- 5/17/2025
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00:30All I remember about the next thing is a blinding flash and, you know, a terrible bloody smell
00:42of cordite and things like that, but it was all just a mess, because the Germans, anything
00:52that was moving, they were shooting.
00:59The beach was covered in bodies and tanks and smoke.
01:14Everything was brighter, in my mind, than it would have been normally.
01:29This was it.
01:44Can you tell me about D-Day itself?
02:07Testing, testing, one, two, three. Testing, testing, one, two, three.
02:11Testing, testing, one, two, three.
02:18What had they told you beforehand to expect?
02:20Expect hell. They didn't lie to us about that.
02:25It was sheer nerves. Exhilarating nerves, if you know what I mean.
02:30Your task will not be an easy one. Your enemy is well-trained, well-equipped and battle-hardened.
02:45He will fight savagely.
03:00Mr Kelly, real one, can you tell me whereabouts you were born, please, first of all?
03:14Well, I was born in Liverpool, in a street called Doncaster Street.
03:26And what did your father do?
03:28My father was a sailmaker, and so was his entire family, actually.
03:37When the war came, what were you doing then?
03:40I think I was about 17 years of age. The bombing started at the end of, well, the early 1941.
03:52The corner of the street was actually destroyed by a semi-bomb.
03:56So I signed up for the Royal Marines.
03:59Because my eldest brother was already in the Marines then, and he was on leave.
04:05And he looked absolutely magnificent in his blue uniform.
04:17Why did you immediately volunteer?
04:20Well, it was a feeling amongst young men at that time that something was going to happen,
04:26and the Germans were at it again, and we weren't going to let them do that.
04:30And pride, I suppose, and patriotism, and the unknown sense of adventure again, I suppose.
04:41I told my mother that I was going to join the Marines, and of course she was upset.
04:47What did your mother say to you when you found out?
04:50Er...
04:52Please don't go.
04:55Wait until your father comes home. I'll talk it over with him.
05:05In 1944, World War II has been raging for over four years.
05:11From one side of Europe virtually to the other is under German control.
05:15This is Nazi territory.
05:17Germany is beginning to bring the war increasingly to Britain's doorstep,
05:21and there's a sense that, really, Britain's the only little bit that's left.
05:25The Allies had been thinking about how to get back into Europe
05:28ever since the defeat at Dunkirk in 1940.
05:32The ultimate goal is to get into Germany,
05:36the end point being that they get to Berlin,
05:39that they can overthrow Hitler in his own city at the very centre of the Third Reich.
05:44The Allies contemplated various different options for how this could be done,
05:47the best way, ultimately, to get to Germany.
05:50And they reasoned that the only way to do that is via northern France,
05:54just across the Channel from Britain.
05:58But to do this, they would need hundreds of thousands of men,
06:02and volunteers like James Kelly were key.
06:27I got a text emerald out of Majesty's safe.
06:30She said, what's this?
06:33So I said, I don't know.
06:36She said, what are you going to tell your father?
06:40So I said, I'm not sure.
06:42But I said, I'll do it on the face of the Germans and him.
06:57GERMANY, SEPTEMBER 1941
07:03For six months, I was at the Resistance Nest 62
07:09on the beach of the Kolewilfsee Sea.
07:21We wanted to defend our homeland.
07:24Because for us, our homeland was,
07:27through the many bomb attacks,
07:30more and more drawn into the Greeks.
07:38Every single soldier in these Resistance Nests
07:42was ordered to fight to the last cartridge and not to surrender.
07:47People like Franz Goeppel believed,
07:50if the Allies land, he would have to fight and die.
07:54There was only a slim chance to survive.
08:02Germany always knew that the Allies
08:05were highly likely to mount an invasion.
08:10And in anticipation of that,
08:12they created a huge series of fortifications
08:15all along the north of Europe that became known as the Atlantic Wall.
08:19Gun positions, bunkers, etc,
08:21that were all put together with the single intention of ensuring
08:25that if the Allies were to come, when the Allies came,
08:29then they would be pushed straight back into the ocean.
08:34The Germans also started to fortify the beaches,
08:37putting all sorts of armaments, barbed wire, huge pieces of equipment
08:41that would basically stop any landing force from being able to get too far.
