June 2024 

 

To commemorate the 80th Anniversary of D-Day, we will be releasing 3 special episodes to tell the full story of The Longest Day. This second part is a complete remastering of our original Overlord episode with the addition of much new content.

80 years ago today, more than 150,000 Allied troops were boarding planes, gliders and landing craft as they prepared to invade Fortress Europe in Operation Overlord, the Normandy Invasion. Meanwhile, 200 miles away in the Buckinghamshire countryside the Codebreakers of GC&CS were also ready and waiting. 

Naval Section spent the day decrypting German messages and forwarding that vital intelligence to Allied commanders, in many cases only two and a half hours after the German operators had sent them.

 

Today at Bletchley Park our Archive holds hundreds of these handwritten decrypts and using a selection of these we tell the story of The Longest Day. Our Research Officer, Dr Thomas Cheetham & Research Historian, Dr David Kenyon will be your guides, with the help of 12 of our Veterans’ memories from that eventful day.

This episode features the following from our Oral History archive:

Margaret Bryant

Colette Cook

Jean Tocher

Pat Davies

Norah Brierley

Eric Dodd

Stanley Clegg

Kenneth Case

Gordon Rosenberg

Jimmy Thirsk

Aileen Hasdell

Pam Harding

Many thanks to Dr Ben Thomson for voicing our archival documents.

Image: ©Bletchley Park Trust 2024

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