Day 5 – Starting to walk "In Their Footsteps" – The Heroes of D-Day

Another day is upon us, actually the days are winding down as we gear up for the 9^th of April.  The sun is shining again today as you can see from the gorgeous photograph that Ms. Thain has taken just after breakfast this morning.  We have just left the Mercure hotel in Port de Bessin, France.  

(Ok EF keep them coming….accommodations, breakfasts have been great….a little shout out to Mouna Ouihabi as I believe she is following the blog and helps us a great deal through these endeavors….the only change I would have made today was to set aside 4.5 hours this morning for a round of golf for your high commander and his lieutenant McNeill….sorry David Harrod is talking to the kids about the D-Day invasion and those words came to mind.)

As we make the trek to Arromanches, David is talking about the importance of the D-Day invasions to the eventual VE Day that wouldn’t be realized until about 14 months later in 1945.  He is discussing the names of the beaches that we will visit today, let’s see if you can name them:

Beaches for Operation Overlord:

US: ________________________ (US State) and _________________________________(US City in Nebraska and Peyton Manning’s favorite pre-snap line call)

British: _____________________ (rich color) and ________________________________ (traditional weapon and a large game fish)

I will insert answers at the randomly in blog…..also makes you read the whole thing!!!!

    Pointe du Hoc-

Thank you to the American Rangers is about all I can say right now.  Probably the hardest outlook on the wars, especially WWII and D-Day, are the sheer number of people who probably knew that by sometime later that day, that may be the end for them and their comrades.  I always think about these things and wonder if I am a coward for being scared of those thoughts and just how brave were these men were in times like this.  

As you can see from the photos, the Germans chose the natural fortress very carefully as

these 100 foot high cliffs seem almost completely impenetrable.  The stories told on the on the boards leading down to the cliffs are almost hard to believe.  How did they actually take this area and how many lives were lost.  Well most of the shelling, that is still very visible

with the presence of huge craters, took place from either the air or the sea.  As you can see in the images, the area was very secure and was tough to take.  American ingenuity at its best with its long range bombers and off shore cannons as well as rocket propelled ropes to scale the wall and allow the soldiers to begin the 100 foot high climb into the extremely well bunkered German stronghold.

Amazing, truly amazing.  I know I have been told stories of men who were indeed scared and more appropriately clean terrified, and of course the stories of the heroes that almost seem supernatural.  As I always tell the kids, all of these people were heroes in my mind.  To be able give of themselves, their most important possession, their own lives, is the ultimate in heroism, keeping in mind that both of sides of the war had heroes.  I say that as we quickly approach a German war cemetery whose men faced the same uncertainties that the Allies did, many of them fighting a war they did not believe in, but had to support for fear of their own lives.

La Cambe German cemetery –

It is very important to tell both sides of the story and therefore when we get the chance to we always stop at German cemeteries in the area.  A stark contrast to what we will see at places such as Beny-Sur-Mer, La Cambe is darker, even on a day like today when the sun is shining brightly, the stones are dark and lie on top of the ground as you will see. The light of victory and the dark of defeat, both groups of people we are meeting in these cemeteries, in my mind neither, had gained personal victory and only suffered defeat in death.  That as well shows you the concept of the ultimate sacrifice, putting the greater good of their country ahead of themselves. 

After our lunch stop at Arromanche, a man made harbour that became integral in the

maintaining of the beaches D-Day +, we are on our way to Beny-sur-Mer.  Beny-Sur-Mer is the site of the first Canadian Commonwealth War Graves site that we are visiting on our tour.  One of the most beautiful and serene places in the world, which I love to visit each time we are in the Normandy region of France. 

They have been introduced to cemetery protocol, rules born out of remembrance, respect and sacrifice and not out of strict government directives.  These are very important to me and I know our kids will behave in the appropriate manner.

We have a couple of special introductions to make as both Sherra Rogers and Emma Gallant(I will update the pics for Emma as soon as I get the pics "air dropped to me") have relatives in this cemetery.   We will be busy doing grave rubbings as well as doing a plaque presentation by Kinkora High School.  The cemetery visits are sometimes difficult for the students because there is a fine line when I talk about celebrating the lives of these heroes, but it can become very emotional when you see the ages and the personalized writings on the graves.  You will see by the images that it can be very difficult to keep it together at times when walking row upon row.

The students from all schools were interested in finding people from their own areas and we were quite successful in finding a number of Islanders who have been laid to rest in Beny-sur-Mer.

