Richard M Palmer

Tec 5 Richard Palmer was killed in action on 06 June 1944, serving with HQ Company, 2nd Battalion, 116th Infantry Regiment. On the morning of June 6, 1944, this company came ashore at the right end of Dog Red Beach at precisely H+30, arriving as the first troops to reach that stretch of sand after earlier boats had drifted off course. The beach appeared quiet at first, but machine-gun fire raked the ranks the moment the ramps dropped, and a cluster of twenty to thirty men who took cover behind tanks in the shallows soon drew heavy artillery fire onto that position. As the battalion command post was established at the sea wall, the main body remained pinned down for much of the day by persistent sniper fire, a period that cost the lives of five medics and left several officers wounded, before the men finally pushed forward with the rest of the battalion late that evening. Tec 5 Palmer was killed in action that day; the report does not specify the individual circumstances.