D-Day, the Allied invasion of Europe, began on the night of 5-6 June
1944. At 07.00 hours on the 6th, Britain's First Corps and XXX Corps
came ashore on Sword and Gold beaches, to withering fire from the
entrenched German forces. Within the initial and critical couple of
hours some 30,000 soldiers, 300 guns and 700 armoured vehicles were
landed, a magnificent achievement and, though the sands were soon choked
with the mother of all logjams, exacerbated by a swelling tide, the
British were firmly lodged; a bridgehead had been secured, albeit a
rather flimsy one at this juncture. This is the story of the British
soldiers' experience of the beach landings on that fateful morning - the
spearhead of Operation Overlord.