“That two or three hours that it took us to get off the beach, we saw an aspect of war and world history that hopefully won’t have to be repeated.” Five?miles of land covered in ?corpses,” Van Roosen said. “Everything I saw was on such a grand scale that I knew it would never happen again. We looked at the guy next to us and we said, ‘Too bad, man.’” said Normand Drapeau, 89, of Holyoke, who as a Navy petty officer piloted?a landing craft to Omaha Beach 12 times under German fire before his boat struck a mine.ĭonald Van Roosen, 90, of Newton, enlisted as a Harvard sophomore, was a private when he waded ashore on Omaha with the 29th Infantry Division. “Before we left the harbor, they said, ‘Half of you will not be alive tomorrow.’ We didn’t say nothing. Three Massachusetts men who stormed the Normandy?beaches on June 6, 1944, ?believed they would not live to see nightfall, but 70 years later, they are among the last witnesses to the carnage of the largest amphibious invasion? of all time - what many consider the turning point of World War II.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |