Photos Colour and Colourised Photos of WW2 & earlier conflicts

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The man up front pulling the raft is 1st. Lieutenant Walter Sidlowski of the 348th Combat Battalion, 5th Engineers Special Brigade, supporting the 1st Infantry Division on Omaha Beach, he was awarded the Bronze Star for Valor for rescuing scores of men from a floundering landing craft and others who were in the grip of a churning sea.

The rescues were captured in a sequence of photos taken by famed photographer Walter Rosenblum.

“There was a landing craft breached, either due to fire or to being grounded, and quite a few men on it were not getting off and the craft was going down. We swam out and took a few…back to shore. Somebody else got a long rope which we swam out with, tied onto the landing craft, and had them hold onto…and walk themselves in…. At that time I had no idea there was a photographer in the vicinity.”
“I saw this magnificent man swim out and bring some people off the sinking ship and bring them back in to shore and to me he was the picture of heroic beauty.”

 

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One of the original “Toccoa Man” of Easy Company, 506th PIR, 101st ‘Screaming Eagles’ Airborne Infantry Division, Forrest Guth is seen here goofing off at Marmion Farm, near Ravenoville, Normandy. June 6, 1944.

The Marmion Farm complex was a rally point for Allied paratroopers and it also happened to be a German strongpoint featuring half a dozen bunkers manned by a platoon size garrison. Fortunately for the paratroopers, the German defenders were not well organized and despite a spirited defense, were no match for the 101st men. After about one and a half hours of combat the surviving Germans surrendered.

The helmet Guth is wearing is said to have belonged to a large German soldier that in the early morning of June 6 was sleeping next to the building’s door when a paratrooper barged in and fell over him. As the two fought it off a second paratrooper came up behind the German soldier and stabbed him to death.

Forrest Guth carried a camera borrowed from his boyhood friend and fellow paratrooper, Roderick Strohl. It was this camera that shot some of the most famous photos featuring men of Easy Company during the opening stages of the Normandy Invasion.

 

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Troops of 3rd Infantry Division on Queen Red beach, Sword area, circa 0845 hrs, 6 June 1944. In the foreground are sappers of 84 Field Company Royal Engineers, part of No.5 Beach Group, identified by the white bands around their helmets. Behind them, medical orderlies of 8 Field Ambulance, RAMC, can be seen assisting wounded men. In the background commandos of 1st Special Service Brigade can be seen disembarking from their LCI(S) landing craft.

(Photo source - © IWM B 5114)
Sgt. Jim Mapham, No 5 Army Film & Photographic Unit

“In the context of Second World War photography, Jim Mapham is best remembered for his coverage of the British landings on Sword Beach during June 6, 1944,” she said.

“Arriving with Sherman tanks of the 13/18th Hussars as part of the initial assault wave, Mapham was in an ideal position to capture the start of the D-Day landings.

“His photographs take one through the dramatic events of June 6-7 from approaching Sword Beach under fire, through the drama of the landings to the initial push inland. “Amongst the images captured by Mapham is one of the iconic photographs taken on D-Day showing British troops coming ashore whilst under German mortar and artillery fire. That medics are seen assisting men wounded whilst landing gives the photograph a real immediacy."

 

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USS Samuel Chase (APA-26)'s LCVP-16 approaches "Omaha" Beach on "D-Day", 6 June 1944. The boat is smoking from a fire that presumably resulted when a German machine gun bullet hit a soldiers smoke grenade.

After discharging his load of troops the boat's coxswain, Coastguardsman Delba L. Nivens of Amarillo, Texas, assisted by his engineman and bowman, put out the fire and returned to their transport.
Note the beach obstacles just ahead of the boat.

 

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WW2 - US soldiers preparing to land in Omaha Beach, June 6, 1944.

The Normandy landings (code name Operation Overlord) began in the early hours of Tuesday 6 June 1944 (D-Day) in the Cotentin peninsula and in the Caen area when the allied troops (United States, Canada, United Kingdom, Poland), preceded by a heavy air and naval bombing, they landed on five beaches: Sword (near Courseulles-sur-Mer) - Juno (Arromanches-les-Bains) - Gold (Longues-sur-Mer) - Omaha (Vierville-sur-Mer) - Utah (on the coast near Sainte-Mère-Eglise).

 

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Robert Capa

Robert Capa (born Endre Ernő Friedmann; October 22, 1913 – May 25, 1954) was a Hungarian-American war photographer and photojournalist as well as the companion and professional partner of photographer Gerda Taro. He is considered by some to be the greatest combat and adventure photographer in history.

Capa fled political repression in Hungary when he was a teenager, moving to Berlin, where he enrolled in college. He witnessed the rise of Hitler, which led him to move to Paris, where he met and began to work with Gerta Pohorylle. Together they worked under the alias Robert Capa and became photojournalists. Though she contributed to much of the early work, she quickly created her own alias 'Gerda Taro' and they began to publish their work separately. He subsequently covered five wars: the Spanish Civil War, the Second Sino-Japanese War, World War II across Europe, the 1948 Arab–Israeli War, and the First Indochina War, with his photos published in major magazines and newspapers.

