OMAHA BEACH, Normandy -- On a bluff above the sand and a half-mile from the ocean's edge at low tide, which was the condition when the first Allied soldiers left their landing craft, a round circle of concrete 5 feet in diameter provides a collar for a hole in the ground. On the morning of June 6, 1944, the hole was (BEG ITAL)Widerstandsnest(END ITAL) (nest of resistance) 62, a German machine gun emplacement.
Hein Severloh had been in it since shortly after midnight, by which time U.S. aircraft were droning overhead, having dropped young American paratroopers Severloh's age behind the beaches to disrupt German attempts to rush in reinforcements.