20-05-2025
Cecil Newton obituary: Survivor of D-Day who almost lost a leg
As dawn broke off the Normandy coast after a miserably rough crossing, a fellow trooper of the 4th/7th Royal Dragoon Guards aboard Cecil Newton's tank landing craft (LCT) decided to make tea on their field cooker. A huge orange flame shot up, the LCT commander threatened them with death, and then the guns of a hundred warships opened fire.
Gold Beach, one of the five Allied divisional landing zones on D-Day, June 6, 1944, was the 50th Northumbrian Division's objective. To give the assaulting infantry battalions a chance of making it across the beaches, the Allied air and naval forces were to pound the defences in preparation, but they could only do so much. Intimate support by tanks was necessary. To give the tanks a
