New memorial to fallen under UK command
A MEMORIAL to almost 22 500 servicemen and women under British command killed during D-Day and subsequent battles was unveiled in northern France yesterday, a tribute to their sacrifice seen as long overdue.
The British Normandy Memorial, inscribed with the names of 22 442 men and women who lost their lives during the invasion of Nazi-occupied France in the summer of 1944, is situated on a hillside in the Normandy village of Ver-sur-Mer.
Opened on the 77th anniversary of the landings, it overlooks Gold Beach, one of three beaches where British forces landed on the morning of June 6, 1944 to begin the liberation of Western Europe from Nazi occupation.
Covid-19 restrictions prevented British survivors from travelling to France for the opening ceremony, but some 100 veterans were gathered at the National Memorial Arboretum in Staffordshire, UK, to watch the ceremony via video link.
The memorial – built at a cost of
£33 million (R627m) met by both the UK government and private donors – is the first Normandy site commemorating those who fell under British command.
It consists of a series of 160 standing white stones where the names of the soldiers who fell are inscribed in chronological order from June 6 to August 31, 1944. Some 4 000 tons of stone were used.
The site also includes a French Memorial, dedicated to the memory of estimated 20 000 French civilians who died in Normandy as a result of bombing and fighting.
The heir to the British throne Prince Charles, in a video message broadcast at the ceremony, described
the memorial as “long overdue”.
Soldiers from over three dozen nationalities, including from across the Commonwealth and French resistance fighters, served under British command in the landings.
Steven Dean, the manager of the project, said he hoped that the site could draw a quarter of a million visitors every year. Until now, the main site of pilgrimage for paying respects to those who died under British command has been the cemetery in the nearby town of Bayeux.
The American cemetery in Colleville-sur-Mer, whose 10 000 graves overlook Omaha Beach, used to welcome some one million visitors annually before the pandemic struck.