A regional daily is planing to live-tweet the events of the D-Day landings in real time as it begins the countdown to the 70th anniversary of the event.
Thousands of soldiers left the Portsmouth area to attack Hitler’s grip on Europe in June 1944, ultimately changing the course of the Second World War.
Now Portsmouth daily The News has launched a special Twitter feed which will aim to report the events of the Normandy invasion as they happened.
The feed @RealTimeDDay will be tweeting an extensive timeline at the exact day and time the events happened 70 years ago.
Defence correspondent Sam Bannister said: “We’re hoping the launch of our @RealTimeDDay Twitter feed will draw interest from even more people and get them following the story as the June 6 anniversary approaches.
“The number of tweets posted will begin to gather pace as D-Day nears, and the troop movements and action begin to escalate. D-Day itself will see updates posted almost every minute of the day.”
Sam said Portsmouth played a vital part in the invasion with thousands of the forces embarking from the city and the invasion HQ being based just outside of the city.
He added: “The News has always covered the anniversaries extensively. This year is particularly special, however, because there are few living veterans still around to see it. This is expected to be the last milestone which can be seen by a sizeable number of veterans.
As well as the Twitter feed, the paper will also be publishing a special commemorative publication called D-Day 70: In Pictures, made up of photographs from its historical archives, including dozens of pictures taken by our its wartime photographers.
Said Sam: “We believe some of the images will never have been published before, as the wartime censors banned publication of anything revealing the locations of the invasion forces.”
Several detailed accounts of the D-Day invasion have already been written by us, but this publication aims to capture the atmosphere of the time through photographs and memories of those who took part.
“The result is very moving, and while lighthearted in places, does not underestimate the immense importance of the invasion’s success.”
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@DDAYTommy
FYI You were right mum, the invasion IS tomorrow and IMHO its Normandy not Calais! OMG!
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My father told me all about D Day, he was in the Royal Engineer’s and took part in the invasion, he fought the German Forces from France into Belgium where he told me he was stationed in Brussels until the end of the war.
Later on in 1966 my sister and I visited Berlin in a friendship exchange visit, I was invited into our German friends house and two weeks later my father invited to young German lads into our house in Glasgow. D Day and the war had of course not been forgotten but we were very friendly with the Germans during those visits.
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“Changing the course of the second world war.” Come on let us look at D Day through the eyes of world history not post-war Britain. Seven-tenths of the German Army were in the Eastern front and by the time of D Day had been beaten. It was just a matter of who would reach Berlin first. D Day although heroic, epic and tragic had little to do with deciding who win. It decided where the Iron Curtain would fall. I still cannot believe ignorant and ill-informed reporters still spout this lazy journalism.
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