The lake area had a very special tie to the Normandy invasion on June 6, 1944. Dr. J. Lee Parker Jr. of Greensboro.

A day when 2,400 Americans gave their lives on the vast expanse of open beach under withering fire from the firmly entrenched Germans. Omaha was the bloodiest of the five beaches, mainly due to the enormous expanse of open, flat beach that the Americans had to cross. When Dr. Parker passed away Sept. 27, 2012, he had outlived all of the Navy doctors who went ashore at Omaha that fateful day. Just a year earlier, 2011, Dr. Parker was bestowed the Legion of Honor by the French government — the highest award they can give a person.

This year’s ceremony at the American Cemetery was held on a beautiful spring day — warm and only small puffy clouds overhead. It added to the serenity of being in the middle of the graves of 10,000 Americans who died on French soil at the beginning of the liberation of Europe. The grounds were perfect. There was a very long walk from the parking lot all the way around the cemetery to get to the seats. No one was to walk among the perfect rows of the fallen until after the ceremony.

There was a one-hour trip to the cemetery beginning at 6 a.m. to be a part of the 13,000 fortunate few who had the required ticket for the event. Busses came from all over Normandy for staging and inspection by the French police. Then there was a police escort to the parking area at the cemetery for discharge and the busses disappeared back to their holding areas, as much as 30 miles away.

The roads were clogged and the security was more than evident. With the U.S. and French presidents, the King of England and president of Ukraine, things were very tight. The 1 ½ ceremony was to begin at 12:30 but nothing happened until 1:15, without any explanation. The highlight was the presentation of the French Legion of Honor to 8 American servicemen.  They were splendid in their hats and jackets, commemorating their unit. Army, Navy, black and white, all in wheelchairs, all stood when French President Emmanuel Macron presented their medal and read the award.

At the conclusion of the ceremony, a flight of F-35 jet fighters flew directly over the assembled crowd with a noise level that actually hurt the ears, peeling off one off one of the aircraft into the missing man symbolic gesture.

It was truly moving.

Then there was time to walk the cemetery while waiting for the bus to return to the ship docked in Honfleur and search for particular graves. 

Names from every state. 

Crosses and Stars of David.

At day’s end, 32,000 Americans and 2500 vehicles had come ashore at Omaha.  Dr. Parker and his medical team came ashore in the second wave a 7:30 am.  Bodies were everywhere and the gunfire withering. 

Not only was the beach strewn with the wounded, many had drowned coming ashore when the water was too deep and their 60 pounds of equipment, took them to a watery death. These bodies were washing ashore, further clogging the beach.  Dr. Parker and his men tended to the wounded and also had to move bodies out of the way so they would not be run over by the equipment being offloaded. It was not until the end of the second day, June 7, that they were no longer being shot at or shelled. 

Dr. Parker and his medical staff of 40 remained on Omaha beach for 21 days, tending to the wounded and rendering mortuary affairs for those felled on “Bloody Omaha.”

Many reading this will recall that Dr. Parker did not speak of Omaha beach very much. He was a private man who’d prefer to tend to patients in Greene County.  He was honored by the Navy and the History Chanel, including him in interviews about his and the 6th Navy Beach Battalion’s role in the invasion.

I cherish the brief time I had with Dr. Parker in the final year of his life. Being a fellow Navy man, he opened up a bit and shared information and acts of heroism performed by his men.

Each year fewer U.S. WWII veterans are alive and able to return to France. I urge you, if you know one, spend more time with them. Learn their stories and of suppressed memories — good and bad.  They were truly America’s “Greatest Generation.”

God bless them all.

Dr. Parker’s obituary can be read at: https://www.mccommonsfuneralhome.com/obituary/Joseph-ParkerJr

—Submitted by Larry Hone