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Post here with any anecdotes or stories about the Juno Beach landings on 6th June 1944…
We built the first allied airfield at Beny-sur-Mer!
At 20 years old, I landed on Juno Beach on D-Day with the Canadians. The scene was nothing like I’ve ever since before or since. There was just a mass of metal and it looked as if you could just walk from one boat to another, right back to England! When we landed there was water up to our chests, but we were told to keep the guns above our heads. Once ashore we had to keep those wet clothes on for days until they dried out.
We (Royal Engineers) built the first airfield at Beny-sur-mer and the first spitfire to land there killed my good friend, John Queen. The airfield site was completely covered with fellas walking about, doing their different jobs to put the site together. Then this Canadian aeroplane came down. He’d been shot so he had to land, mowing right through the bunch of fellas. Queenie was one of the unlucky ones who couldn’t get out of the way in time. So he just ran and the propeller chopped him into pieces. He is now buried at Bayeux cemetery – I found his grave in 2012 after years of searching.
Sapper Young.
POSTED BY ABRAHAM (TED) YOUNG
My father led French Canadians troops on to Juno Beach
My late father, Jim Baker, was at D-Day. He was on Juno Beach and led the French Canadians in to shore. He was aged just 21 at the time. He was awarded the DSM and, more recently, the Legion d’Honneur. By the 8th of June he was at Omaha beach and did 22 landings with the Americans there. Thank you for sharing his story.
POSTED BY SHELLY SAYER
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