WWII Veteran and Hunterdon Medical Center Volunteer Will Take Part in D-Day Celebration in France

Pictured: Lois Manning, 87 of Annandale.

Published June 2, 2009

Lois Manning, 87 of Annandale will leave for Normandy, France on June 3rd to take part in the Anniversary of D-Day celebrations being held at the American Cemetery overlooking Omaha Beach.  The D-Day celebration marks the 65th anniversary of the 1944 allied landings in France, then occupied by Nazi Germany, that proved a critical turning point in the course of World War II.  Ms. Manning will be sitting among dignitaries and other World War II veterans at the ceremony.

Ms. Manning was a newly graduated registered nurse in December 1943 when she joined the U.S. Army.  She was just 21 when just months after her enlistment she was involved in the most important event of World War II – D-Day, June 6, 1944.  Ms. Manning was part of the 3rd Army’s 109 Evacuation Hospital which was on loan to the 1st Army for the invasion. She was one of 30 nurses, 20 doctors and support personnel who were set up in tents near Southhampton, England to take care of the first casualties of the D-Day invasion.  “Nights were like days, with flares going off all around.  We operated in tents, slept, ate and washed in tents.  We traveled in Army transport trucks and followed the troops, setting up hospitals in the fields,” explained Ms. Manning.   Ms. Manning stated, “We moved about 93 times before the war ended in May of 1945.” 

Ms. Manning was a nurse in the Emergency Department at Hunterdon Medical Center from 1967-1977.  She has been a volunteer at Hunterdon Medical Center for 18 years and has logged in more than 2,960 hours of service.  Ms. Manning volunteers twice a week at the hospital in the transport department as a courier.