08:46The beaches themselves were also mined.
08:49And above the beaches, there were strongpoints,
08:52manned by German troops who were armed with machine guns.
09:16When you look at the average German infantry division
09:20in the West in June 1944,
09:23they normally consist of 40% young recruits,
09:2617 or 18 years old, with still a solid training,
09:30but without any war experience.
09:35The German infantry division,
09:37which consisted of 40% young recruits,
09:4017 or 18 years old,
09:42with still a solid training,
09:44but without any war experience.
10:13Eventually, the Allies identified five beach landing areas
10:17across Normandy in northern France,
10:20where over 100,000 troops would land on D-Day.
10:24From the West, they went from Utah, Omaha,
10:28Gold, Juneau, and Sorbonne.
10:32The Allies were able to secure the beaches,
10:35and the Germans were able to secure the beaches.
10:38Utah, Omaha, Gold, Juneau, and Sorbonne.
10:42So Utah and Omaha were identified as being the American beaches.
10:47Juneau was going to be the Canadian beach,
10:50and then Gold and Sorbonne were Britain's beaches.
10:54It's really important to be clear about the fact
10:57that nothing of this scale had ever been attempted in human history.
11:01This is an event without precedent.
11:05The undertaking that was D-Day was absolutely vast.
11:08It's almost impossible to imagine.
11:10It's an incredible test of logistics.
11:13To have the right amount of aircraft, ships, landing craft,
11:16everybody ready at the same moment when they could launch this attack.
11:26It was going to need a massive amount of training for the troops involved,
11:29and a massive amount of new technology to be refined.
11:32Because, of course, the means of achieving this had never been done before.
11:37It's all very well to talk about secrecy,
11:39to hope that all this is private,
11:41but you would have had to have been blind and deaf, really,
11:44certainly in the south of England, not to notice that something was going on.
11:49Every little lane, the tanks,
11:52well, they turned bumper to bumper,
11:55if I used that, track to track.
11:58They were parked right down one side of the road,
12:01underneath the overhanging trees, wherever they could get.
12:05But even so, they weren't camouflaged.
12:08You couldn't camouflage them properly.
12:10And you were there for everybody to see.
12:16You've got hundreds of thousands of troops.
12:19All of them need to be trained and prepared.
12:22And these aren't just troops from Britain, either.
12:24They're from Canada and America.
12:31OK, you're Harry NMI Parley.
12:34That's right.
12:36My serial number was 3297-3006, I recall that.
12:45When did you go into the army?
12:47I went into the army in 1943.
12:52I got married before... I knew I was going to be drafted.
12:56You were 23 years old.
12:58Yes.
13:02American troops had been arriving in record numbers
13:06to Great Britain since 1943.
13:08In fact, by the end of May 1944,
13:11there were more than 1.5 million US personnel on British soil.
13:15And they were there to support or participate in D-Day
13:19and the Battle of Normandy that was to follow.
13:32My name is Thomas William Porcella.
13:35I was born in New York City, October 4th, 1923.
13:41Men like Tom Porcella were brought over in huge troop ships
13:46and they would land in places like Belfast or Liverpool
13:50and then they would attend training camps.
13:52These were mostly in southern England to prepare for the invasion.
13:56I was thinking to myself,
13:59I was thinking to myself,
14:01this is it.
14:03It's just a matter of time now and I will be in combat.
14:06I wonder what the hell my folks are doing back home.
14:09I wonder if they're thinking about the invasion like we are.
14:13I wonder what they would think if they knew at this moment
14:16their son Tom was preparing himself for this big invasion.
14:21All sorts of thoughts went through my mind.
14:25I was told that all the new arrivals were to be brought to company
14:31from about 250 to 300,
14:34that they expected about 30% casualty on the invasion
14:40and that we were it.
14:45One of the really difficult things about military planning
14:48is that you have to plan for a number of your own men getting killed.
14:54The strategists and the commanders knew that they were sending
14:58a percentage of these young men to their deaths
15:01because that's the only way that the invasion could have happened.
15:06They just hoped that they'd done whatever they could
15:09to mitigate the numbers.
