Juno Beach Zip Code Map

[Terpsícore Deckelman]

Its widely agreed among historians that D-Day, which began June 6, 1944, marked a turning point in World War II. The Allied operation, code-named Operation Overlord, sent some 156,000 American, British and Canadian troops to assault on five German-occupied beaches along a 50-mile stretch of France's heavily fortified Normandy coast. One of the largest and most extensively planned amphibious military assaults in history, it led to the liberation of France and, ultimately, the rest of Western Europe.

The westernmost of the D-Day beaches, Utah was added to the invasion plans at the 11th hour so that the Allies would be within striking distance of the port city of Cherbourg. In the predawn darkness of June 6, thousands of U.S. paratroopers dropped inland behind enemy lines. Weighed down by their heavy equipment, many drowned in the flooded marshlands at the rear of the beach, and others were shot out of the sky by enemy fire. One even hung from a church steeple for two hours before being captured.

Surrounded by steep cliffs and heavily defended, Omaha was the bloodiest of the D-Day beaches, with roughly 2,400 U.S. troops turning up dead, wounded or missing. The troubles for the Americans began early on, when Army intelligence underestimated the number of German soldiers in the area. To make matters worse, an aerial bombardment did little damage to the strongly fortified German positions, rough surf wreaked havoc with the Allied landing craft and only two of 29 amphibious tanks launched at sea managed to reach the shore. U.S. infantrymen in the initial waves of the attack were then gunned down in mass by German machine-gun fire. The carnage became so severe that U.S. Lieutenant General Omar Bradley considered abandoning the entire operation.

Slowly but surely, however, his men began making it across the beach to the relative safety of the seawall at the foot of the bluffs and then up the bluffs themselves. Assistance came from a group of Army Rangers who scaled a massive promontory between Omaha and Utah to take out artillery pieces stashed in an orchard, and from U.S. warships that moved perilously close to shore to fire shells at the German fortifications. By nightfall, the Americans had carved out a tenuous toehold about 1.5 miles deep.

At Juno, Allied landing craft once again struggled with rough seas, along with offshore shoals and enemy mines. Upon finally disembarking, Canadian soldiers were then cut down in droves by Germans firing from seaside houses and bunkers. The first hour was particularly brutal, with a casualty rate approaching 50 percent for the leading assault teams. In the confusion, an Allied tank inadvertently ran over some of the wounded, stopping only when a Canadian captain blew its track off with a grenade. Other Canadians lacked any tank support at all.

To begin our recent visit, the train journey from Paris was pleasant and relatively quick, about two hours. As we disembarked at the station in Caen, we came face to face with images of World War II, the D-Day invasion, and its aftermath.

We began our visit by walking along the beach itself. Among the sights was this plaque, installed by the Comit Juno Canada Normandie, for the Voie du Souvenir or Remembrance Way. The walk stretches along the whole length of the beaches assigned to Canadian troops.

Outside the centre is this breath-taking construction. It consists of wooden posts, each of which is topped by a plaque providing the name and other details of a Canadian soldier killed on the very first day of the landing. In total, there are 359 posts, representing each of the Canadians killed on Juno Beach on that first day alone.

The landing. The June 6th landing of troops on the five Normandy beaches was called Operation Neptune, although it may be better known as D-Day. The overall battle for Normandy was code-named Operation Overlord.

The D-Day operation of June 6, 1944, brought together the land, air, and sea forces of the allied armies in what became known as the largest amphibious invasion in military history. The operation, given the codename OVERLORD, delivered five naval assault divisions to the beaches of Normandy, France. The beaches were given the code names UTAH, OMAHA, GOLD, JUNO, and SWORD. The invasion force included 7,000 ships and landing craft manned by over 195,000 naval personnel from eight allied countries. Almost 133,000 troops from the United States, the British Commonwealth, and their allies, landed on D-Day. Casualties from these countries during the landing numbered 10,300. By June 30, over 850,000 men, 148,000 vehicles, and 570,000 tons of supplies had landed on the Normandy shores. Fighting by the brave soldiers, sailors, and airmen of the allied forces western front, and Russian forces on the eastern front, led to the defeat of German Nazi forces. On May 7, 1945, German General Alfred Jodl signed an unconditional surrender at Reims, France.

General Eisenhower's determination that operation OVERLORD (the invasion of France) would bring a quick end to the war is obvious in this message to the troops of the Allied Expeditionary Forces on June 6, 1944, the morning of the invasion.

