D-DAY THROUGH CANADIAN EYES

Minutes after midnight on June 6, 1944, the first Canadians dropped into France from airplanes, followed hours later by troops storming the beaches and then tanks rumbling in after them. The Allied command had taken advantage of a tiny window of good weather, favourable tides and moonlight, and with three words from the laconic Supreme Commander Dwight D. Eisenhower — “Okay, we’ll go” — they set about reversing their fortunes in the Second World War. More than 10,000 Canadian sailors and 15,000 Canadian troops were involved and, according to the Department of National Defence, they suffered a total of 1,074 casualties on that day alone. And after landing on the beach, they kept battling through France, suffering ever more casualties. Stuart Thomson reveals what Operation Overlord, the battle for the beaches of Normandy, looked like through Canadian eyes on that historic day.