D-DAY JUNE 6, 1944--FASCINATING FACTS FROM "THE HISTORY READER"

 

 

 

THE HISTORY READER

 

The D-Day Assault: June 6, 1944 On 6 June 1944, just after midnight, the Allied assault upon Hitler's 'Fortress Europe' began. Catching the German military high command unaware, low tides and bad weather—combined with Allied deception plans—had convinced the Germans that an attack was unlikely at that time. As more than 1,000 British bombers began to pummel Normandy's coastal defenses, over 4,000 allied vessels were approaching the Normandy beaches primed to invade Nazi Europe.

Quote of the Month "The eyes of the world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of liberty loving people everywhere march with you." —Dwight D. Eisenhower June 6th, 1944

The Heart Healers: Saving Men at the D-Day Beach Landings  by James S. Forrester M.D.   In June 1944 at the D-Day beach landings, Dwight Harken was brought a dying soldier with a gaping injury to his sternum and ribs. The heart's right ventricle lies directly behind the sternum, Nature's impenetrable bony shield. Ancients saw Nature's logic. The word sternum descends from the Greek word sternon, meaning a soldier's breastplate. As his assistants used retractors to widen Harken's field of view within the chest cavity, he saw shrapnel had penetrated the right ventricle... Read More

James S. Forrester M.D., is the author of The Heart Healers: The Misfits, Mavericks, and Rebels Who Created the Greatest Medical Breakthrough of Our Lives and an Emeritus Professor and former Chief of the Division of Cardiology at Cedars-Sinai. In addition, he is a Professor of Medicine at the David Geffen School of Medicine at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Dr. Forrester developed the Forrester classification of hemodynamic subsets of acute myocardial infarction. In the early 1990s, Dr. Forrester led a team that developed coronary angioscopy. He lives in Malibu, CA with his wife who is also a physician.

Easy Company in France: After D-Day  by Don Malarkey   Normandy, France, was beauty and the beast. The sprinkling of land unspoiled by war was the beauty. We, the soldiers, were the beasts. I'd see miles and miles of fields and orchards that, in places, reminded me of spots I'd seen in the Willamette Valley while hitchhiking from Astoria to Eugene back in Oregon. Then, suddenly, I'd see the remains of a horse splattered by artillery, the legs here, the head there. In some places, a breeze would bring the smell of grass and trees; in others, the rancid odor of death. Germans. Americans. Civilians. Animals. Whatever got in the way of war. One of the biggest problems we were having was taking care of our dead—getting them buried. Some of our Graves Registration guys resorted to getting drunk to do their jobs... Read More

Don Malarkey was born in 1921, and grew up in Astoria, Oregon. After trying to enlist in several branches of the service, he was drafted in 1942 and spent more consecutive days in combat than any other member of E Company, 506th Regiment, 101st Airborne—the most recognized fighting unit in American history. Today he lives in Oregon. He is the author of Easy Company Soldier: The Legendary Battles of a Sergeant from World War II's "Band of Brothers"   Bob Welch, an award-winning columnist for "The Register-Guard" newspaper, is the author of seven books. His work has appeared in "Reader's Digest" and "Los Angeles Times Magazine, " among other publications. He is an adjunct professor of journalism at the University of Oregon in Eugene, where he lives.