The National D-Day Memorial...
Honoring Bravery, Fidelity and Sacrifice

What is the National D-Day Memorial all about? By mid-1944, Hitler's army had pretty much overrun Europe and there wasn't much standing in the way of their goal of world domination. All that changed on June 6, 1944 when the Allied Forces stormed ashore at Normandy and started pushing back.

In that one landing, the Allies had suffered 10,000 casualties with 4,500 dead. It was the largest air, land and sea operation in the history of modern warfare and included 5,000 ships, 10,000 aircraft and 150,000 ground troops.

Thus it is that the National D-Day Memorial, located in Bedford, Virginia just off U.S. 460, is about remembering and honoring the men of June 6th, 1944.

It is also a reverent, solemn place of graditude for unimaginable acts of courage and for those who gave the ultimate sacrifice for our freedom. To the residents of Bedford, it is sacred ground.

On June 6, 2011, the National D-Day Memorial will celebrate its tenth birthday. It was dedicated on June 6, 2001, established to honor and to educate.

The dedication was attended by over 20,000 people including then president George W. Bush. How could he have known that in just a little over three months the world would be changed again forever; that our country would be launched into an unending war with a different brand of fanatics?

Worthy of honor are the Allied Forces who landed and fought on that bloody beach and their bravery, loyalty and sacrifice will never be forgotten.

As long as the Memorial is in existance, it will fulfill its mission to educate our generation and generations to come on the legacy and meaning of what happened on June 6, 1944.

Since its dedication the D-Day Memorial in Bedford, Virginia has drawn over 1.2 million visitors from all over the world. Just like Normandy, Bedford is on the map.

The Memorial is located on 88 acres in the City of Bedford, Virginia in the foothills of the Blue Ridge Mountains.

If Bedford, Virginia seems like an unlikely place for such an important, consecrated Memorial, consider that in the mid-forties, Bedford had a population of 3200 citizens.

It had the tragic honor of losing 19 out of 32 of its young men who participated in the Normandy landing on Omaha Beach.

They were in Company A, 116th Infantry, 29th Division and all 19 of them perished in the first wave of the landing.

Five others were wounded and only three made it bach home unharmed. The last Bedford survivor of the D-Day invasion, Ray Nance, died in April, 2009 at the age of 94. He was the last living link between the community and that bloody day in Normandy.

It was the single greatest sacrifice of any U.S. community. The Alex Kershaw book tells the story and honors their memory.

The Bedford Boys: One American Town's Ultimate D-day Sacrifice

Bedford, Va was chosen as the Memorial site to honor all the communities across our country that sent men to fight that war.

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There are a lot of exhibits packed into those 88 acres, so plan on taking a few hours to see it all. The layout of the grounds is no haphazard placement of exhibits, everything is carefully sited to recreate the flow of events surrounding D-Day.

Starting with the lush English garden symbolizing the planning phase, the statuary and plaques, the ocean and beach landing complete with gunfire and fallen heros, scaling the cliffs up to the imposing victory arch inscribed with OVERLORD, the Allies' code name for the Normandy landing.

Before leaving, be sure to visit the gift shop and education center, open from 10:00 am to 5:00 pm. It offers an incredible selection of books, DVD's, videos, posters and memorabilia. There is an admission fee of $7.00 for adults, $5.00 for children from 6 to 18, with children under six free.

Access is easy. It is located at the interchange of routes 460 and 122 in the City of Bedford, between Lynchburg and Roanoke.

The National D-Day Memorial Foundation is a non-profit organization that relies on gifts to sustain its operations. These gifts come in many different forms. Below is a list of ways you can help assure that the Foundation is around to educate future generations.

Online Donations

Luminary Project

Estate Planning

Donating Artifacts

Named Giving

Direct Gifts

Stock Gifts

Matching Gifts

IRA Rollover

Charitable Gift Annuity

Charitable Remainder Trust

If you are moved to help support this important work, you can link to Help the Memorial and click on any of the menu items shown above.

Change of Leadership

On June 28th, 2010 the presidency of the D-Day Memorial passed from Col. William A. McIntosh (ret) to Mr. Robin Reed. Given his passion for history, Mr. Reed is an excellent choice to head up the memorial.

His credentials include 14 years at the Museum of the Confederacy in Richmond, VA resigning in 2001 as its Executive Director. Then it was on to the Smithsonian Institution's Museum of American History as Senior Project Director and most recently the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation.

Reed steps into some daunting challenges at the National D-Day Memorial, most recently being the controversy over the installation of a bust of Josef Stalin.

Moreover, the memorial is facing mounting deficits and in the past has had to lay off close to half of its paid employees. The site is partially supported by the city and county with contributions of utility services and cash grants. Recently visits to the memorial have been on the increase which is very good news.

In order to keep the site open to the public and meet its hefty maintenance costs, there has been an effort to have the federal government's National Park Service take over control of the D- Day Memorial. A feasibility study is in preparation but when it will be completed is anyone's guess. Let's hope they choose wisely; this isn't just a Bedford tourist site, it is a national treasure.

Under Col. McIntosh, the D-Day Memorial's $5 million construction debt was successfully eliminated, a very extraordinary accomplishment.

McIntosh, who succeeded Richard Burrow, the memorial's first president, was a Professor of English and history at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point and is also a published author with his book "Guide to Effective Military Writing" currently available on Amazon.com.