Seen here, Gallagher’s story, complete with typo, begins: “American, British and Canadian forces landed by daylight in massive strength on the Normandy coast of France today and sped inland from quickly-established beachheads. Gen. Dewight D. Eisenhower told his troops this grand assault was a crusade which must bring “nothing less than full victory.'”
Gallagher was stationed at SHAEF (Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Forces) in Portsmouth, England. His job was to take official military information and turn it into poetry, which he does here, as indicated by the red-penciling atop the page by Paul R. Mickelson, AP general news editor in New York. “Straight, factual, fast and superb,” he calls it.
At the end of Gallagher’s dispatch, which was his “second lead” of the unfolding story, is the signoff “DA1005AEW.” This coding includes the initials of the sending operator and the time: 10:05 a.m. Eastern War Time. That would have been 3:05 p.m. in England.
Gallagher (1911-97) later became AP’s ninth general manager.
In all, 18 AP staffers “were assigned to various phases of the Expeditionary force news,” AP World, the company publication, later reported. “They were backed by ten desk men who pitched into the main and running story, reinforced by an elite team of photographers and artists … Copy flowed out. There were 40,000 words in the first 24 hours, all written by staffers on the scene.”
Also on June 6, 1944, daring cameramen were filming the Allies’ assault by sea and air, including the combat on the beaches. British Movietone News, whose current sales are handled by AP Archive, produced this vivid 10-minute reel of D-Day preparations and the onslaught that changed history.