15:13We wanted to go, most of us anyway wanted to go.
15:17It's something that had to be done.
15:19It might sound a bit gung-ho,
15:23but that's how we felt.
15:26We had to go and do it.
15:30I don't ever remember talking to anybody who was frightened or feared.
15:39I don't think frightening is the word for a young man.
15:45It's excitement really.
15:47If you stand back from us and watch it, I suppose that it is frightening.
15:51You do get this tingling.
15:55But I don't think I can honestly say that I was actually frightened.
16:08As well as the seaborne invasion,
16:10there was another aspect to D-Day which was absolutely crucial
16:14and this was the airborne assault.
16:18In the middle of the night before D-Day,
16:20hours before the troops would land on the Normandy beaches,
16:23thousands of men would be dropped behind enemy lines.
16:29And leading one of these units was Major John Howard.
16:34John Howard, D-Day
16:40Well, I'd like to begin, at the beginning, with you.
16:48Well, I had a very poor childhood.
16:52My father, when he married my mother,
16:56slightly older than him,
16:59was a baker's roundsman with a horse and cart in London,
17:04in the Tomahawk Road area.
17:08As the eldest of a very poor family,
17:11I had to become a breadwinner as soon as possible.
17:17So I joined the army.
17:21I was promoted to Major.
17:27John Howard, he was an officer slightly different
17:32than the normal officer type, if you can use that expression.
17:39He was a dedicated man. He was a fanatic.
17:48He was determined to make that company the company,
17:51not only the best company in the outfit, in the regiment,
17:54but in the division.
18:01And the next thing I heard was that the 52nd,
18:05that's the 2nd Battalion, who'd come home from India,
18:11was going to be airborne.
18:14Going to be glider troops.
18:18And I was interested in this.
18:24The plan on D-Day was for some of the airborne troops
18:27to fly in on gliders.
18:29Essentially a new concept in warfare.
18:32They were really lightweight wooden gliders.
18:36They were to be towed across on D-Day on bombers
18:39and then they would be released.
18:41Of course, one of the most useful things about the gliders,
18:44quite apart from the fact they could put these people
18:46all together into one place at one time,
18:48is that as soon as they'd been released,
18:50they were completely silent.
18:52They were a really useful means of a surprise attack.
19:00What was the appeal?
19:04I suppose there was a bit of glamour about it as well.
19:07Everything was a bit hush-hush as it happened, you know.
19:14In the final weeks before D-Day,
19:16soldiers were moved to sealed camps
19:18where they learnt their missions.
19:20The soldiers inside these camps were effectively sealed off.
19:23They weren't allowed in or out of the camp boundaries.
19:26No telephone calls home, for example.
19:29Any correspondence would be censored.
19:31Secrecy was paramount.
19:35And I imagine that the tension started to build
19:37in these sealed camps as well.
19:41There was a sort of fever.
19:43And we knew that there was definitely something going on.
19:46A rumour started from nowhere.
19:48We had to attack some places, take some bridges.
19:51My camera was lucky to be selected for what turned out to be
19:56a wonderful operation.
19:58Glydebourne, to capture two bridges in Normandy.
20:07John Howard's objective on D-Day was to secure the Bennuville Bridge,
20:11later became known as Pegasus Bridge.
20:13This bridge was really critical.
20:15It's really close to the landing beach at Sword.
20:18So securing this bridge should allow the troops coming in from Sword
20:22and those further along to come across
20:25and move on towards their objectives.
20:27If it's not secured, it allows the Germans to do the opposite
20:31and move tanks and troops towards them
20:34and potentially to wreak havoc upon them on the beach.
20:39This was an incredibly bold plan by an elite unit
20:43that would become the start of D-Day.
20:49It's only a few days before D-Day itself
20:51that they're showing this scale model
20:53so that when they stepped off the plane,
20:55the idea was that nothing would come as a surprise.
21:00We all had to go into a big tent,
21:02and there, laying on the table, was this thing.
21:07We just looked at it, and there it was.
21:10The bridge, rivers.
21:12We knew there was something to do with the river.
21:15We knew there was something to do with the bridge.
21:17There was all sorts of guesses as to where it could be.
21:20Nobody had a clue.
