NEW YORK (PIX11) – On this day 80 years ago, more than 160,000 Allied troops stormed the coast of France on June 6, 1944, in the Normandy Landings operation commonly referred to as D-Day.
Of those troops, 73,000 were from the United States, and over 83,000 were from Britain and Canada. The Allies, along with several other countries, faced around 50,000 German soldiers to take back France from the Nazi Army in the most intricately planned military operation in history.
June, 6, 1944: Reinforcements disembarking from a landing barge at Normandy during the Allied Invasion of France on D-Day. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
Second Lieutenant Walter Sidlowski of 348th Engineer C Battalion, 5th Engineer Special Brigade, on Omaha Beach, Normandy, after helping to rescue a group of drowning soldiers after their landing craft sank on the morning of June 7, 1944 during the Normandy Landings. Photo: PFC Walter Rosenblum (1919 - 2006). (Photo by Walter Rosenblum/U.S. Army Signal Corps/Galerie Bilderwelt/Getty Images)
1940: British soldiers negotiating a barbed wire defence during a seashore invasion exercise. (Photo by Hulton Archive/Getty Images)
Few moments are remembered as critical in history for Americans and other countries involved in World War II. This was also the day that Franklin Delano Roosevelt, the president of the United States at the time, took to the radio waves to address the country in a prayer speech.
“Almighty God: Our sons, pride of our Nation, this day have set upon a mighty endeavor, a struggle to preserve our Republic, our religion, and our civilization, and to set free a suffering humanity,” President Roosevelt said.
His speech, broadcast to millions of Americans, lasted more than five minutes.
New Yorkers crowded Times Square as they watched a news broadcast of the D-Day invasion. Thousands more were reported to have prayed at synagogues and churches.
A crowd watching the news line on the Times building at Times Square .
(Photo courtesy of Library of Congress Lot: 1777)
A crowd watching the news line on the Times building at Times Square.
(Photo courtesy of Library of Congress Lot: 1777)
Noon mass at Saint Vincent de Paul's Church on D-day.
(Photo courtesy of Library of Congress Lot: 1777)
Times Square and vicinity on D-Day. (Photo courtesy of Library of Congress Lot: 1777)
D-day services in a synagogue on West Twenty-third Street.
(Photo courtesy of Library of Congress Lot: 1777)
A crowd on D-Day in Madison Square.(Photo courtesy of Library of Congress Lot: 1777)
Noon mass at Saint Vincent de Paul's Church on D-day.
(Photo courtesy of Library of Congress Lot: 1777)
Blood donors on D-day.
(Photo courtesy of Library of Congress Lot: 1777)
By the end of D-Day, a total of 4,414 Allied troops were killed; 2,501 of the lives lost were Americans.
In total, 1.6 million New Yorkers served in WWII — 10% of the U.S. armed forces at the time, according to a spokesperson for the NY State Military Museum.
Matthew Euzarraga is a multimedia journalist from El Paso, Texas. He has covered local news and LGBTQIA topics in the New York City Metro area since 2021. He joined the PIX11 Digital team in 2023. You can see more of his work here.
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