Franklin D. Roosevelt - D-Day Prayer (1944)

This is the prayer originally entitled "Let Our Hearts Be Stout¹" written by President Franklin D. Roosevelt as Allied² troops were invading German-occupied Europe during World War II. The prayer was read to the nation on radio on the evening of D-Day, June 6, 1944, while American, British and Canadian troops were fighting to establish beach heads on the coast of Normandy in France.,The previous night, June 5, the President had also been on the radio to announce that Allied troops had entered Rome. The spectacular news that Rome had been liberated⁴ was quickly surpassed by news of the gigantic D-Day invasion which began at 6:30 a.m. on June 6. By midnight about 57,000 American and 75,000 British and Canadian soldiers had gotten ashore⁵. Allied losses on D-Day included 2,500 killed and 8,500 wounded.,