21:22And even when we were shown it and everything else,
21:25we weren't told where it was.
21:30In the briefing, did you give them a pretty good rundown
21:33on not only the immediate objectives,
21:37but did you also then say, now, the big picture is?
21:41Oh, yes, everybody had that quite clear in their mind
21:43and knew where we fit into the picture.
21:46The first people to land that night,
21:49and it really did hit them between the eyes.
21:54MUSIC PLAYS
22:07The night before D-Day, over 7,000 boats set off,
22:11laden with troops, weapons, tanks and explosives
22:15from different points all along the south coast of Britain.
22:19They would travel through the night and wait off the French coast,
22:22ready to launch the assault the next morning.
22:28Well, on the night of the 5th, we went.
22:31It's an amazing, amazing sight.
22:35Everywhere you looked, there were ships of all shapes and sizes.
22:41The sky always seemed to be full of hour planes
22:45with the black and white stripes on them.
22:48And everything seemed to stand out in technical.
22:51It seemed to be...
22:55..a psychedelic picture.
22:58But it was a lovely feeling, because they were all ours.
23:02Everything was ours.
23:04And then we went off to Normandy, through the night.
23:10Everything seemed to be ex... What's the word I'm looking for?
23:15Exaggerated. Exaggerated, yes.
23:18Everything in colour. Technical.
23:26We went to support these landing craft infantry.
23:29They were very, very cramped.
23:31And, you know, you have memories of...
23:35..of just things that may happen to you, you know.
23:38And what I associate with those craft were self-eating soup.
23:43I know it sounds outlandish, but...
23:45..self-eating soup.
23:46It was the only way you were going to get a hot meal.
23:49That's what I remember about the landing craft.
23:51Self-eating soup and a desire to be sick.
23:54It was a terrible, rough crossing.
24:02From the Allies' perspective, D-Day was a massive gamble.
24:06Because if those men were to be lost
24:08and that equipment was to be destroyed,
24:11then how do you start again?
24:13But not only that, they would then know
24:16that the Germans knew what their plan was.
24:20So they would have to completely reconceive
24:23how any sort of future invasion could have worked.
24:27The stakes are extraordinarily high.
24:30And it's really impossible to overstate that point.
24:44You must have been apprehensive
24:46about the possibility of being killed on men.
24:49No. As a matter of fact, looking back to the fellows I spoke to
24:53when we did, they were so keen,
24:56but at the same time so ignorant of true warfare.
25:01And this is one of the things that keeps a man going in battle.
25:04He can always imagine his mate being killed.
25:07He can always imagine his mate being killed.
25:10He can always imagine himself getting a nice, tidy wound
25:13across the head or through the leg or the shoulder.
25:16The thing that keeps most men going in battle is,
25:19despite seeing men die left, right and centre,
25:22they always seem to get this idea that it's not going to be them.
25:30The risks with the gliders were incredibly high
25:33because they had no engines.
25:35When they were released, the pilots had really limited means
25:38of controlling what was happening.
25:40And what they were essentially doing
25:42was kind of a controlled crash landing.
25:45If they were to hit anything solid
25:47or to miss their original landing point,
25:50there was nothing that the pilot could do but accept what was to come.
25:58Up at the airfield, everybody went to their gliders
26:01to check the equipment was all tied all right.
26:08Before that glider went off,
26:10I managed to get the longest piece of chalk.
26:13I put Lady Irene right along the side of it.
26:16Lady what? Lady Irene.
26:18That's my wife's name.
26:20I put Lady Irene in great big white letters all along the side.
26:24And I kept that bit of chalk and I wouldn't let anybody else have it.
26:27Nobody else was going to scrawl on that.
26:29That was Lady Irene.
26:31And then Jack Bailey, my old mate down there,
26:33he's still down there with me, said,
26:35let's have a bit of chalk.
26:37Come from the same area, Lewisham.
26:39He said, I'll let you have it, Jack, and I want it back.
26:42And he put Lewisham Special on the other side.
26:44Lewisham Special? Lewisham.
26:46The borough we live in, South London.
26:59My clearest memory was a somewhat sad one
27:03of going round and giving farewell.
