Private Normandy Tour Canadian D-Day Juno Beach

A major constituent of the Atlantic Wall, the Longues-sur-Mer artillery battery includes a firing command post and four casemates, each housing a 150mm artillery piece. Located in the heart of the Allied assault zone, on the top of a cliff overlooking the English Channel, the battery played a strategic role during the Allied Landings on the 6th of June 1944.

Mulberry "B" (British) was the harbour assembled on Gold Beach at Arromanches for use by the British and Canadian invasion forces.

Juno or Juno Beach was one of five beaches of the Allied invasion of German-occupied France in the Normandy landings on 6 June 1944 during the Second World War. The beach spanned from Courseulles, a village just east of the British beach Gold, to Saint-Aubin-sur-Mer, and just west of the British beach Sword.

Courseulles is our first stop on Juno.

The Juno Beach Centre is the only Canadian Museum on the D-Day Beaches. Located on the very beach where Canadian troops landed on June 6, 1944, museum is an ideal location to discover Canada’s participation in the military operations of the Second World War as well as the efforts made on the home front. The Centre is also a window onto Canada today. The “Explore Juno as a Family” youth circuit makes visiting as a family more engaging and accessible.

This is our second stop on Juno Beach.

The Queen’s Own Rifles land at Bernières. Hidden German cannon and machine gun positions rake the beach. The QOR makes a 300 yard charge from the shore to the seawall under fire. Only a few men of the first company survive. Reinforcements from Le Regiment de la Chaudière finally overwhelm the German defences.

The cemetery at Bény-sur-Mer, located a few miles from Juno Beach, is one of two Canadian military cemeteries in Normandy. In total they harbour 4.800 graves of soldiers killed during the fighting in the summer of 1944. The tombstones demonstrate the importance of Canadian participation in the liberation of France and Northwestern Europe.

On the 7th of June, 1944, SS Panzergrenadierregiment headquarters, led by the SS SS and Kart Meyer belonging to the 12th SS Panzer-Division Hitlerjugend counterattack towards the beaches and settled in the abbey in order to take advantage of the point of view offered by constructions. Indeed, from this position, the Germans can observe a large part of the adverse movements in the sector and Kurt “Panzer” Meyer directs his counter-attack which pushes back the Canadians of the 9th brigade of the 3rd infantry division, supported by the Tanks of the 27th armored regiment Sherbrooke Fusilier, at the height of Buron.

S.S. soldiers, determined not to retreat hold this position for a full month. Several Canadian soldiers are taken prisoner during this period and are questioned in the abbey domain. The fighting, particularly violent in this sector, led the soldiers to carry out acts of extreme savagery: within a week of disembarkation, 27 Canadians were coldly executed near the abbey.