As D-Day Anniversary Nears, Moving Scene Unfolds in Normandy

The transformed landscape created an effect so somber and breathtaking that the project coordinator called it a “meadow of souls.”

According to The News —  a local newspaper and website in Portsmouth, England — organizers and volunteers have installed 1,475 giant silhouettes at the British Normandy Memorial in Ver-Sur-Mer, France, as the Western world prepares to mark the 80th anniversary of the D-Day invasion during World War II.

The Standing with Giants charity organized the four-year-long project that has now culminated in an astonishing display called “For Your Tomorrow: The People’s Tribute.”

Each silhouette represents one service member who died on June 6, 1944, while serving under British command.

The display is now open to the public and will remain so until Aug. 31.

Standing with Giants will install 1,475 silhouettes across the British Normandy Memorial grounds, a project four years in the making, titled “For Your Tomorrow”.

The public will be able to see the installation as part of the D-Day 80 commemorations from 21st April – 31st August. pic.twitter.com/6FE857dU5X

— Armed Forces Day 🇬🇧 (@ArmedForcesDay) April 22, 2024

Dan Barton, Standing with Giants Founder and Chair of Trustees, began the project with “zero budget.”

Now, thanks to volunteers and donations, the field outside the British Normandy Memorial features hundreds of giant silhouettes. Photos of the site show each silhouette with its head slightly bowed, as if in sad reflection or prayer.

According to the U.K.’s Daily Mail, the silhouettes stand two meters tall, or nearly 6 feet 6 inches.

But the representative soldiers’ physical stature does not account for the “Standing with Giants” name.

“We call our silhouettes Giants due to the enormity of their sacrifice,” the charity’s website explained.

Once installed, the silhouettes cast lengthy shadows as the sun began to set. Project coordinator Janette Barton, wife of the Standing with Giants founder, described the effect.

“It’s so emotional, we came over to the memorial last night as the sun was setting and sat and watched the sun go down and our volunteers felt it was like a meadow of souls,” Janette said, according to The News.

Earlier this month, the silhouettes began their journey to France from England’s legendary Blenheim Palace.

One could scarcely imagine a more appropriate point of departure. After all, among its many claims to fame, Blenheim Palace is the birthplace of Sir Winston Churchill, the prime minister who led the British people through World War II. Nov. 30 of this year will mark Churchill’s 150th birthday.

Churchill died in 1965, and most of the World War II generation has since passed as well. But at least one hero with living memories of the war has survived to see the Standing with Giants tribute.

On Thursday, Mervyn Kersh became the first Normandy veteran to observe the display, per the British Normandy Memorial. On Dec. 20, Kersh will celebrate his 100th birthday.

The memorial and the newly-installed silhouettes overlook Gold Beach on the Normandy coast in northern France. On D-Day, Gold Beach served as one of five Allied landing points.

Overlooking ‘Gold Beach’, 1,475 statues representing the three services now erected & fill the landscape beside the D-Day memorial in honour of number the servicemen who fell during the epic mission.

The Standing with Giants silhouettes are part of the ‘For Your Tomorrow’… pic.twitter.com/bg148clUeJ

— Mr Pål Christiansen (@TheNorskaPaul) April 19, 2024

In geographic terms, Gold Beach was also the center of the invasion. To the west lay Utah Beach and Omaha Beach, where service members under American command came ashore on June 6. And to the east lay Juno Beach and Sword Beach, under Canadian and British commands respectively.

Gunner Charles Wilson of the Essex Yeomanry later described the scene at Gold Beach.

“The beach was strewn with wreckage, a blazing tank, bundles of blankets and kit, bodies and bits of bodies. One bloke near me was blown in half by a shell and his lower part collapsed in a bloody heap in the sand,” Wilson recalled, as quoted in Peter Caddick-Adams, “Sand and Steel: The D-Day Invasion and the Liberation of France.”

In other words, whether or not they did it by design, the Bartons, their volunteers, and everyone associated with the project seemed to know what they were doing when they placed the silhouettes in somber, prayerful poses.