I remember the roar of guns as if it was yesterday…I won’t ever forget it, says D-Day hero ahead of 80th anniversary
IT will be 80 years on Thursday since veteran Don Sheppard landed on a beach in northern France as part of the largest ever land and sea invasion.
Yet even at 104 years old, the former soldier says the sounds he heard on D-Day on Juno Beach in Normandy will haunt him for ever.
He says: “I remember the noise as though it was yesterday. The noise is something I won’t forget.
“The roar of a battleship discharging its guns over our heads and the sound of rocket ships.
“The Germans sank the boat behind us.
“The run-in to the beach was hazardous, to say the least, because the Germans had their guns aimed at us.
“When we landed we were in about four feet of water and soaking wet.
“The first vehicle that landed disappeared in a shell hole. I was in the next one off.
“There were many dead guys who hadn’t made it.
“Right in front of me there must have been at least 20 or 30 dead there, probably engineers removing mines, and that was just a small section of a beach that went on for miles and miles.
“As I looked around me, I could just see bodies everywhere. It really was the longest day, like they say.”
In an effort to free Europe from the clutches of the Nazis, more than 156,000 British, American and Canadian troops launched from the sea and air on to French soil.
The British numbered more than 83,000.
Known as one of the most successful military operations in history, around 4,400 troops paid the ultimate price during D-Day itself on June 6, 1944, including 1,760 Brits.
The campaign was to go on for 12 weeks, with more than 53,000 Allied troops and airmen being killed among more than 225,000 casualties.
The invasion paved the way for the Allied troops’ victory over Germany and the end of World War Two.
Don was a 24-year-old sapper with the Royal Engineers and arrived on Juno Beach at around 4.30pm in a tank landing ship.
He says: “We went across the Channel to France to liberate Europe and that should never be forgotten.
“Thousands of young men gave their lives for others, to get rid of the Nazis.”
Later that day he ended up in Bavent Wood, in an intense firefight to clear a German command post, one of the most crucial early battles of the Allies’ victory.
Don says: “German dive bombers began drop-ping shrapnel bombs. We were laying under an American tank.
Even though I cannot travel to Normandy any more, I have to pay my respects to all of the men I was with that day
Don Sheppard
“There were explosives in-side it, to blow up Pegasus Bridge if the Germans got through.
“My mate said, ‘Let’s get out of here, Don’. We shot across the wood and jumped into a ditch.
“There was so much shelling. I got shrapnel in my leg. It was patched up and I had morphine.”
Don then advanced to safety once the Germans had been cleared away and he was in Hamburg in 1945 when victory was declared.
He served his country from the beginning of World War Two, with postings in Sicily and North Africa, and was involved in the liberation of the concentration camps.
For years, Don, from Basildon, Essex, travelled out to the D-Day commemorations in France.
Now he is too unwell to make the trip, following a short hospital stay.
But he says: “Even though I cannot travel to Normandy any more, I have to pay my respects to all of the men I was with that day.”
And he continues to give talks to local schoolchildren to explain what happened on that day.
He says: “It’s important and I like doing it.
“The children want to know about my medals, and they ask me questions about what happened.
“The younger generations don’t really know what fighting a war like this means.
“We have to keep reminding everybody, so this doesn’t fade away.”
Research from the Commonwealth War Graves Commission last week found one in five young Britons do not know what the significance of D-Day is, but Don adds: “It’s so important not to forget those guys.”
Don, a father of three, grandfather of six and great-grandfather of four, who went on to work at the Ford plant in Dagenham, says: “It’s important that young people today understand and remember those that died.
“I will be thinking of them as I have done every year — and the younger generation should do that too.”
‘THE SCALE WAS UNIMAGINABLE’
Says ex-marine JJ Chalmers
FORMER Royal Marine Commando JJ Chalmers will be reporting from D-Day 80: The Allies Prepare – the national commemoration event staged in Portsmouth.
It will be broadcast live on BBC One on Wednesday from 10.15am.
The 37-year-old suffered life-changing injuries in an IED blast while serving in Afghanistan in 2011.
He has since launched a media career, competed on Strictly Come Dancing and won gold for cycling at the Invictus Games wounded, injured and sick servicemen and women.