27:11It really was a tough time going round
27:13with a lump in your throat.
27:17I got back to my glider and shut the doors.
27:23And right on the dot of 2256 I was airborne.
27:34WHIRRING
27:41As soon as we got up to 5,000 or 6,000 feet,
27:46the men started loosening their tongues
27:49and a lot of singing went on.
27:53We sang everything, anything we could lay our tongues to.
27:56Simple as that. It was sheer nerves.
27:59But exhilarating nerves, if you know what I mean.
28:02Absolutely.
28:05Going through my own mind, apart from the plan
28:07and what was going to meet us at the other end.
28:11I mean, one couldn't help thinking of your family.
28:17Dan Brotheridge, he was the platoon commander I was closest with.
28:21He was the oldest officer next to me.
28:27Most of his platoon were cocknets.
28:30And I was a Londoner myself and felt very much at home with cocknets.
28:36My wife, Joy, and Margaret, Dan's wife, were pregnant together.
28:40And we discussed it quite often, Dan and I.
28:44He was obviously very worried
28:46because the date that Margaret's child was due
28:50was the fortnight after D-Day.
28:56Having a journey out, shout out.
29:00Something about we're over the coast, or words to that effect.
29:04Now you begin to get a little bit.
29:07Canary over occupied Europe.
29:10You know where I've been.
29:17And the next thing, we cast off.
29:21Seeing them stopped.
29:25When we levelled out a bit at 1,000 feet,
29:28we opened the doors of the gliders.
29:33Now I could look forward at the fields of France
29:38and it had an amazing tranquilising effect on me.
29:42And it was so quiet, it was like being on an exercise in England.
29:58But they all flew very, very high
30:01and soon bombarded my line.
30:05But we suddenly heard
30:08at least one very, very low-flying aircraft.
30:12From the noise.
30:13But that had irritated us.
30:15What was that?
30:16That was new to us.
30:23The glider suddenly did a right-hand turn.
30:29And we came to what we knew was going to be
30:33the toughest moment of the lot.
30:36The crash land.
30:46I could see the glider pilot holding that bloody great machine
30:50and driving it in at the last minute.
30:52Those damn great footballs of sweat.
30:55Those damn great footballs of sweat
30:58across his forehead and all over his face.
31:02And then the summit bang.
31:05More bang.
31:07Onto the top of the trees.
31:10And there was zombies.
31:11Rending.
31:12Splash.
31:13Made to lumber.
31:14Made to lumber.
31:23I wasn't prepared for that bump.
31:25And everything going all quiet.
31:38He looked around.
31:40God only.
31:42And for a moment, there wasn't a sound.
31:51I felt my head had been knocked rather badly.
31:57First thing I saw was that the door had disappeared.
32:01It had completely telescoped.
32:05I could hear the glider pilots on my right
32:08moaning in their cockpit,
32:11which seemed to have been smashed.
32:15But I was conscious that everybody in the glider was moving.
32:20I could hear the click of the safety belts being undone.
32:26And I knew that men were getting out of the glider
32:28and people were pushing in front of me
32:30to get through the broken door.
32:32As I stood there, I could see the tower of the bridge
32:37about 50 yards from where I was standing.
32:45I suppose that really was the most exhilarating moment of my life.
33:03I saw the smoke bomb explode.
33:06The phosphorus bomb.
33:08I heard the thud, thud, thud in the pillbox
33:11as the grenades exploded.
33:14I knew we'd get no more trouble from there.
33:17And the legion platoon ran across the bridge.
34:02We were supposed to meet up with Dan Broderidge.
34:13Where's Dan?
34:15He said, I don't know. He said, I haven't seen him.
34:16I haven't seen anything.
34:18Only as far as here.
34:20I started to run to go around the back end
34:22where he should have been.
34:23I ran past a bloke lying on the floor in the road.
34:28I looked at him.
34:30I went to run on and I stopped dead.
34:33I said, hang on.
34:35I came back, knelt down,
34:38looked at Dan Broderidge.
34:45I just knelt down beside him.
34:48His eyes were open and his lips were moving.
34:51I just looked at him.
34:53I put my hand under his head to lift him up.
34:57I took my hand away and put my mouth back.
