point Du Hoc. There were five landing beaches on D-day, Omaha, Utah, Juno, Gold and Sword. The United States was assigned the task of landing at Omaha and Utah beaches, whereas the British, Canadians and a consortium of other allies landed on the other three beaches. The landings on D-day were depicted in the Black and White movie, The Longest Day, and some of the events that actually occurred were dramatized in the movie.
Frank’s photos of the American Cemetery at Normandy sadly show crosses and other burial monuments to the 9,200 dead Americans buried there, who gave their lives to put an end to World War II. Most of the buried in the Cemetery were under 21 years of age and most all young men. There are three women, who were killed during the invasion, who are buried there also. The original cemetery has been moved to its present location and is under the supervision of the United States Park Department. A solitary statue in the Cemetery is dedicated to the spirit of American Youth. A plaque and map at the Cemetery assists visitors to find the location of a person buried there. The American flag flies over the memorial cemetery to those who gave their lives that fateful day in June, 1944.
The cliffs above Omaha Beach today are somewhat the same as they were 69 years ago during the battle, and yet vegetation has created a more serene look to the bloody battle that took place. Army Rangers scaled the cliffs at Pont Du Hoc to put out of commission a German fortification; the pill box still stands there today as a memorial to the brave Rangers who trained to put it out of commission and climbed the cliff from the beach below. On top of the cliff, bomb craters litter the landscape, where American bombers dropped tons of explosives to try and knock out the pill boxes. There weren’t only German soldiers defending this point The Germans has “enlisted” men of other nationalities and teenagers to guard the beaches in case of an invasion. Many surrendered when the outcome was assured. At Vierville, the citizens have a museum commerating the invasion and the men of U.S. 29th Infantry Division, who helped liberate the town. A German 88 mm Gun stands in stark contrast to the peaceful village of today.
The tour took Frank’s group to St.Mere Eglise, a village off of the coast, which is where U.S. paratroops from the 101 St. Airborne Division were parachuted in during the dark hours before the seaborne invasion began. In the movie, the Longest Day, a paratrooper (played by Red Buttons) lands and is snagged on the tower of the chapel at St. Mere Iglese and helplessly watches other paratroops land in the town and attacked by German soldiers. He later was rescued by the townsfolk. To commerate that event, there is a parachute and mannequin of a US paratrooper hanging from the tower. St. Mere Iglese has other mementos of the war at the village, a Sherman Tank, C-47 Jump plane and mannequins of paratroops boarding the plane. Many of the paratroops had their hair cut in the Mohawk fashion thinking that the Germans feared American Indians.
We owe a debt of gratitude to those who fought and died at Normandy, and as one Frenchman told Frank, if the allies had not prevailed, they would be speaking German today.