Today I had the privilege of visiting my relative Foster Rogers at the Canadian War Cemetery in Beny-Sur-Mer.  Leading up to this trip, I spent a considerable amount of time learning about who he was and what my connection was to him.  As I was looking for his grave, I felt a mixture of emotions.  I was excited, but already the sadder emotions had set in.  At first sight, I immediately recognized his name on his grave, and it was a moment I will never forget.  As the first person in my family to visit Foster, the sight of poppies growing next to him comforted me, and that a single

poppy had been placed by his well kept grave.  I began to be so overwhelmed with emotions.  His young age of 20 truly sank in with me and I realized just how much he sacrificed.  Despite my excitement for the trip and the work I had put into researching and understanding him, the time I was able to spend with Foster at the cemetery was the part that made everything become much clearer.  I was able to leave some small rocks at his grave that I had gotten from his home.  Foster grew up in Nova Scotia, so before leaving I paid a visit to my grandfather and had him take me to where he and Foster grew up.  I hope that wherever he is, Foster can be comforted by the small piece of home that I could bring to him.  I know that I will never be able to let go of the feelings I had whilst visiting him, and therefore I have changed so much as a person.  My Dad shares my interests in learning about Foster, so I am looking forward to talking with him when I get home to share the experience with him. 

                                                                                                Sherra Rogers Grade 11

Kevin Bustard

Kinkora High School

In 2015, during the 70th Anniversary for Victory in Europe, Jill Parker researched her great uncle, Almon Docherty, from Cherry Valley. Almon fought with the North Nova Scotia Highlanders during the D-Day invasion on Juno Beach. He was injured by an artillery shell to his left and suffered shrapnel wounds to his leg, buttocks, arm and face. He was treated by medics and was sent to the field hospital with a note on his injuries stating he should be fine. Unfortunately he passed away that night and upon further inspection, he had sustained a fatal chest wound that was missed. 

In that trip, we did not visit Beny sur Mer.  Once we found out that we would be visiting Almon's final resting place in 2017, we knew we had to contact the Parker family. Today we paid respects to Almon on behalf of the Parker family and the Royal Canadian Legion. David did a grave rubbing which we will bring back to the Parker family. May Almon look down upon us and know that his family has not forgotten his sacrifice. 

With an emotional end to our visit by completing a number of grave rubbings we are officially off to Juno Beach and then onto the most famous house on the beach, Canada House at Bernieres-sur-Mer.  When in this area of France the beautiful beaches, in all of their serenity and peacefulness, dominate the landscape and are major attractions to this area.  It is now a place to enjoy the water, the sun, the sand, a book, your children and your existence in general. But as we all know these beaches were so far removed from those feelings in June of 1944, as the Canadians approached from across the English Channel so early that morning.  

With the number of Canadians descending upon France this weekend, EF in concert with the Juno Beach Centre and other military interpretive centres, has done a great job of making sure that we all get a chance to get in to see the exhibits.  Although our time is limited, we still get to experience the centre and get a feel for what took place during Operation Overlord and the D-Day landings of June 1944.

A new feature of the interpretive centre is a 12-minute video at the end of the museum called “In Their Paces”.

This video proved to be an unbelievable addition to the tour and the ending was so amazingly powerful, as ghostly images of soldiers walked behind a family of Canadians as they walked and talked about what took place their so many years ago.  I was nearly brought to tears, in fact I am pretty sure that I did wipe one away, as this is exactly what I want kids to get out of this tour.  The reason to remember is right in front of them everyday.  Every thing they hold so important to them was built upon the lives of these men so long ago.  Again, you may not agree, but this is my forum and I feel very strongly about the fact that these men and women gave freely of themselves so that we could exist as we have and do today.  The gains made at Juno and D-Day, just as at Vimy in 1917, were so important that they each began to turn the tide of the war.  Don’t get me wrong, we did not  undertake D-Day on our own, unlike Vimy, but the beaches at Juno were among the most heavily fortified in all of this expanse of beach head and we took it, albeit with enormous losses.

After our stop at Juno we as a large group descend upon the most famous house on the beach at Juno in Bernieres-sur-Mer, the Queen's Own Rifles House or Canada House.  A number of years ago we were able to get in for a visit on Easter Sunday morning, was a great surprise.  We gathered for a picture of the group in front and are in a bit of a rush to get to our 5 hour drive to Lille.  After the pic, one of the ladies who we had been waving to came out to greet us.  I began to use my old school French with her and eventually had to get Mya to step in(only after Mya laughed at me for using broken "Frenglish" to ask if she remembered us from 5 years ago), and once again we were invited in.  The "cool" bus had already rushed away as had most of our bus, but a number of us stayed and enjoyed the quick tour as you will see by the pics.

It is almost 1 AM here in Lille, as we are now in the Vimy region, and I have a busy day ahead with our trip to Thelus, which is always an emotional time for me....I am sure it will be easier tomorrow as I introduce my veteran to my daughter for the first time!!!  Time for bed!!!  Good night all!!! 

PS. I will leave you with my favorite pic of the day taken by yours truly and the answers to the Juno quiz.

UTAH/OMAHA

GOLD/SWORD

JUNO