The beaches of the D-Day landings

On June 6th 1944, Operation Overlord was launched. Nearly seven thousand ships of all types arrived on the Calvados and Manche coasts. They carried over a hundred and fifty thousand men, come to liberate France and Europe from the Nazi yoke. They parachuted over Sainte-Mère-Eglise and Pegasus Bridge and landed on Gold, Juno, Sword, Omaha and Utah beaches. Two thousand five hundred were killed on June 6th including one thousand on Omaha Beach. Among them, Lieutenant Brotheridge was the first to die for the freedom of Europe. These days the landing beaches are visited by many tourists in summer, by those who like the sun and the sea, but they are also grounds recalling the memory of D-Day.Cemeteries, memorial stones, monuments, milestones, plaques, blockhouses, batteries and museums are reminders that Lower Normandy was the theatre of the fiercest battle of the XXth century. Between June 6th and August 20th 1944, on the beaches but also among the hedges, wood-lands and the plain of Caen, the war raged, flattening many towns of Lower Normandy. This book offers the possibility of discovering or rediscovering this Second World War heritage, the beaches of the D-Day landings.