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US troops at Camp Quorn prior to D-Day 1944
Paratroopers of H Company 505 Parachute Regiment of the 82nd Airborne Division pose for a photo at Camp Quorn in England prior to D-Day invasion of Normandy on June 6th 1944.
Back row: John C Kluve - William B Scherer - Archie J Brandt - Albin E Palmquist Joseph T Stehn
Front Row: John Matesick - Harold L Eatman - Herbert S Gallagher
The 505th Parachute Infantry Regiment of the US 82nd Airborne Division arrived in Quorn on February 14th, 1944. Their camp was on the Farnham estate, now owned by Tarmac. The entrance was where the current opening for Northage Close (off Wood Lane) is now. The sergeant's mess was at what is now 27 Meeting Street.
The paratroopers departed two and a half months later on Monday May 29th 1944 to prepare for D-Day (operation Overlord, specifically at St Mere Eglise) and after a month fighting in Normandy they returned Quorn victorious. But the cost was high. Two-hundred and twenty men were killed in action out of a total of two-thousand.
They left Quorn again on Friday, September 15th 1944 to parachute into Holland (operation Market Garden, mainly centred around Nijmegen, Holland), never to return to Quorn as soldiers.
The village took the American paratroopers to their hearts. There is a plaque in the Memorial Gardens, upon which a wreath is placed each year on remembrance Sunday. There is also an avenue of lime trees in Stafford Orchard (the village park) in remembrance of those American soldiers that died, together with a plaque.
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Submitted on: |
2009-09-04 |
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Submitted by: |
Les Cruise, Philadelphia |
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Artefact ID: |
524 |
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Artefact URL: |
www.quornmuseum.com/display.php?id=524 |
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