MGen Roger Rowley: Missing D-Day

Warriors In Their Own Words | First Person War Stories

MGen Roger Rowley describes his experiences fighting as a ground forces officer in the days following the invasion of Normandy, and how he missed the D-Day invasion.

MGen Rowley served in World War Two as ground forces officer in the Canadian Army. For months he and his unit prepared for the invasion of Normandy, but when the fateful day came, no orders arrived, so they weren’t sent to France. Instead they arrived on the beaches of Normandy two days after D-Day.

In this interview, Rowley describes his whole D-Day story, as well as Allied and German equipment, the destruction he witnessed, the controversy over Falaise, Operation Totalize, and the taking of Caen.

During the episode, Rowley recounts his feelings after finally arriving on the beaches of Normandy:

“I was very exhilarated. I keep saying that. I was very excited about this thing. It was going fine, and I was kind of... Well, I shouldn't say this I suppose, but it's truly true: I think I was sort of... Couldn't wait. I was a little trigger happy. I wanted to shoot at somebody. I really did at that stage. You get trained to a peak where this is what you've been looking at for four years. And it's like, if you're a boxer, and you've got a fight coming up, you're ready. And we were ready. And I can't speak... All the fellas that I had anything to do with felt very much the same way. “

To hear from the famous Canadian tank ace mentioned in this episode, listen to his two-part episode: BGen Sydney Radley-Walters (Part I): A Tank Ace on D-Day

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