Did you know that a Nenagh man, John Desmond Bernal, played a crucial role in ensuring the success of the D-Day landings on this day in 1944?
Born in 1901 on the Portumna Road in Nenagh, J.D Bernal was one of the 20th century’s greatest scientists. His work on X-Ray crystallography led to him becoming a founding father of molecular biology.
At the outbreak of the second World War, he joined the research department of the ministry of home security and worked on air-raid shelter design and the possibility of building floating airfields made of ice.
His most important role was in helping to devise plans that contributed in a major way to the success of the D-Day landings. He was one of the scientists most closely involved with analysing the Normandy D-Day beaches before the landings. He established the physical condition of the beach the allies would land on and instigated aerial photography to create accurate models of the French coastline. It was Bernal who took the lead with the scientific investigations.
Such was his impact that Richie Calder, a journalist covering the war, stated that by the end of the process, Bernal’s “ingenuity in determining the nature of the Normandy beaches, of the terrain over which the troops and armour would have to advance, and of the tides and wave formations, had made him the authority”. The importance of his contribution should not be underestimated because if the coastline and terrain of the Normandy beaches had not accurately been mapped it might have seriously jeopardised the landings — the beaches might not be able to take the weight of tanks and other heavy equipment, which would risk becoming bogged down on the beach and be ‘sitting ducks’. This would have been an unmitigated disaster for what was the largest seaborne invasion ever undertaken.
As well as that, he is credited with co-inventing the “Mulberry temporary portable floating harbour” which facilitated the rapid offloading of supplies and personnel along the coast of Normandy, France.
Due to his efforts during the war, he was awarded the Royal Medal and the US medal of Freedom in 1945. Nevertheless, due to his communist sympathies he was often ostracised by the Western powers, with both the US and France refusing him visas in later years. He was also never awarded the Nobel Prize.
Sources:
http://www.irishidentity.com/.../famou.../stories/bernal.htm
https://www.thurles.info/.../tipperary-born-j-d-bernal.../
https://www.coppsurvey.uk/lates.../jd-bernals-normandy-visit
https://www.dib.ie/biography/bernal-john-desmond-a0624
https://www.irishtimes.com/.../john-desmond-bernal…
