Day of Days

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Boatswain's Mate 2nd Class (BM2) Ted Jackson had one eye on the beach and the other on the infantrymen huddled in front of him. His Higgins boat was pitching, rolling, and yawing a lot. Sure, he'd seen far worse seas in his three years in the Coast Guard, but for the soldiers he was ferrying to the beach this was probably the worst ride they'd ever been on. Most of them were vomiting, a number of them were praying, all were whey-faced and shivering, save one.

Near the ramp, facing his men, was an older man, grizzled-looking and dead-eyed. He was watching "his" boys. All the training, all the effort of the past year were about to come to fruition. This was old hat to First Sergeant Mendez, he'd made the landings in North Africa and Sicily before being wounded near a small Sicilian town he'd never got the name of. His wound wasn't bad enough to send him Stateside, but it kept him out of action long enough so that he missed his outfit moving from Italy to England to prepare for this: the invasion of Normandy.

Soldat Heinz Bäcker tossed away the remnants of the bitter ersatz coffee and wiped the sleeve of his tunic across his lips. Acorns, who makes coffee out of acorns, he thought. Only the bloody Deutsches Heer. I'll bet the Amis and the Tommies don't have to drink this swill.

"Bäcker, it's our shift, go get some chow. Cookie has more beans today!"

"Iss Scheiße Odo. We had beans yesterday. We'll probably have beans again tomorrow. What happened to all the Wurst cookie promised us, did you, Dicke Hermann, eat all of it yourself?"

Odo Meyer chuckled briefly, then his face went still as he saw the sergeant coming up behind Heinz. He thought it was funny that everybody called him Dicke Hermann, an unflattering nickname for Reichsmarschall Hermann Göring, head of the Luftwaffe who had famously stated, "No enemy bomber can reach the Ruhr, if one reaches the Ruhr, my name is not Göring. You can call me Meyer." But Oberfeldwebel Georg Krebs did not.

Before the sergeant could chastise Bäcker for using Meyer's dangerous nickname (as the Gestapo would not find it funny at all), he paused and lifted his head, listening.

"Bäcker you're staying here we need every man on duty. Meyer, go down and sound the alarm, get the men to their posts! Every man to stand to!"

Before either of the young soldiers could say a word, they both heard the sound of big shells overhead. What the Hell? Someone is firing from the sea? Then it struck Bäcker, they're coming. The Allies are coming!

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BM2 Jackson had to fight the wheel as they got closer to the beach. Seems to be a cross current pushing us away from where we're supposed to land. Why aren't the other coxswains seeing this? He had to wonder, was he the only man in the first wave who noticed that they were all off course. Dammit, I suppose I have to follow the crowd, makes no sense to land a platoon all by their lonesomes when everybody else lands elsewhere.

Crap, he thought as he spun the wheel to follow the boats ahead of him. That's when he noticed the rumbling of naval gunfire overhead. Sounds like the battlewagons are starting to hit their targets. Hope they know not to fire short!

First Sergeant Mendez yelled out at the men, "Get yourselves ready! Get off the damn boat as soon as the ramp drops and get your asses to the sea wall. Stay low, stay alert, and dammit, keep moving!"

Right after those inspiring words his lieutenant deposited his breakfast down the sergeant's leg. Before he could do anything else, he heard the boat's engine rev up and felt the bottom scrape over the sand. The whir of the ramp falling left no room for thought, time to unass the boat!

Second Lieutenant Saul Ginsberg was mortified that he'd puked on his sergeant, but he had never felt so miserable in his entire life. As the ramp of their boat dropped into the surf, the young lieutenant from Fresno, California took one step forward. He heard things in the air, which puzzled him, it reminded him of his time in the pits at the rifle range going through ROTC.

The ramp of landing craft PA-30-31 grounded, exposing the infantrymen who were beginning to move forward to get off the boat. At that point the German gunner who had been firing at their boat adjusted his aim.

Oberfeldwebel Krebs pushed Bäcker aside, "Dammit Junge, you always fire too high. Watch this!" Putting his shoulder into the butt Krebs lowered his aiming point to just in front of the Ami landing craft which was maybe 150 meters away. He pulled the trigger and walked his rounds from the sand into the boat itself.

He'd had the boys strip all the tracer ammunition out of their ready ammunition and most of the stuff stored in their bunker. When asked why he did that, he pointed out that the Amis could see the tracers just as well as they could, and that would pinpoint their position. He'd learned that the hard way, on the Eastern Front.

