A tank-busting RAF Typhoon aircraft in the Memorial Centre, Caen.
Each year the number of veterans decreases as time and age take their toll. Students of the period feel almost cheated as these larger than life figures quietly fade away. Thousands of Irishmen from North and South volunteered to serve in the Allied forces; my family was one of the many that produced citizen soldiers from both sides of the border. A lot of ordinary people became household names after the war through recorded heroic deeds, memoirs, speaking at functions, or being thrust into the public realm via the many film productions about those days. The fiftieth anniversary in 1994 attracted huge TV coverage informed a generation that previously had but a vague idea of D-Day with an insight into the invasion and the men who had participated in it. Hollywood and the movie industry presented many versions of the Normandy invasion, most of which appear to have concentrated on the cellulose exploits of famous actors rather than the actual hard facts. Stephen Spielberg broke that mould with his portrayal of US paratrooper Fritz Niland’s story when he produced “Saving Private Ryan” in the late 1990s. He presented a version of D-Day that was close enough to the real thing to upset veterans and shock cinema audiences. For the record, Fritz Niland was a trooper in the US 101 Airborne who parachuted into France early on 6th June 1944. Within a matter of days he was located by a Chaplin who had orders to bring him back to a rear headquarters where he was told that his three brothers had been killed and he was being withdrawn from combat on explicit orders from Washington. Two or three sentences in the late Dr. Stephen E. Ambrose’s book “Band of Brothers” described that event and those few 66
Autumn 2013 Countrysports and Country Life
words inspired Spielberg to make the Private Ryan movie. Filming took place in both Ireland and England, with the D-Day sea-landing sequences being shot on our local beach at Curracloe, Co. Wexford. I was fortunate to meet both Stephen Spielberg and Tom Hanks when visiting the set during filming. At that time it was not common knowledge that the inspiration for the movie came from the Niland story and I recall asking both gentlemen what they proposed doing afterwards with all the hardware strewn around the sand. This comprised much of the impedimenta of a seaborne invasion including a number of Sherman tanks that did not feature in the completed film. Hanks smiled as he said that they had definite plans for the future. Several years later these plans came to fruition in the form of a blockbuster mini TV series ‘Band of Brothers.’ In a very short space of time the world became familiar with the exploits of E Company, 506th parachute infantry of the 101st airborne division of the US Army. This series once again highlighted the sacrifices and horrors experienced by people of many nationalities that fought World War 2 and while it concentrated on one specific American Army unit, it brought home to millions what had been endured by an entire generation in order to buy the peace that we enjoy in Europe today.
I recognised him instantly The men portrayed in the series became household names world-wide and I don’t mind admitting that I watched the story of those ordinary people - spellbound. The series came to life for me one afternoon in 2008 as I was checking into a hotel in Bayeux in Normandy. A touring coach had stopped outside and I saw a sign on