Alabama at D-Day

We’ll likely never know, precisely, how many Alabamians stormed Omaha or Utah Beach, or parachuted into the Normandy countryside, on D-Day. Or for that matter, how many of them gave their lives, or were wounded, in what General Dwight Eisenhower had already christened “the Great Crusade.”

But we do know that at least 13 crosses at the Normandy American Cemetery mark the Alabamians who gave their lives on this day, 80 years ago today -- June 6, 1944.?

?These are those men (and families) for whom those crosses stand.

Even before the first landing craft hit Omaha and Utah Beaches, Alabamians parachuted into Normandy with the 101st?and 82nd?Airborne Divisions.? In the latter,?Private Charlie K. Edmondson, the son of a Gadsden steel mill worker, was killed in action in Saint Sauveur le-Vicomte fighting alongside a comrade in the 307th?Engineer Battalion.??70 years later, his sister could still remember running to her mother to bring her a copy of the telegram bearing the tragic news.

Another fellow paratrooper in the 82nd?Airborne –?Private John H. Hunt, of Brent, in Bibb County – was killed in action when German flak shot down the glider that was bringing him and his artillery piece into Normandy.??Private First Class Bryant H. Lipham, a mortarman with the 82nd’s 507th?Parachute Infantry Regiment, had farmed outside of Arab, Alabama, before the war.? He died in chaotic fighting in a foreign farmer’s field outside the village of Chef-du-Pont.

Six other Alabama casualties on D-Day served in the fabled 16th?Infantry Regiment, of the 1st?Infantry Division – the “Big Red One.”??Private First Class Samuel J. Di Paola?was one of them.? The son of Sicilian immigrants, he had served overseas for 17 months, fighting his way through North Africa and Sicily, before losing his life on Omaha Beach.? He left a wife and 16-month-old son back home in Ensley, Alabama.

PFC John L. Hastings?was a 26-year-old former farmer from Aspel, just outside of Scottsboro, in Jackson County. “He was a good boy and proud to be willing and ready to do his part for himself, country, and others,” the local newspaper would remember, noting that his only brother was serving in New Guinea at the time.? The exact details seem to have been lost on the chaos of D-Day, but Hastings received a Silver Star – posthumously – for “gallantry in action” on that bloody day.?? Ironically, Hasting’s cousin,?PFC James R. Knight, also lost his life with the regiment on the Normandy sands. His parents resided in Fyffe, in DeKalb County atop Sand Mountain.?

Also serving in the Big Red One’s 16th Infantry Regiment,?Private First Class Leon D. Hampton?hailed from the small hamlet of Vida, in Autauga County.? A graduate of Billingsley High School, he had enlisted in November of 1942 at Fort McClellan and was mortally wounded during the D-Day landings on Omaha Beach.

Sergeant James “Curtis” Pittman,?who grew up on Route 2 outside of Roanoke, was another Alabamian serving with the 16th?Infantry.? He had already been wounded twice in North Africa and Sicily, but his luck would fail him on D-Day.? So would that of?Private Ruel Sanford, a graduate of Parrish High School, who left his widow?Bessie and a 20-month-old daughter in Walker County.

As the 1st?Infantry Division hit Omaha Beach, the 4th?Infantry Division landed, twelve miles east, on the beached code-named Utah.??Private Edward Hayes?died on that stretch of sand.? His widow, along with their infant daughter Patricia Ann, would receive a telegram with the terrible news in Lanett in the days to come.??Staff Sergeant Allan?J. Mann,?who had attended school in Anniston, was another Alabamian who wore the division patch.? He also died on D-Day, serving in the 22nd Infantry Regiment.

Off Utah Beach, the artillerymen of B Battery, 29th?Field Artillery, provided fire support from their self-propelled M7 howitzers afloat the landing craft LCT-458 for the 4th Infantry Division soldiers ashore.?Captain Vernon “Junie” Burns?commanded the battery; he was a native of Frisco City, Alabama, and had played guard on Auburn’s ’38 and ’39 football teams.

A little over an hour after the first wave hit Utah Beach, Burns’ LCT struck a floating German mine.? The exploding mine’s blast broke both of Burns’ legs and threw him into the water.? But the former Auburn player not only managed to stay afloat but remained in the water, helping to save many of his men from drowning, until the last survivor was pulled to safety.??

Unfortunately, Burns’ heroics were not enough to save 37 members of his battery.? One of those lost was his fellow Alabamian?Private Noel N. Nichols, who had grown up near the small town of Hodges on the Alabama-Mississippi border in Marion County.? Nichols’ body was never recovered and, for his part, Burns would spend nearly three years recuperating in a hospital stateside.??

More fortunate was Burns’ former assistant football coach at Auburn. Captain Ralph “Shug” Jordan?had also been wounded in the assault on Utah Beach with the 1st Special Engineer Brigade. Before the war was over, Jordan would be back in action – and, as any Auburn fan knows, would one day return to Auburn as its head football coach.

Like Junie Burns and Shug Jordan,?1st?Lieutenant Joe Mercer?was another officer from Alabama.? Mercer had grown up outside of today’s Fort Novosel (then Camp Rucker) in Ozark, Alabama, and, in January of 1941, had enlisted as a tanker.? After service in the Pacific, Mercer completed Office Candidate School and was assigned to the newly formed 746th?Tank Battalion, in which he led C Company’s 1st?Platoon.? The company of M4 Sherman tanks landed on Utah Beach two hours into the assault and, after working their way through minefields and enemy shelling, began to push through the falling dusk toward St. Mere Eglise.??

Approaching a creek just outside of the small town, Mercer’s company ran into well-placed German anti-tank guns.? In response, one platoon peeled off the road toward the right, and Mercer led his Shermans to the left.? Firing down from the heights above the creek, the Germans knocked out three of Mercer’s tanks – to include the platoon leader’s own.? Historian Cornelius Ryan would call D-Day “the Longest Day,” and, in a flaming Sherman, Mercer lost his life in its waning hours.

Together, these men came from hometowns stretching from Scottsboro to Ozark, and from Lanett to Hodges.? Some were brand-new to combat; others already wore Purple Hearts on their uniform blouses. ?Some had never been married; others left behind widows and children.? ?But, all told, eighty years later, as I recount just a little piece of each man’s story, I can’t help but recall, as I sit here in Alabama, the final words of Tom Hanks’ Captain John Miller in the film?Saving Private Ryan.

?“James . . . earn this.? Earn it.”

?Indeed.

?###

?

?

?