Dean Murray (2)

Today we remember the D-Day Landings on 6 June 1944. What Dean Murray, who was in charge of a flotilla of landing craft, saw that day was forever etched into his memory-bank.

Dean Murray — The sea was rough. There were ships everywhere. It was simply crowded — it just covered the whole sea.

Dean Murray audio file (MP4 23.88 MB)

Dean Murray audio script

75th Anniversary of the End of the Second World War

Audio actuality

“Fellow Citizens, the War is over” — (The Hon J B Chifley, Prime Minister of Australia)

On the 75th Anniversary of the End of the Second World War, Australia remembers the D-Day Landings on June the 6th, 1944 — the largest amphibious invasion in history.

Dean Murray was in charge of a flotilla of landing craft. What he saw that day was forever etched into his memory.

Dean Murray

The sea was rough. There were ships everywhere. It was simply crowded — it just covered the whole sea … it was quite tremendous.

We were part of a long-line of landing craft heading for the beach. We had air cover; we had destroyers just astern of us bombarding the beach; and we had what were called landing craft rockets that were fired about a mile off the beach and landed on the beach and cleared a swathe for the soldiers to run up, clear of land-mines and anything else. That actual landing did not suffer any fire from the shore at all. I think mainly because of the air raids and bombardments that had gone on all through the night. It involved millions of personnel, tens of thousands of ships. I feel quite proud to have been part of it, actually.

Saturday, August 15 marks the 75th Anniversary of the End of the Second World War. Let’s pay our respects to that amazing generation of Australians.