35:02And Dan was covered in it.
35:05I just looked at him.
35:06I just didn't go like that a lot of times.
35:10His eyes sort of rolled back.
35:12Just showed from their back.
35:18I just looked at him right in the middle of it.
35:19I looked at him like, my God.
35:23I don't know if it was...
35:24Do you know what?
35:25I don't know if it was the bloke himself
35:27or all the years of training he'd put in to do a job.
35:33It only lasted 20 seconds, 30 seconds.
35:41First news I got from Den's platoon
35:43was the fact that he'd been...
35:48hit.
35:51And that really shook me.
35:56And I could see it was fatal.
36:11And the fact that I knew that Margaret, his wife,
36:17was expecting a baby almost any time.
36:21In the event it arrived fortnight later.
36:27It was at the top of my mind
36:29as I saw Dan carry past on that stretcher.
36:36A very sad moment for myself.
36:41And for everybody concerned.
36:50I was just so sad.
37:06John Howard and his airborne troops
37:08had managed to capture Banneville Bridge
37:10in less than 20 minutes.
37:13But now the airborne had to keep hold of it
37:15whilst they waited for the troops to arrive from Sword Beach.
37:20That was going to be a long night.
37:34In those early hours of D-Day,
37:36it wasn't just the British airborne troops
37:38who were landing behind enemy lines.
37:42All of a sudden we heard,
37:44are you ready?
37:45All the troopers shouted all at once,
37:47yeah, let's go.
37:50Let's go.
37:56The Americans dropped six parachute regiments
37:58behind enemy lines on the morning of the D-Day invasion.
38:02About 13,000 men.
38:05As the chute popped open,
38:06my head snapped forward and my feet came up.
38:09My elbow was pushed slightly over my face.
38:14The jolt of the opening of the chute
38:16soon made everything a reality.
38:20I looked up at my chute to make sure it was OK.
38:24Then looked down and I couldn't see anything but blackness.
38:30Tom Porcella's regiment's mission
38:32was to secure two bridges beyond Utah Beach.
38:35One thing that the Germans had done
38:37was flood fields in order to turn them into quagmires
38:40to slow the Allied advance down.
38:43Of course, the paratroopers dropped into these soaked fields
38:46and found themselves, in some cases,
38:48shoulder or neck deep in cold, freezing water
38:51and weighed down by their own equipment.
38:53Many of them drowned.
38:55I had the shock of my life.
38:57I plunged into water.
39:00My heart was pounding
39:01and my thoughts were running a mile a minute.
39:03How deep is this water?
39:05Can I get free of my chute?
39:06Am I too heavy? Will the weight keep me on the bottom?
39:13All the training I had received
39:14had not prepared me for such a landing.
39:16My eyes strained to see the landmarks
39:18but I could see nothing in the darkness.
39:20I was cold and I began to shiver.
39:23We realized that time was running out.
39:25If we were going to do anything, we better do it fast.
39:28So we moved as fast as we could.
39:30We knew it was very important
39:32that we leave the water before daylight.
39:46The first signs were on the left of us.
39:49We could see the weather.
39:52The first parachutists had already come down.
39:56Then we saw a lot of flashes of guns.
40:01We had also seen the detonation.
40:05We knew that something was going to happen.
40:09In the past weeks, German soldiers
40:11had been put on alert again and again.
40:14Many of them had become complacent.
40:17And even in the night from the 5th to the 6th of June
40:20when the first information went in
40:23that there was an Allied parachute drop,
40:26the Germans did not fully believe
40:28that this is the big invasion.
40:30The Germans did not fully believe
40:32that this is the big invasion.
40:34The Germans did not fully believe
40:36that this is the big invasion.
41:05The Allies were attacking German defences
41:08right across Normandy.
41:10And one of their targets was the Merville Battery,
41:13a battery commanded by Raymond Steiner.
41:16The Merville Battery was a collection of guns
41:19within reach of Sword Beach.
41:21The battery was stormed
41:23by British glider-borne infantry.
41:25But at the time, Raymond was a mile away
41:28at an observation post.
41:30At the time, Raymond was a mile away
41:32at an observation post.
41:34And therefore he could only hear what was happening.