2Lt Ginsberg felt something tug at his field jacket sleeve, "what was that?" he wondered. Then he heard his radioman behind him grunt and fall against his legs. 1Sgt Mendez shoved him off the boat and face first into the cold water. As he rolled over to yell at the older man, he saw his radioman's lifeless body on the ramp. He also saw that a good third of his platoon was already down, never having made it off the boat.

At that moment 1Sgt Mendez grabbed him by the collar and began to drag him forward.

"Dammit lieutenant, ya gotta move son. Let's go! Let's go!" Mendez's bellowed commands had the same effect here on Omaha Beach as they did in training. The troops began to move, with purpose, spreading out, hunched over and moving inland.

"Peters grab that BAR, Johnson ain't gonna need it!"

2Lt Ginsberg wondered how Mendez knew that was Johnson, the man was missing his head. Oh yeah, he had the only BAR in the platoon. They were supposed to get two more but...

"Dammit lieutenant, quit woolgathering and freaking lead us in!" Mendez was insistent, and Ginsberg was used to that. He'd learned to rely on the big Cuban sergeant and in the confusion of combat, the guy seemed to be a rock, nothing fazed him.

"Helm, left five degrees rudder, bring us in closer!"

"Five degrees left rudder, Aye! Sir, my rudder is left five degrees!"

The low, sleek gray destroyer moved closer in to the beach. The captain could see that the men in the first wave were being cut to pieces. He had to give them a chance, but he prayed there was enough water under the keel for this. Otherwise his next command might be a desk in the Aleutians!

The gunnery officer had his target, he adjusted the gun director to bring the two forward 5-inch mounts onto the target he had spotted. What appeared to be at least one machine gun and multiple infantry aligned along the top of the bluff. They were in prepared defenses but with no overhead cover.

"Fire!"

The two forward mounts aboard USS Emmons (DD-457) barked once, then again, then a third time before the gunnery officer shifted them to a new target. In the judgement of Lieutenant (Junior Grade) Oliver Salliotte, the target he'd first spotted was destroyed.

Bäcker's head was ringing, his mouth seemed to be full of dirt and he couldn't see a thing. He seemed to recall an explosion just beyond their position, then another to one side which had wounded his friend Odo. (Soldat Meyer had actually been killed instantly by the impact of the 5-inch shell from Mount 52 of USS Emmons.)

"Ach mein Gott!" Bäcker thought, "I've been buried alive!"

"Get up Junge! You're not dead yet!" Oberfeldwebel Krebs struggled to get the young soldier on his feet, it was tough to do so with only one arm. His left arm hung useless at his side, the sleeve of his tunic shredded by the detonation of the 5-inch round so close by. As far as he could tell, only he and Bäcker were still alive. They had to get away from this place as fast as they could.

2Lt Ginsberg couldn't believe his eyes. He and Mendez with about seven other men had reached the seawall, as the big sergeant turned to get his men into action, a stray piece of shrapnel had torn into his face.

"Shit, shit, shit, that effing hurts! LT grab a bandage out of my first aid kit!"

Shaking, the lieutenant did so, he couldn't function without this man, he was the soul of the platoon. As he tore open the bandage, he pressed it to the sergeant's face. Who roughly tore it out of the lieutenant's hands.

"Jesus LT, a man could effing bleed to death while you fumble around. Don't look so sad dammit, the Krauts haven't killed me yet. Facial wounds always look nastier than they are. Hell, ain't you ever cut yourself shaving? Suppose not. You, Connors, lay down some fire on that spot up there, keep the Krauts' heads down while we figure out our next move."

2Lt Ginsberg settled down when he saw that Mendez seemed to be okay. The man's field jacket was a bloody mess but he was alive and meaner than ever.

Hell, he might just live through this yet.

Seventy-five years ago today, men from eight nations fought their way ashore on five beaches in Normandy: Utah, Omaha, Gold, Juno, and Sword. 156,000 soldiers went ashore on that day to begin a campaign which wouldn't end until Adolf Hitler lay dead in the ruins of the capital city of the Third Reich.

Over 10,000 of those men would become casualties on that day, of whom 4,414 were killed.

Of the men who began the drive to liberate Europe from the Nazis, many are still there. Within sight of the beaches they came ashore on, their grave markers mute testimony to their courage, their honor, and their sacrifice.

Remember them always.

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