Hatfield-Hankins European Adventure 2015: D Day Revisited 04-20-2015

Today was unlike any other in a great way. Prior to coming to Normandy we had contracted with Dale Booth's Normandy Tours to give us a guided tour of the beaches our forces landed on during the D-Day invasion. We started out with a visit to the battle site at the La Fiere bridge. This was a scene of horrific devastation, with approximately 500 deaths on each side. The Americans held the bridge and the Germans tried to take it. There was a Medal of Honor, two DSC's, and numerous other valor awards , including many Purple Hearts were given out. Two Privates, Marcus Heim and Len Peterson knocked out 3 German tanks with a bazooka. After the third tank was taken out, Len( a Swede, who spoke broken English) jumped up and shouted "we did good". Sgt Charles N. DeGlopper received the Medal of Honor for sacrificing his life to save his comrades by killing and wounding numerous Germans with a BAR automatic weapon. This battle waged for several days. At one point the U.S. forces assaulted the German forces with about 250 troops and 10 survived. It was very emotional to hear about the stories of the bravery the young men displayed.

We then went to Ste Mere Eglise and got the story behind the story of John Steele on the church steeple. First of all, two G.I.'s landed on the church. Private Ken Russell was the second. Steele dropped his knife and could not cut himself loose. Russell used his knife and cut him self loose. Secondly, they landed on the opposite side of the church. Not the side where the mannequin currently hangs.
We visited the drop zones, other small action sites, a field hospital, and went back to Utah Beach. After a revisit to Graignes, with a detail brief of the battle, we headed back to our quarters and called it a day.