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Suburban World War II veterans mark D-Day anniversary in Normandy

Posted June 05, 2024 6:04 pm

Steve Zalusky

World War II veteran Bud Berthold, 104, of Fox River Grove attends a service at the Pegasus Bridge memorial in Benouville, Normandy, France on Wednesday. He’s among the veterans from across the United States as well as Britain and Canada in Normandy this week to mark 80 years since the D-Day landings that helped lead to Hitler's defeat. Associated Press

Eighty years ago, the land, air, and sea forces of the Allied armies landed on the beaches of Normandy, France.

Today, three World War II veterans from the suburbs are there once more to mark the 80th anniversary of what Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower called the “Great Crusade.”

Dick Rung, 99, of Carol Stream, Jack Kinyon, 101, of Bartlett, and Edward “Bud” Berthold, 104, of Fox River Grove, made the trip with other veterans through the Best Defense Foundation. The California-based nonprofit provides opportunities for World War II veterans to return to their battlefields for closure, camaraderie and remembrance.

American World War II veteran Dick Rung, 99, of Carol Stream poses Wednesday during a service at the Pegasus Bridge memorial in Benouville, Normandy, France. Associated Press

Born in Chicago, Berthold said he enlisted in the Army Air Corps because he didn’t want to be in the infantry. After training as a B-24 bomber pilot, he shipped out on March 4, 1944. His third mission was on D-Day, when he co-piloted a mission to bomb the town bridge of St. Lo, France.

Edward Berthold Courtesy of the Best Defense Foundation

He would fly 35 missions in two months. One of the planes he piloted, the B-24 “Fort Worth Maid,” was shot down.

Kinyon enlisted in the Army Air Forces in 1943 and later was assigned to the North Atlantic Division for flight duty on Douglas C-54 “Skymasters.” In addition to flying over Europe, he served on missions to Africa, the Middle East and India.

Jack Kinyon Courtesy of the Best Defense Foundation

Rung, a native of Buffalo, New York, joined the Navy at 18 years old. He was sent overseas to London and assigned to a landing craft tank that was part of the D-Day invasion.

He would later say that after soldiers disembarked after landing on Omaha Beach, time was spent hosing down the deck of the craft of the blood of those killed.

Dick Rung Courtesy of the Best Defense Foundation

Rung, who went on to teach history and political science at Wheaton College, shared his memories with the Daily Herald in 2018.

“I couldn't help but see all these GIs floating in the water” after the initial landing,” he said. “I didn't want to see it, but I can't help but tell you that's what happened in the war.”

He stayed in Normandy for almost five months, conveying troops, supplies and vehicles from larger ships to shore.

In December 1944, he was assigned to a landing ship heading to the Pacific Theater, where he spent the rest of the war.

This photograph is believed to show E Company, 16th Regiment, 1st Infantry Division, participating in the first wave of assaults during D-Day in Normandy, France, June 6, 1944. The greatest armada ever assembled, nearly 7,000 ships and boats, supported by more than 11,000 planes, carried almost 133,000 troops across the English Channel to establish toeholds on five heavily defended beaches stretched across 50 miles of Normandy coast. More than 9,000 Allied soldiers were killed or wounded in the first 24 hours. AP

Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower, Allied Commander in Chief, speaks with American paratroopers at an undisclosed location in England, June 6, 1944, prior to the first assault on the coast of France during D-Day. AP

American soldiers and supplies arrive on the shore of German-occupied Normandy during the Allied D-Day invasion on June 6, 1944. Nearly 160,000 Allied troops landed in Normandy. AP

Carrying full equipment, American troops move onto a beachhead code-named Omaha Beach, on the northern coast of France on June 6, 1944, during D-Day invasion. AP

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