NORMANDY 2011
This month marks the 67th Anniversary of the Operation Overlord D-Day landings in Normandy.
See our Normandy section for tips and hints when travelling to the region......
Why the World at War?
This site is called 'The World at War' after the 1973 ITV series, which I believe is responsible for my lifelong interest in the Second World War.
Produced for Thames Television (UK), the series was narrated by Laurence Olivier.
I was eight at the time of broadcast, and was bundled off upstairs by my parents because of the gruesome scenes that it might show. I listened to the whole 26 episode series through the floor of my bedroom.
It was nearly twenty years later before I was able to watch the series on a video.
Perhaps no ONE TV series has had such a life shaping effect on a person?
The World at War website also aims to guide around Normandy and other WW2 battlefields, and to show how WW2 is remembered by reenactors and living history groups".
A debt of thanks is owed to the Trustees of the Imperial War Museum, London for their kind permission to use the period images used on this site.
Thanks also go to all the enthusiasts that help to gather images, stories and other content for this site.
The world at war this week:
1 June 1940: 64,420 men are evacuated from the beaches of Dunkirk, France despite heavy German air attacks.
2 June 1941: German paratroopers murder Greek civilians in the village of Kondomari, Crete retaliation for the participation of Cretans in the Battle of Crete
3 June 1940: Dunkirk evacuation ends with 338,226 men having been rescued
4 June 1940: British Prime Minister Winston Churchill broadcasts that: “…..we shall fight them on the beaches, we shall fight them on the landing grounds…….. We shall never surrender”. 1944: Rome is liberated by the Allies
5 June 1944: D-Day; Operation Neptune. Allied airborne troops land in France; the first trrops setting foot on French soil being the British 6th Airborne Division, at Benouville, near Caen
6 June 1944: D-Day; Operation Overload begins as allied troops storm the German defences of Normandy
7 June 1944: D-Day; British Commandos attack the fishing port of Port-en-Bessin, which was to become the landing point for the Pipeline Under the Ocean (PLUTO)
8 June 1940: British aircraft carrier HMS Glorious sunk by German battlecruisers Scharnhorst and Gneisenau
9 June 1944: 99 civilians are hung from lamp posts and balconies by German troops in Tulle, France, in reprisal for resistance attacks
10 June 1944: With over 326,00 troops now ashore, the Allies cut the road and rail links from Carentan to Cherbourg as the landing beachheads link up
11 June 1940: Italian dictator Mussolini declares war on the Allies
12 June 1942: Dutch Jew Anne frank receives a diary for her thirteenth birthday. Telling of the horrors of daily life in occupied Holland, this diary is published after the war
All material on this site is copyright and should not be used without the written permission of the site owner.