D-Day landings explained for kids

On the 6th of June 1944 the first day of Operation Overlord happened, D-day. Also called the Normandy invasion, it was the day when British, Canadian and American troops invaded France that was under control of Germany at the time. It is thought to be one of the most successful military operations in history and was the start of the end of the Second World War, let me explain that…

In the 1940s Germany had invaded and successfully occupied Belgium, the Netherlands and a huge part of France (that means they were under control of the German army.) In 1942 the Allied leaders started to meet to figure out how to get Germany out of those countries.

By 1943 they had come up with Operation Overlord. Thousands of soldiers would land on five different French beaches to drive the German army out. So, on the 5th of June thousands of ships left England for France and thousands of men parachuted down onto the beaches.

In the morning on the 6th the ships arrived with more soldiers and tanks and battle began. By the end of the day the Allied forces had successfully taken over the beaches but battle went on for another week in Normandy before the allied troops broke through the German defences.

By July 1944 the Germans began to retreat and the Allied troops had reached Paris and freed it from German occupation. This was a huge success for the Allied forces, pushing Germany out of France and starting the campaign to free the rest of Europe. So, it was the start of the end of the Second World War as such an important German defeat.

The term D-Day is used by the army to refer to the start of an operation, so really it just means Day-Day, think of it like day one. Before the 6th of June 1944 there would have been loads of D-Days because so many operations happened but, this day was so iconic and important that it has become common for D-Day to refer to this specific day instead.

Written by Katie Arnold.