32 obscure facts from the depths of WWII history. Even Mike might not know these.
U.S. Army Rangers scaled 100-foot cliffs at Pointe du Hoc under fire to destroy six 155mm German cannons only to find telephone pole decoys. Sgt. Leonard Lomell and Sgt. Jack Kuhn discovered the real guns in an orchard 1,300 yards away and destroyed …
Brigadier General Theodore Roosevelt Jr., age 56 with a heart condition, was the only general officer to land with the first wave on D-Day. Carrying a walking stick, he landed on Utah Beach 2,000 yards off course. Rather than relocate thousands of in…
Brigadier General Theodore Roosevelt Jr., son of President Theodore Roosevelt, was the only general officer to land with the first wave on D-Day. At 56 years old and with a bad heart (he carried a cane), he landed at the wrong beach in the first wave…
The Normandy American Cemetery at Coleville-sur-Mer overlooks Omaha Beach and contains 9,387 graves — mostly of Americans who died in the invasion of Normandy and later operations in France. But the lesser-known fact is that approximately 300 of thos…
The Normandy bocage — thick hedgerows of earth and tangled bramble that separated centuries-old farm fields — created conditions worse than any Allied planner expected. The hedgerows were over 2,000 years old, some originally planted by the Romans an…
Major General Percy Hobart designed specialized tanks for D-Day that were unlike anything the Germans had ever seen. There were 'Duplex Drive' (DD) swimming tanks with inflatable canvas screens, 'Crab' flail tanks that cleared minefields with chains …
The Canadian 3rd Infantry Division achieved the deepest penetration of any Allied force on D-Day at Juno Beach, advancing 10 km inland — further than any other unit. But at a cost: they faced 14% casualties, the highest of any D-Day beach assault. Th…
Rommel, anticipating airborne landings, ordered the flooding of low-lying fields behind Utah Beach. The resulting marshlands were 5-6 feet deep — deadly for paratroopers who landed in them with 80+ pounds of gear and couldn't swim. Many drowned in th…
Group Captain James Stagg, a Scottish meteorologist, personally convinced Eisenhower to launch D-Day on 6 June based on a brief window of improving weather that German meteorologists had completely missed. The Germans believed no amphibious landing w…
A mixed-breed terrier named George was adopted by the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division and smuggled onto Juno Beach. When artillery fire became too intense, George would run between foxholes, apparently comforting wounded soldiers. He was officially en…
The village of Sainte-Mere-Eglise, made famous by the movie 'The Longest Day,' was not the first town liberated — that honor goes to Ranville, taken by British paratroopers of the 6th Airborne Division at 00:30 on D-Day. But Ranville was recaptured b…
Captain Philippe Kieffer, leading the Free French 1er Bataillon de Fusiliers Marins Commandos on D-Day, brought two dogs — a German Shepherd named 'Cesar' and a Scottish Terrier named 'Patsy' — which were trained to detect mines. Kieffer was a civili…