42:01The Allies had now started the next phase of the operation.
42:09The Allies had now started the next phase of the operation.
42:13And this was pounding the German coastal defences
42:16with a massive aerial bombardment.
42:31It was so impressive that they flew right down.
42:39So the plan for D-Day
42:41was that before the landing troops
42:43got to the beaches,
42:45the Atlantic Wall in Normandy
42:47would be absolutely bombarded.
42:51What they knew
42:53is that it would have dreadful consequences
42:56for French civilians.
43:01France had been occupied by the Nazis
43:03for almost four years at that point to the day.
43:06People on those shores
43:08and a little bit inland,
43:10they didn't see the landings.
43:12They heard the landings.
43:14They didn't know what it was.
43:16It was like these rumblings.
43:18You know, is it thunder?
43:20Is it some bombardment?
43:22I mean, there had been bombardment all throughout 1944.
43:25So it wasn't completely unfamiliar,
43:27but there was something much more intense about it.
43:30And as daylight starts to come,
43:32then they see that this is probably the landings,
43:35that something is happening,
43:37and all they're thinking is,
43:39let them land elsewhere.
43:41Let them not land where we are,
43:43because that's the most dangerous.
43:57♪
44:27♪
44:38Andre Heinz was quite a typical resister.
44:41He was a young man.
44:43His whole generation during the occupation
44:45was targeted by the forced labour service
44:47imposed by the Germans,
44:49which involved young men his age
44:51going to Germany to work for the German military cause.
44:55And he was infuriated.
44:57He had been seeing the grip of the Germans
45:00of the occupation on France for years now.
45:03He had been waiting for this day for a long time.
45:07But he couldn't have known what this would really be like
45:11and how damaging it would be for the French people.
45:26♪
45:49While the Allied air forces are pounding the Atlantic wall,
45:53the American troop ships are anchored
45:56several miles off the French coast.
45:58These troop ships would contain the main body
46:01of the landing forces to hit the Normandy beaches.
46:24It's very uncomfortable, very, very crowded.
46:27We talked about life,
46:29and I would expect they'd take it if we were wounded
46:34and what would happen to us.
46:44We had breakfast about 4.30 a.m.,
46:46then the planes went on the beach
46:49and the warships sheltered.
46:51We got on Higgins' boats on deck
46:53so we didn't have to climb down rope ladders
46:56like some other boats.
47:01The American army used Higgins' boats
47:04to carry platoons of soldiers from ship to shore.
47:07These boats were lowered from the troop ships,
47:10but many of the soldiers, of course,
47:12would have to scramble down netting to get into them.
47:15The boats were rising five to six feet in the air
47:18as they were waiting to take you down.
47:20We got into the boat, and with all this equipment,
47:23these guys climbed down.
47:25The first wave for all the beaches
47:27were to get into the channel,
47:29and then there was a certain amount of time
47:32where they had to actually circle
47:34while all the boats were lowered and loaded
47:38until the entire first wave was ready and in line.
47:51Everybody got sick, except me.
48:08As the boats approached the beaches,
48:10the Allies launched a massive naval bombardment
48:13so that by the time the landing forces
48:15stepped off their boats,
48:17then the guns that would have been firing at them
48:20had been destroyed.
48:47How shall I put it?
48:53Then I started to pray loudly,
48:56and then I tried to think through this prayer,
49:00what is happening now, what is coming from us.
49:11The bombs were firing from above,
49:14and they were firing from far away.
49:18You could hear the shot,
49:20and then it started.
49:23You can only say this acoustically.
49:28It goes through the marrow of the leg
49:30when they are firing, always taking aim.
49:35Does it hit me now, or does it go over?
49:38You are afraid of death, in any case.
49:41Always afraid.
49:43And it goes.
49:44That's how it went for me.
49:45I always thought of my mother.
49:57I understood that the ships were pretty close to the beach here,
50:03maybe 500-600 meters,
50:06and before the first storm,
50:09they fired like a fireball.
50:39You hear people screaming,
50:41you might see some of your colleagues dying,
50:46perishing, bodies ripped apart.
50:48Psychologically, this is one of the most terrifying things
50:53soldiers probably can ever experience.
