Memories of D-Day, Replayed on the Normandy Coast
By MAÏA de la BAUME and ALISSA J. RUBINJUNE 6, 2014
VIERVILLE-SUR-MER , France At Camp Dog Green, recreated just a few miles inland from where combat raged on and around the Normandy beaches in June 1944, soldiers in American uniforms and nurses with the Red Cross insignia on their breast pockets mill among the drab green tents, tuning their tinny radios to the music of Glenn Miller. They appear to be just waiting for orders.
For these troops, death is a remote idea: They are all re-enactors from France, Belgium, Holland and elsewhere who have a passion for recreating the environment that surrounded D-Day, complete with vintage cars and trucks. The women have swept their hair back into buns and wear the bright red lipstick favored in the 40s. For their off-duty hours, some have even brought period polka-dot dresses.
France's President Hollande hosted a luncheon for world leaders at the D-Day commemoration that included President Obama and President Putin who have been at odds over Ukraine. The goal, said Serge Balleux, the president of a Belgian association called Duty First, which staged another re-enactment camp on the Normandy coast, is to make the environment exactly like what happened here 70 years ago.
That camp, Cecil Breeden, named for a medic who treated many soldiers during the invasion, is a reproduction of a makeshift base that American soldiers set up as battle raged in the surrounding countryside. Mr. Balleux has spared no detail to make the camp look authentic. The soldier re-enactors stand in line to receive their pay and in their spare time play dice in their tents, which are restored from the era. I want to show the public how the G.I. lived here, Mr. Balleux said.
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/06/07/world/europe/memories-of-d-day-replayed-on-the-normandy-coast.html?_r=0
Members of a World War II re-enactment group on Gold Beach at Arromanches-les-Bains, France, this week.
World War II history fans dressed as American soldiers took part in D-Day commemoration events this week in Sainte-Mère-Église, France