Place de Québec

Place de Québec is situated just around the corner from The Bayeux Tourist Information Office. We pick up here at 09:35 for a full-day D-Day PRIVATE Tour (or at 08:35 if ‘Early-Bird’ option added at checkout). There are toilet facilities here, as well as a cafe nearby – ‘La Garde Manger’ – perfect for clients who wish a quick coffee prior to departure. Clients can also specify their tour start time and designated pick-up / drop-off location on our booking system. (Our Mon-Fri Bayeux Train Station pick-up is between 09:15 and 09:35 – or earlier upon request, and we always wait for your train…). Private Tour clients also benefit from a free Bayeux Hotel pick-up / drop-off option.

1. L’Abbaye D’Ardenne (*option)

On D-Day + 1, German soldiers – members of the 12th SS Panzer Division Hitlerjugend – captured Canadian soldiers and led them to this Abbey. Eighteen of them were executed, in violation of the Geneva Convention on the treatment of prisoners of war. Other summary executions were also carried out during this month of fighting and during the course of the Normandy Campaign an estimated 156 Canadian prisoners of war are believed to have been executed by the Hitler Youth. There is a poignant war memorial commemorating this tragic event in the Ardenne Abbey. Here we will also learn how the abbey was taken back from the Germans on 8th July 1944 by the Canadian soldiers of the Regina Rifle Regiment, which enabled the liberation of the left bank of Caen the following day….

2. Pegasus Bridge & Glider Landing Zones

Pegasus Bridge was known as The Benouville Bridge, and then as the Horsa Bridge, before being renamed in honour of the British airborne troops who landed there during Operation Deadstick (part of Operation Tonga) in the opening minutes of the Allied invasion of Normandy on 6 June 1944. A unit of glider infantry of the 2nd Battalion – the Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry – of The British 6th Airborne Division (commanded by Major John Howard) was to land, take the bridges intact and hold them until relieved. The successful taking of the bridges played an absolutely critical role in limiting the effectiveness of a German counter-attack in the days and weeks following the Normandy Allied liberation campaign of operation Overlord. Here we will look briefly at the meticulous execution of this stealth mission and remember Den Brotheridge (The 1st soldier to have made the Ultimate Sacrifice on D-Day)….

Pegasus Memorial (*or Juno Beach Centre option)

The Pegasus Memorial at Ranville is a D-Day Museum and Memorial to the British 6th Airborne Division. In particular it is an eternal tribute to the part they played in the successful completion of Operation Deadstick, which began on June 5th 1944. On 26 June 1944, in honour of being the first objective taken by the airborne troops in the Normandy campaign, The Bénouville Bridge was appropriately renamed ‘Pegasus Bridge’. In 1993 the original Bridge over the Caen Canal was removed and replaced by a new structure and the original bridge was resituated, close to its original position, on ground which now belongs to the Memorial. At this, our first stop we will look at the heroic actions of ‘D’ Company of the Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire Light Infantry, who as part of the 2nd Airborne Battalion, had been assigned an impossible mission upon which the success of all others on D-Day would ultimately depend…

3. Ranville Commonwealth Cemetery (*or Ryes Commonwealth / Bény Canadian Cemeteries)

As the first village liberated on D-Day, Ranville is today home to the final resting places of over 2,000 soldiers, and among them lie the heroes of The British 6th Airborne Division. On the morning of 6 June 1944, when the nearby Pegasus Bridge over the Caen Canal was attacked and captured, elements of the 5th Parachute Brigade moved quickly into the village. Among the graves in the cemetery is that of Lieutenant Den Brotheridge (considered to be the first British Allied Officer death on D-Day). The churchyard itself was immediately used to accommodate battlefield dead. Following the end of the war, Ranville War Cemetery was established and the bodies of those soldiers who had received temporary field burials were gathered here. Architecture contained within the cemetery is a Cross of Sacrifice, typical of memorials designed by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission. As is typical of war cemeteries in France, the grounds are beautifully landscaped and immaculately kept. The final interments were made in 1946.

