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June 6 1944


Okiepan

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Operation Overlord has started D Day 

The Allies are liberating Europe

 

Never Forget our Brave Troops who gave the ultimate sacrifice for Freedom.

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#Aujourd’hui en 1944, 73000 soldats américains débarquaient sur les plages de #Normandie. 6603 furent tués lors du #débarquement / #Today in 1944, 73,000 American forces landed in Normandy on #DDay. 6,603 died

 

 

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Remember the sacrifices of all those in the military, but especially on this anniversary. Ordinary people put in extraordinary circumstances, and despite great losses, the objective was achieved. Civilian soldiers, sailors, airmen, made, and make, the difference. 

Today we remember their sacrifice.

 

To truly honor all our military, and what they did, and do, we all have to be responsible to ensure what they did, will not have been in vain.

Each generation must be vigilant, and responsible, to safeguard that effort, and sacrifice....for it could only take one generation to undo everything, if they are not responsible, and educated. As parents, and grandparents, it is our responsibility to make sure this is instilled in the coming generations. It is NOT the responsibility of "the village", or the school, or the neighbors, or the politicians (God forbid). 

 

As a veteran, and the son of a veteran, I so much appreciate what our military folks do, and put up with, to get their objectives accomplished. 

 

We remember, and cherish, this day, as a day of sacrifice, and the beginning of the destruction of an evil empire. The axis sowed the wind...they reaped the whirlwind, and D-Day was the beginning of the reckoning. 

 

What is amazing is, our men and women did not ask to be put in those situations, they did not like it, they did not want it, but they, never-the-less, did it, persevered, and had the determination to do what needed, what had, to be done. Definitely, the greatest generation. 

 

 

 

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For a larger accounting:

 

Quote

On D-Day, the Allies landed around 156,000 troops in Normandy. 73,000 American (23,250 on Utah Beach, 34,250 on Omaha Beach, and 15,500 airborne troops), 83,115 British and Canadian (61,715 of them British) with 24,970 on Gold Beach, 21,400 on Juno Beach, 28,845 on Sword Beach, and 7,900 airborne troops.

 

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This will be the last year I will be able to post this. From my dad. The only writing from him about the war. After the war he became a police officer for over 30 years. I served and also became a cop for 26 1/2 years. Great uncle WW1 who also became a cop till he was fatally wounded during a robbery. 

 

 

 

I was a member of Task Force “A”, commanded by Brig. Gen. James A. Gavin. Task Force “A” consisted of the 505th, 507th and 508th Parachute Infantry Regiments and the 325th Glider Infantry – all elements of the 82nd Airborne Division.

I was with “B” Company, 1st Battalion, 508th Parachute Infantry. We were at an airfield at Cottesmore, England, on June 5, 1944. We had been alerted that day, but later the alert was canceled. At 1500 hours, again on June 5, we were assembled at the airfield with full combat equipment. This consisted of an M-1 rifle, 156rounds of .30 caliber ammo, a .45-caliber pistol with three magazines of ammo, an entrenching shovel, knife, canteen, first-aid packet, four grenades, rations, maps, a raincoat, our main parachute and the reserve chute. At this time I weighed about 165 lb. With all that equipment, I weighed about 265 lb.

Our pathfinder teams (to mark the drop zones) left before midnight and landed in the Drop Zones about 0100 or 0200 hours on June 6, 1944. The fields and areas were marked wherever possible and Task Force A left on time and jumped from an altitude of 600 feet at about 0415 hours on D-Day, June 6, 1944.

We landed near the Merderet River, north of Lu Fiere, France about three miles from the Lu Fiere Bridge, not too far from the town of St. Mere-Eglise. This was determined much later. At the time we were some three miles from where we were supposed to be, were in a swamp, and were totally lost for about four hours. Later on in the morning we joined up with another group from the 505th and later with our own battalion.

We spent most of our time avoiding enemy units (both in front and to our rear) and returning fire only when necessary. The bridge was taken and we passed on to the town of St. Mere-Eglise.

The battle continued on to the town of La Haye-du-Puits, where on July 3, 1944, the regiment participated in the final attack of our part of the Normandy Invasion. We were withdrawn on July 11, 1944, and a few days later were returned to our billets in England.

During our campaign, our regiment, the 508th, had 46% of the members killed, missing in action or evacuated as wounded.

I celebrated my 19th birthday on June 12, 1944 at St. Mere-Eglise – with coffee heated over the exhaust system of a truck and cold rations. A picture of Paul Goforth and myself was taken on June 14th 1944, at St. Mere-Eglise. Goforth was killed on June 17, 1944.

A picture of me pointing to a glider was taken sometime in April or May 1944, at the airfield. I trained in this glider, with the number 13, but did not fly in the invasion, as I jumped.

The 325th Glider Regiment entered the battle on June 8, 1944 (D-Day plus 2) and suffered even greater losses, as the fields were full of obstacles and stakes and many of them broke up on landing.

 

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I had found this on a defense.gov page a few years ago, the link to which doesn't seem to be working now.  Fortunately, I had copied it:
 

D-Day By the Numbers By the end of June 11 (D +5):

· 326,547 troops

· 54,186 vehicles, and

· 104,428 tons of supplies ...had arrived on the beaches.

 

· War planners projected that the first 20 days after the initial assault could potentially require 5,000 tons of gasoline.

· Operation Pluto provided more than 1 million gallons of oil to Allied Troops daily.

· The estimated 3,489 long tons of soap would be required the first four months in France.

· ~17 million maps are estimated to have supported the D-Day mission.

· 20,000 tons of supplies per day were unloaded at Utah and Omaha beaches within weeks of the D-Day assault.

· 10,000 Seabees of Naval Construction Regiment 25 built substantive pontoon causeways onto the D-Day beaches so Allied troops could charge forward.

· By D-Day, ~300 billion units of penicillin were available to armed services crossing the channel. · 2,830 calories were in the Krations U.S. soldiers received during World War II.

· In 1939, Hershey reportedly produced 100,000 ration bars per day. However, this number increased to 24 million/week by the end of the war.

Maybe someone else can get it to work:

https://www.defense.gov/Portals/1/features/2016/0516_dday/docs/d-day-fact-sheet-the-supplies.pdf

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