"Order of the Day" - statement as issued to the soldiers, sailors and airmen of the Allied Expeditionary Force on June 6, 1944 [Museum Manuscripts transferred to the Library FY69, Box 1; NAID #12000995]

Following the decision for the cross channel invasion, General Eisenhower wrote a press release on a pad of paper, to be used if necessary. The handwritten message by General Eisenhower, the "In Case of Failure message," is mistakenly dated "July" 5 instead of "June" 5.

The Sextant and Eureka Conferences, November-December 1943 [Combined Chiefs of Staff: Conference Proceedings, Box 2, Sextant Conference November-December 1943 Papers and Minutes of Meetings; NAID #12005144]

Report of the Amphibious Operations, Invasion of Northern France, Western Task Force, United States Fleet, June 1944 [Walter Bedell Smith Collection of World War II Documents, Box 48, Amphibious Operations Invasion of Northern France - Western Task Force June 1944; NAID #12005066]

Audio of General Eisenhower reading his D-Day "Order of the Day" for radio broadcast, accompanied by a slideshow of still photographs from the Department of the Navy, the Army Signal Corps, and the Department of the Coast Guard.

Those days of piling up victory after victory were over. Now there was a sense of unease. North Africa was gone. The German troops had not quite managed to seize Suez. Their Italian allies turned out to be unable not only to repel the Allied invaders from their homeland, but had actually turned against Germany. The British, once on their knees, were resurgent.

And then there was Russia. Had the Fuhrer not understood history? Did he not know what had happened to Napoleon? The armies along the Atlantic Wall had too many young men, too many raw recruits because the best soldiers had died on the steppes of Russia.

On June 6, 1944 the worst nightmares of those German soldiers became a reality, as the largest invasion force the world had seen came out of the morning fog. Today those Normandy beaches, code-named Juno, Sword, Gold, Omaha and Utah, are places of pilgrimage for the descendants of the young men who landed there to begin the liberation of Europe and their long march to Berlin. There is only a hint of what was there 70 years ago.

This makes Juno Beach like so many other old battlefields. Time heals the wounds not only of the soldiers but of the scorched and scared earth where the battles were fought. From the Juno Beach Centre, the Canadian museum, you can see a carrousel, children playing where 70 years ago men fought and died.

Do you actually know what D-Day stands for? Apparently it's the most frequently asked question at the National World War II Museum, but the answer isn't overly simple. Many experts have varying opinions, including that the D simply stood for "day," a code used for any important military operation. Others have said it's just alliteration, like "H-Hour," when a military assault begins.

A lot of weather-related requirements were necessary to pull D-Day off. The days needed to be long for maximum air power usage; a near-full moon was needed to help guide ships and airborne troops; and the tides had to be strong enough to expose beach obstacles at low tide and float supply-filled landing vehicles far onto the beach during high tide. H-Hour was also crucial in that it relied on those tides to be rising at that time. There also had to be an hour of daylight just beforehand for bombardment accuracy.

Only nine days in May and June seemed to fit those requirements, so commanders eventually settled on June 5; however, thanks to forecasts that showed a short window of good weather that day, Gen. Eisenhower decided last-minute to switch D-Day to the early hours of June 6.

Stories of how U.S. troops stormed the beaches of Normandy have been legendary for years, with the names Omaha Beach and Utah beach standing out in people's minds. But the invasion stretched out over 50 miles of land, so we couldn't do it alone. Three other beach invasions by Allied troops happened simultaneously: Great Britain and some smaller forces stormed Gold and Sword beaches, while the Canadians took Juno Beach.

Initial Assault Resolute faces of U.S. Army paratroopers just before they took off for the initial assault of D-Day. The paratrooper in the foreground had just read Army Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower's message of good luck and clasped his bazooka in determination. Note Eisenhower's D-Day order in the hands of the paratrooper in the foreground. Share: Share Copy Link Email Facebook X LinkedIn WhatsApp Download: Full Size (1.46 MB) Photo By: DOD photo VIRIN: 440606-O-ZZ999-769

Thousands of U.S. paratroopers died during their drop behind enemy lines at Utah Beach, having been shot out of the sky by enemy fire or weighed down and drowned in flooded marshlands. Many also missed their landing spots, as did the seaborne forces, which landed more than a mile from their intended destination, thanks to strong currents.

3a8082e126