4. Kieffer Monument: The Free French Commandos

The Kieffer Monument on Sword Beach at Ouistreham, inaugurated on June 6th 1984 by former French President Francois Mitterrand, is a tribute to the 177 Free French Commandos who landed alongside their British Allied brothers-in-arms on June 6th 1944. The memorial, which takes the form of a flame, is in fact housed on top of a German bunker. The pathway leading up to the memorial is lined with stones with the names of the French commando’s who were killed on D-Day. There is also a statue of Brigadier Lord Lovat here, who famously ordered his personal piper Bill Millin to play ‘Highland Laddie’ as he led British Commandos ashore on D-Day. From here you will have freetime to walk along the the beach, down to the newly developed Peace Promenade, lined with storyboards and charged still today with the atmosphere of unforgettable reverence…

5. Bill ‘Piper’ Millin Monument

Canadian-born Bill Millin joined the Territorial Army in Scotland, where his family had moved to from Canada. In his youth he played in the pipe bands of the Highland Light Infantry and the Queen’s Own Cameron Highlanders before volunteering as a commando. The only soldier on D-Day to wear a kilt, he disembarked the landing craft and, as his comrades fell around him on Sword, and played ‘Highland Laddie’ on his pipes. On this stop we will find out how Bill survived the D-Day Infantry landing armed only with his sgian-dubh (dagger)…

6. Hermanville Brèche

It was opposite Hermanville that Major-General Rennie’s 3rd British Division landed, with the support of special tanks. This was flanked by two special brigades of “Green Berets”. To the east, the 1st Special Service Brigadeond by Brigadier Lord Lovat, had the task of gaining a foothold in Colleville before marching eastwards and attacking Ouistreham from the flank. Among its ranks were the 177 French marines led by Lieutenant Philippe Kieffer (whose monument we will also be visiting). At the other end of the sector, the 4th Brigade was also to make its way inland, in order to take Lion-sur-Mer and Luc-sur-Mer. This stop is one of our favourites since there are storyboards erected all around the square, and there are also monuments here to the Navy, as well as a very special D-Day anchor…

7. Canada House: Bernières-sur-Mer

“Within sight of this house over 100 men of the Queen’s Own Rifles were killed or wounded, in the first few minutes of the landings”. That stark inscription welcomes visitors at the entrance of a large, timber-framed house overlooking Juno Beach In the village of Bernières-sur-Mer. ‘La Maison des Canadiens,’ or Canada House, is one of the most iconic buildings in Canadian military history. It was one of the first houses liberated by Canadian soldiers on D-Day, 6 June 1944, and has since become a familiar historic landmark, standing in the backdrop of the many black-and-white photographs showing troops landing on the sands of this village in Normandy….At Canada House we will take a closer look at the fierce battle which resulted in heavy losses for the Canadians landing on Juno Beach on D-Day…

8. Courseulles

On June 6th, 1944, the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division and the 2nd Armoured Brigade were tasked with establishing a bridgehead on the beach codenamed “Juno”. This was an eight-kilometre long stretch of beach bordering Saint-Aubin, Bernières, Courseulles-sur-Mer and Graye-sur-Mer. Assault troops were then to move towards the Carpiquet airfield, 18 kilometres inland. The 3rd Infantry Division, under Major-General R.F.L. Keller, was under command of the Second British Army. It was flanked on the left by the 3rd British Infantry Division that was to land on Sword beach (Lion-sur-Mer, Langrune-sur-Mer). To the right, the 50th British Division had as its target “Gold Beach” (La Rivière, Le Hamel, and Arromanches). At Courseulles, we’ll take a look at some of the challenges facing The 3rd Canadian ID on D-Day…

Juno Beach Visitor Centre (*option instead of Pegasus Museum)

Thanks to a project conceived in the 1990s by a group of Canadian veterans – and spearheaded by veteran Garth Webb and his companion Lise Cooper – the Juno Beach Centre was inaugurated on 6 June 2003 with over one thousand Canadian veterans attending. The museum’s exhibitions, features & photos not only relate the events of D-Day itself, but the story too of life in Canada before the outbreak of the war. It also tells the story of Canada’s civilian and military contribution to the war effort, and of contemporary Canadian society in the decades since World War II. The unique building – designed by Canadian architect Brian K. Chamberlain – is made up of five main points in a single-storey structure, resembling a stylized maple leaf. Just adjacent to the visitor centre there is a ceremonial area, which features a statue entitled Remembrance & Renewal. The museum also houses a temporary exhibition space, which changes approximately once per year and which highlights historic themes & stories relating to Canada past and present. A visit here is considered by many a must for everyone, and especially for all Canadian visitors to Normandy…

9. Charlie-1 Tank & Cosys Bunker WN#31

This Churchill Mk IV AVRE tank was designed to get close to fortifications and blow them up with its mortar. This obstacle-clearing tank called ‘Avenger’, lay hidden under the sand-dunes of Juno beach for 3 decades and was not rediscovered beneath the sand dunes until 1976! Just along the path we will also visit Cosys Bunker, named after Lieutenant W.F. “Cosy” Aitken, who commanded No. 10 Platoon, of B Company, Royal Winnipeg Rifles. On D-Day, his men stormed the bunker and suffered 78% casualties in doing so...

