D-Day 80 The Last Veterans: Norrie Bartlett

Norrie Bartlett, Age 98, Royal Navy

Interviewed 7 March 2024

Offshore from Gold Beach on D-Day on a warship, Mr Bartlett from Surrey was inside a turret firing a 4.5 inch naval gun to protect those who were landing.

Earlier his ship had helped escort other vessels crossing the Channel. 

"The shells used to come up automatically," he said.

"From down below where they had been fused ready for exploding. They loaded into the turret and also we put them in a barrel and when we were ordered fired them.

"When (the troops) started to land, that's when we began to bombard the German defences - horrendous.

"Bearing in mind the battleships were six or seven miles offshore - some of the troops were firing anyway.

"I am concentrating on where my gun is aiming, and we weren’t hit at all because they were concentrating on the troops going on the beach.

"We left when all the troops had landed.

"We were sent back to Portsmouth and had to escort more merchant ships which were carrying spares and guns.

"We escorted them back down to the beaches again, and stayed there that night - then we went back to Portsmouth again.

"We just thought we were doing a job and we did it the best we could. There was no heroics about it.

"I will be quite honest we were all dead scared, I don’t mind admitting it. We had two chances. Get away with it or go under."

Mr Bartlett had originally trained as a gunner at the Royal Navy’s Whale Island training base in Portsmouth.

Prior to the landings his ship had been in the Dover Straits firing at positions in the Calais region.

This was part of the Allied deception plan to fool the Germans into believing the invasion would take place there and not in Normandy.

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