He says: “As a boy my family holidayed in France and my parents took me to the beaches in Normandy and the graves of British soldiers and their allies.
“I was struck by the scale.
“It was so unimaginable even for a youngster to see so many who’d made the ultimate sacrifice.
“For someone who then went on to serve in conflict, I felt its meaning even more closely.
“I lost friends during my time and that will live with me for ever, but it was nowhere near the scale and suffering and loss of D-Day – not just those who died but the ripple effect on those close to them. It remains hugely important we know our history.
“For every one person who lost their life, there were dozens more who served in some form, uniform or not.
“The enormity of what had to come together to rid the world of a genuine evil was something truly remarkable.
“We have to continue to remember that, to honour them and keep their memories alive.
“We, as a society, have to ensure each year that it is not the final time we ever do this.”
HEROICS HELPED END WAR
THE D-Day landings on June 6, 1944, marked the start of the Allied campaign to overthrow Hitler and free north-west Europe from the Nazis.
Codenamed Overlord and 18 months in planning, it was scheduled for June 5 but bad weather delayed it.
Thousands of ships sailed from England at dead of night.
More than 5,000 vessels delivered 132,000 troops. Thousands more landed by air.
The forces included sailors, soldiers and aircrew from the US, Canada, Australia, Belgium, Czechoslovakia, France, Greece, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway and Poland.
Just after midnight on the morning of June 6, Allied aircraft began bombing Normandy, while soldiers parachuted in.
Between 2am to 4am, 4,000 more troops flew in on paragliders.
At 5am, Allied battleships began firing at Nazi defences as the first landing ships headed for the shore.
Rather than landing where the Germans expected, at the Channel’s narrowest crossing point, they targeted five beaches – codenamed Utah, Omaha, Gold, Sword and Juno – further away.
‘DEADLY CAMPAIGN’
By 6am, as the sun rose, the boats approached the shore – in a moment dubbed H-hour – under heavy fire.
The invasion was the first of its kind so equipment had to be invented for it.
This included the landing craft, which had ramps to drop down so troops could disembark more easily.
At 7am the Allies deployed tanks to the beaches.
More than 1,000 troops died on Omaha but at noon, Prime Minister Winston Churchill informed Parliament that the invasion was going well.
By 6pm Juno was taken, plus other beaches, as the Allies set their sights on the city of Caen, a German strong-hold, although the city did not fall until July 10.
D-Day saw 4,414 Allied troops killed and more than 5,000 wounded.
The operation, over 50 miles of coast, saw more than two million Allied soldiers, sailors, pilots, medics and civilians join the largest naval, air and land operation in history in the coming 12 weeks.
It was one of the Allies’ worst ordeals of the war, as forces faced mines, tank ditches and a fast-firing enemy.
But it would change the fortunes of Britain and Europe – marking the start of a long and deadly campaign that finished with the end of the war, more than a year later, on September 2, 1945.
D-DAY DIARY
HERE are some of the events next week to mark the 80th anniversary of D-Day . . .
- JUNE 5: UK national D-Day event in Portsmouth, where the public will join D-Day veterans, Armed Forces personnel and VIP guests.
- Royal British Legion event at the Bayeux War Cemetery in Normandy. Veterans and descendants will attend with Armed Forces personnel.
- Commonwealth War Graves Commission hosts its annual Service of Thanksgiving, with French and British Armed Forces and D-Day veterans, at Bayeux Cathedral. The Commission also leads a candlelit evening vigil at Bayeux War Cemetery, with 4,500 graves illuminated.
- JUNE 6: The Royal British Legion will stage a Remembrance Service within the grounds of the National Memorial Arboretum near Lichfield, Staffs.
- UK National Commemorative Event at British Normandy Memorial in Ver-sur-Mer, Normandy. The Memorial features the names of 22,442 servicemen and women who fell on D-Day and the three-month Battle of Normandy that followed.
- Movie The Longest Day shown at the Imperial War Museum in Duxford, Cambs. Retelling the build-up to D-Day, and the invasion, the film stars John Wayne, Richard Burton, Sean Connery, Henry Fonda, Robert Mitchum and D-Day veteran Richard Todd.