One of the great turning points of the Second World War took place 78 years ago Monday.
It was on June 6, 1944, that more than 150,000 soldiers of the Allied Forces stormed the beaches of Normandy on the northern coast of France.
“D-Day is here, this is the invasion of Hitler’s Europe,” said NBC radio broadcaster Robert St. John, to American audiences at the time.
Roughly 14,000 Canadians took part in the battle, joining British and American troops to clear beach defenses and minefields, and occupy nearby coastal villages.
“At half past three o’clock this morning, the government received official word that the invasion of western Europe had begun,” said then-Prime Minister William Lyon Mackenzie King, to Canadian radio listeners at the time.
“A great landing in western Europe is the opening of what we hope and believe will be the decisive phase of the war against Germany.”
Seventy-eight years after D-Day, the battle is recognized as a historic turning point, marking the beginning of the end of World War Two. Canada joined the war with Britain on Sept. 10, 1939.
Allied Forces fought in Normandy for a staggering 10 weeks before the campaign came to an end by the third week of August 1944.
D-Day casualties amounted to 1,074 Canadians, including 359 who were killed in action.