During his career he risked his life numerous times, most dramatically as the only civilian photographer landing on Omaha Beach on D-Day. He documented the course of World War II in London, North Africa, Italy, and the liberation of Paris. His friends and colleagues included Ernest Hemingway, Irwin Shaw, John Steinbeck and director John Huston.

In 1947, for his work recording World War II in pictures, U.S. general Dwight D. Eisenhower awarded Capa the Medal of Freedom. That same year, Capa co-founded Magnum Photos in Paris. The organization was the first cooperative agency for worldwide freelance photographers. Hungary has issued a stamp and a gold coin in his honor.

 

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"Taxis to Hell – and Back – Into the Jaws of Death", by Robert F. Sargent, CPhoM, USCG.

A LCVP (Landing Craft, Vehicle, Personnel) from the U.S. Coast Guard-manned USS Samuel Chase disembarks troops of Company E, 16th Infantry, 1st Infantry Division (the Big Red One) wading onto the Fox Green section of Omaha Beach (Calvados, Basse-Normandie, France) on the morning of June 6, 1944. American soldiers encountered the newly formed German 352nd Division when landing. During the initial landing two-thirds of the Company E became casualties.

Once the D-Day invasion began on 6 June 1944, and the 352nd realized it was facing the brunt of the Invasion, it immediately absorbed all troops within is sector, to include Luftwaffe Flak troops and RAD (Labor Service) personnel. Once it became clear that the main Allied invasion force was coming ashore at Normandy, all available units were rushed to the front. Hardened bunkers (Winderstandsnest) on or near the beach opened fire and continued to fire until they depleted their ammunition or all the men inside were dead. Artillery Regiment 352 and 1275 had pre-sighted every inch of the landing areas on the beach and rained shells down upon the landing Allied forces. They, too, continued to fire until they had run out of ammo or were in danger from being encircled.
"...We had a bad break tactically because the German 352nd Division was on a counter-attack training exercise at Omaha [Beach]. So instead of a fortress battalion -- you know, with kind of second-rate troops -- we had a whole damned infantry division in front of us. We hit the sand...behind the bodies of the amphibious engineers...and tried to advance a bit, but there was a large German bunker in front of us, and its machine gun fire hit us every time we tried to move. We didn’t have any comm with the American destroyer behind us because...the naval officer had been killed, his driver too, and the radio set destroyed...so we planned an assault. But before we could get organized, there were huge demolitions around the bunker. Thank God we hadn’t moved out yet: an American destroyer had moved in and was firing direct with 4-inch guns into the bunker."
-Capt Edward McGregor, US 1st Infantry Div
(Photo source - Chief Photographer's Mate (CPHoM) Robert F. Sargent - National Archives and Records Administration)

 

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'Easy Red Sector', Omaha Beach - approx. 0700 on the 6th June 1944

Photographer Robert Capa landed at Easy Red Sector, Omaha Beach with the men of Easy Company, the 2nd battalion, 16th Infantry Regiment, US Army 1st Division.

After completing his task of photographing the landings, Capa’s survival instincts took over. Seeing another craft approaching the beach, he fled towards it. After he was hoisted aboard, the vessel took a direct hit from a German shell and several men on board were killed. Capa survived and transferred to a troop ship for the return journey to England.

On arriving in Weymouth, Dorset, Capa put the four rolls of 35mm film in a courier’s pouch together with several 120mm rolls that he had shot before the invasion. He also included a note to John Morris, Life’s London office picture editor, that stated, ‘John – all the action’s in the 35mm.’ With his films safely on their way, Capa boarded the first boat returning to France.
When the courier arrived at the Life office, Morris urged his staff to develop the films quickly in order to meet the publication deadline. They were given to 15-year-old darkroom assistant Dennis Banks to develop.
The incident that followed has become as famous as Capa’s images. A few minutes later, Banks returned to Morris’s office in tears, saying, ‘They’re ruined! Capa’s films are all ruined!’ In the rush to process and dry the films, Banks had placed them in a wooden drying cabinet and closed the doors. The heat had been so intense that the emulsion had melted and all that was left, as Morris discovered as he examined the films, was ‘a brown sludge in frame after frame’.
Only 11 of the 108 original frames were salvaged.

 

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The crew of CG-6 (CG-83334) of US Coast Guard Rescue Flotilla 1. Sixty 83' cutters were assigned to "lifesaving duty" during Normandy Invasion. These cutters and crew would pull over 1,400 Allied personnel out of the water. To answer the question of the skull and crossbones. Several units had their own insignia, much alike nose art on fighters and bombers.