50:56Those naval bombardments on top of the RAF
51:00was absolutely terrific.
51:02It's something everybody well remembered.
51:05And then we thought of those poor devils
51:07coming in by sea, in those landing launches.
51:13And we were damn glad that we were where we were.
51:17We were in the middle of the sea,
51:19we were in the middle of the ocean,
51:22and we were damn glad that we were where we were,
51:26relatively safe.
51:29I certainly wouldn't want it to be anywhere near the coast.
51:32We were in the middle of the sea.
51:49It was bombarding all night.
51:51We went up, our house was on the third floor.
51:55It was slightly overshadowed,
51:58and we could see the sea perfectly.
52:03What happened right after that?
52:05We saw, as soon as it was light,
52:08even though there was fog,
52:09there was a lot of fog,
52:10but we could perfectly see the shapes,
52:13the sea, with the fire coming out of the cannons.
52:18We could see flames on the harbour,
52:21and then, little by little, all over the coast.
52:23And we saw that it was coming at us,
52:25and we were very scared.
52:28On D-Day, lots of things went really, really well,
52:30and a few of them didn't,
52:31particularly the naval bombardment
52:33and airborne bombardment that preceded the invasion.
52:38Poor visibility and lack of time
52:40meant that many German defences were knocked out,
52:43and French civilians living near the targets
52:45found themselves caught up in the chaos.
52:58We stayed in the dining room for a while,
53:00and then, all of a sudden,
53:02the wall was crumpled,
53:04and the windows, all the tiles had fallen.
53:07So, it was really, really hard.
53:11And what I found funny,
53:13and I often thought about it,
53:14was that the animals were screaming,
53:17the neighbour's dog was howling,
53:19but the birds were flying around as if nothing had happened.
53:22We had the impression
53:23that it wasn't affecting the birds.
53:28All this time, they were shelling the beaches,
53:32and they were bombing the beaches.
53:35And it roared with the guns,
53:37and it roared with the diesels,
53:39and the thudding of the big ship itself.
53:42You had to shout just to be heard by the guy next to you.
53:51I had a very gentle lieutenant in charge of my platoon.
53:57He asked me what I thought about dying.
54:04It seemed very sad,
54:05and I expected him to take me in his arms,
54:08but that didn't happen.
54:27When the ships came closer in the early hours of the morning,
54:31and we could see the details,
54:34it was unimaginable for us.
54:36There were so many ships.
54:41It was like a long fence in the shade.
54:47From west to east, only ships.
54:52From west to east, only ships.
55:00For German defenders like Franz Gokul,
55:02the sight of the approaching armada must have just been terrifying.
55:06But despite the fact that the Allies
55:08had pounded the beaches in advance of the landings,
55:11many of the bunkers remained intact.
55:14The German defenders were in place to rain fire down on the beaches.
55:21On the way in, it was rough.
55:23As we got near the shore, while going in,
55:25we'd seen the rocket ships firing away the rockets.
55:29We couldn't see much because we were supposed to keep our heads down,
55:32and we couldn't hear anything.
55:34Diesel motors on the boats
55:36always remind me of the bus back home.
55:42At this time in his life, boats were getting hit.
55:45As we got closer, they were starting to fire.
55:49Incoming enemy fire was starting to come out toward us.
55:55I could smell the smoke, and I could hear yelling and carrying on,
55:58and those guys, and every once in a while,
56:01a guy would look up over the side and say,
56:03oh, shit, they're ducked down again.
56:05So I knew it wasn't good news.
56:18He came into my bunker and yelled,
56:22Franz, watch out, now...
56:27They're coming.
56:34Now you have to defend yourself.
56:49We didn't know where we were.
56:52We didn't know what to do.
56:56The ramp went down.
57:00And your asshole buggered up,
57:04took a deep breath,
57:06and he started to pray.
57:19When we got there, it was just a shambles.
57:24My friend was down on the deck.
57:29And we got on the beach, which was covered in bodies.
57:35There were tanks coming off and trucks coming off,
57:38and sinking.
57:40And then you just turned away, you couldn't look.
57:43And then you just turned away, you couldn't look.
58:13And then you just turned away, you couldn't look.
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