One soldier landed directly into the burning building.”
Coincidentally, a building in town was on fire, the townspeople were in the middle of a bucket brigade when all the troops started landing from the dark sky. Others got hung up in trees and a few were famously caught by their chutes on the side of the church steeple. Many soldiers landing in the village were shot on sight, often before they hit the ground. Some landing hard with their heavy equipment in these flooded marshes and muck, many others landing in the middle of a German squadron behind us in Sainte-Mère-Église - just like you saw in The Longest Day. The ack-ack anti-aircraft fire and low cloud cover had scattered them miles beyond the jump zone. paratroopers had just landed in the middle of the night. Below us, all of these fields had been flooded by the Germans in anticipation of an invasion.” Mathias calmly shouted amidst the blowing winter wind, a little sleet stinging our faces.
“Over along that ridge, German troops lined the tree lines, all the way to that bell tower in that village over there.
Our incredible guide Mathias Leclère, whom we just met ten minutes ago, pulled us over to chat in the protection of a wall dug into the hill. The cold morning wind was biting our faces as we walked up to the big bronze plaque.