The last remaining known 83' is currently in Seattle. The CG-11 was assigned Omaha during Normandy and saved 40 people on that day alone. The CG-11 insignia was "Wahoo". A Native American cartoon figure (not the baseball team) with ten-gallon hat, long braids and swinging tomahawk More information of the CG-11 is located here:

 

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Landing ships putting cargo ashore on Omaha Beach, at low tide during the first days of the operation, June 1944.
Among identifiable ships present are LST-532 (in the centre of the view); USS LST-262 (3rd LST from right); USS LST-310 (2nd LST from right); USS LST-533 (partially visible at far right); and USS LST-524. Note barrage balloons overhead and Army "half-track" convoy forming up on the beach.
The LST-262 was one of 10 Coast Guard-manned LSTs that participated in the invasion of Normandy, France.

 

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U.S. troops on the Esplanade at Weymouth, in Dorset, on their way to ships bound for Omaha Beach for the D Day landings in Normandy, June, 1944.Photograph by Galerie Bilderwelt / Getty

 

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US assault troops shown coming ashore from LCT (Landing Craft Tank) 538 at 'Red Easy Sector', Omaha Beach as part of the 37th Engineer C. Battalion which was the assault battalion of the second assault wave in support of the 16th Infantry Regiment, 5th Engineer Special Brigade. 11.30-12.30 June 6 1944.

This photo was taken by Captain Herman V. Wall of the 165th Signal Photographic Co.

Wall also became an early casualty of the Normandy invasion, when he stepped on a beach mine.
Despite suffering serious wounds, one of which resulted in the amputation of his left leg, he made sure that his film was delivered to the proper authorities in England for processing. Wall’s pictures were the first received of the actual landings on 6 June.

 

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Omaha Beach, during the afternoon of June 6, 1944

A captain and medics treat a wounded soldier of the 1st US Infantry Division on the Fox Green area of Omaha Beach, in front of Colleville.

He is being given a plasma transfusion and wrapped in an army blanket to prevent hypothermia, while his head is supported on an inflatable life jacket.

Source: Signal Corps, Collection: United States National Archives.

 

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Photo 2: A medic of the 3d Bn., 16th Inf. Regt., 1st U.S. Inf. Div., moves along a narrow strip of Omaha Beach administering first aid to men wounded in the landing. The men, having gained the comparative safety offered by the chalk cliff at their backs, take a breather before moving into the interior of the continent. Collville, Sur-Mer, Normandy, France.

Photographer: Taylor, 6 June 1944.

 

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13.15 June 6, 1944. As the beach seems 'secured' more U.S. troops get ashore and the invasion is in full effect.
US Infantry and landing craft approaching 'Easy Red' sector of Omaha Beach approx.

The shoreline shows the Ruquet WN64 at Saint Laurent-sur-Mer, Normandy

 

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Canadian soldier Victor Deblois of Le Régiment de la Chaudière and two German prisoners of war captured by Canadian troops on Juno Beach during the Invasion of Normandy.
Prisoners of war are sitting near the anti-tank wall.




German POWs being escorted along one of the Gold area beaches, 6 June 1944.



German prisoners of war, working as stretcher-bearers, carry a wounded fellow prisoner to a beach area for transit to a hospital ship, during the Normandy landings.






USS LCI(L)-500 disembarking German prisoners-of-war, D-Day, Normandy, 6 June 1944 and marching them to a POW pen on the beach after interrogation. USS LCI(L)-500 landed British troops from the Durham Light Infantry on Gold Beach on D-Day. Unlike most landing craft that day, LCI(L)-500 did not return to sea after disembarking her troops. A British intelligence officer remained aboard and German POW's were brought to the ship to be interrogated.

Photo from the Imperial War Museum by Sgt. A.N. Midgley of the No.5 Army Film and Photographic Unit

 

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The British 2nd Army: Commandos of 1st Special Service Brigade landing from an LCI(S) (Landing Craft Infantry Small) on 'Queen Red' Beach, SWORD Area, at la Breche, at approximately 8.40 am, 6 June. The brigade commander, Brigadier the Lord Lovat DSO MC, can be seen striding through the water to the right of the column of men. The figure nearest the camera is the brigade's bagpiper, Piper Bill Millin.



Royal Marine Commandos attached to the 3rd Infantry Division moving inland from Sword Beach with a bridgelayer in the background.



Soldiers of the 45 Commando Royal Marines, attached to 3rd Infantry Division for the assault on Sword Beach, pass through a street of Colleville-sur-Orne, 10 Km NE from Caen, on their way to relieve forces at Pegasus Bridge. Normandy, France. 6 June 1944.



Commandos of 1st Special Service Brigade after landing on Queen Red beach, Sword area, 6 June 1944.

 

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Troops from the 50th Division inspect a knocked-out German 50mm gun in its emplacement on Gold area beach, 6 June 1944.

Photographer: Sgt. A.N. Midgley, No. 5 Army Film & Photographic Unit

 

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Check out this D-Day documentary that focuses on the 4th Infantry Division during the landing on Utah Beach, June 6, 1944

 

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D-DAY France Approaching-Omaha Beach