Bény-sur-Mer : Canadian War Cemetery (*option)

Bény-sur-Mer was created as a permanent resting place for Canadian soldiers who had been temporarily interred in smaller plots close to where they fell. As is usual for war cemeteries or monuments, France granted Canada a perpetual concession to the land occupied by the cemetery. The graves contain soldiers from the 3rd Canadian Division and 15 airmen killed during the Battle of Normandy. The cemetery also includes three British graves and one French grave, for a total of 2048 markers. Bény-sur-Mer also contains the remains of nine sets of brothers. We will make a short stop at the cemetery to pay our respects…

10. The British Memorial: Ver-sur-Mer

D-Day and the Battle of Normandy in 1944 opened the way to the liberation of Europe and the end of World War II. British armed forces played a central role in these momentous events, and more than 22,000 made the ultimate sacrifice for Freedom. Until now, there has been no single memorial dedicated to their remembrance (!). The Normandy Memorial Trust was created in 2016 to realise the dream of Normandy Veterans to have a British Normandy Memorial and, following nearly six years of hard work, was opened on Sunday 6 June 2021.

Green Howards Monument – Crépon (*time-permitting)

The 6th and 7th Battalions of the Green Howards were part of the D-Day landings, wading ashore on Gold Beach on the morning of 6 June 1944. By the evening of the first day they had fought their way seven miles inland, further than any other British or American unit. By the close of the operation 180 Green Howards had lost their lives. Middlesbrough born Company Sergeant Major Stanley Hollis (1912 to 1972) was awarded the Victoria Cross (VC) for his actions on D-Day; the only VC to be awarded on 6th June. At the moument errected in his and in his division’s honour and unveiled by the King of Norway on the 26th October 1996, we will take a reverent look at some of his heroic actions on D-Day…

11. Bill Pendell Memorial – Arromanches

“I have never been a real soldier! – Nobody ever told me what to do. I’m just a normal bloke. I’m a bricklayer”.

Bill Pendell landed as a courier, classified at the Royal Signals of the 11th Armored Division, during D-Day June 6, 1944 at Gold Beach. Later he would perform exploration operations. Bill initially went to the infantry in 1941.

“I was always on my own”, Bill said seventy years later. “I only had a stengun as a weapon. But I could hardly ever use that, otherwise, I would betray my position. From Nijmegen we were transported to Eindhoven by truck. Here I had my first bath since the landing in Normandy”.

When the German troops deployed their Ardennes offensive on December 16, the 11th Armored Division had to protect bridges in the area to bring the Germans to a standstill. Bill’s division drove to northern Germany, where the division liberated the concentration camp Bergen-Belsen on April 15, 1945. Bill chose never to discuss what he saw there. Bill served in Germany until 1946.

The ‘D-Day 75 Garden’, designed by John Everiss, was officially opened at its new permanent site at Arromanches in a ceremony involving 50 Normandy veterans (ONTour was present for the inauguration – see header photo on bio page).

With the help of the Royal Engineers, the garden was dismantled from The Chelsea Gardens and moved from Britain and rebuilt in seven days. It now overlooks Mulberry Harbour and Gold Beach, which Mr Pendell, aged 22, stormed June 6th 1944, along with thousands of other men just like him…

Ryes Commonwealth Cemetery (*option)

This small, virtually forgotten cemetery – off the beaten track and surrounded by fields – is situated between Bayeux and Arromanches and is rarely visited by major tour companies or tourists. Beautifully maintained by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission it contains 653 Commonwealth war graves, including one Polish and 335 German. The first interments in the cemetery were made two days after the initial D-Day landings. Some of the soldiers buried here are from the 50th British Northumbrian Infantry Division that landed on Gold Beach. The cemetery also contains a large number of Royal Navy and merchant navy sailors. Two brothers, Private Joseph Casson (Durham Light Infantry) and Marine Robert Casson (45 Commando) are buried beside each other in the graveyard. Time-permitting (and according to client wishes), we might end our Canadian-British D-Day Private Tour in this humble place…

We arrive back at client’s Bayeux hotel at 18:00. Caen client drop-offs will be one hour later. Clients returning to Paris can either make the scheduled 18:30 – 19:00 train, or if they have chosen an extended itinerary, they will require a ‘modifiable’ ticket for a *20:00 (*appx – TBC by clients)) Bayeux departure. Both a standard 8-hr and an extended 9.5 hr itinerary are possible depending on client choices *(Please see info below).

During our relaxing drive back to the station you will have 20 minutes to reflect on the day’s touring and have a casual chat with your Guide. We always appreciate feedback about your D-Day experience and welcome any last-minute questions. Please do not hesitate to let your driver know if we can be of any further assistance. Thank you for choosing NormandyONtour.