Saturday, January 15, 2011

Utah Beach in Winter

This spot on Utah Beach in Normandy is about 6 kilometres to the West of the Museum and the cluster of monuments, including a Higgins boat and a Sherman tank. Visitors often don't have time to appreciate the vastness of the area and how difficult the terrain was for fighting – flat, open, criss-crossed with ditches and irrigation canals, streams and large boggy marais.

That is, roughly, the area where Dick Winters and his Band of Brothers began their war in Europe. Richard 'Dick' Winters died on 2 January 2011.

The first photo shows what looks like remains of a concrete caisson from the second Mulberry harbour, which was destined for the American sector on D-Day, but destroyed in the violent storm about a week after the Allied landings in France. Shells in the foreground reminded me of soldiers' helmets.


The second photo shows the 'crocodile' bunker pockmarked with artillery fire.


Photos ©Alexander Anichkin

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