I landed on Dog Green Sector with the 1st Battalion of the 116th Regiment, 29th Division, on the beach from “Saving Private Ryan” and “The Longest Day.” The weather was the big enemy for us. We were supposed to land with 720 men in four companies. Two got lost and landed to the east, and two companies — mine and another — landed directly where we were supposed to land. One lost three boats. The other lost two. By the time we got there, we only had 210 men to fight.

I was the fifth man on the west side of the boat, behind Clarius Riggs of Pennsylvania. He got gunned down on the ramp. I dove in behind him. My helmet was creased in the left side by a bullet. I was standing neck deep, bloody water with my rifle over my head. I was 5-foot-10, 185 pounds, on D-Day. Our 5-4 and 5-5 guys went straight to the bottom and drowned. The government was nice enough to give us these special combat jackets made out of green canvas material. I didn’t wear that jacket, because that jacket was going to drown me. Instead, as an act of defiance, I drew a large Star of David on the back of my field jacket with “The Bronx, N.Y.” written around it.

We had to cross 400 yards of open beach with body parts laying around — horrible sights for a 19-year-old. When we were 120 yards from the seawall, machine-gun spray came from the bluff. There was a loud thud on my right front. My rifle vibrated. There was a clean hole in its receiver. There was another thud behind me, to my left. That soldier was gone. I hit the sand. To my right, Pvt. Robert Ditmar of Fairfield, Conn. got shot in the chest, tripped over one of the hedgerows, spun around and was lying on his back, yelling “I’m hit! Mom! Mother!” I looked over to my left. Sgt. Clarence Roberson of Lynchburg, Va., was staggering by me, with a gaping hole in the left side of his forehead, blond hair streaked with blood. I yelled for him to get down, but the noise on that beach was horrendous. He knelt down facing the seawall, praying with his rosary beads, and a machine gunner up on the bluff cut him in half. Later on, I killed that machine gunner. We had 85 percent casualties in the first 15 minutes. Two of us survived from my boat team of 30.

I was wounded three times June 6 and two times June 7. Three of my wounds were life-threatening: two in the face, one right through my foot. I am very fortunate to be alive. My fifth wound came while lying on a stretcher waiting to be evacuated. Snipers shot me in the right knee.

I had teeth and gums laying on my tongue for five days. I had a hole in the roof of my mouth. I had my entire upper jaw gone from the two wounds in my face. It took a long time to get me put back together. I had plastic surgery in November 1944. The reason it lasted that long was I was emaciated. I lost 75 pounds. My foot was infected until January 1945, and I begged them to discharge me so I could go back to New York University to continue my studies. I couldn’t walk. I was dragging my left foot. But I promised I would go to VA for further treatment. I went between semesters to get operated on. I’ve had 22 operations since World War II. The last one was August 2006, a bone graft up in the left side of my mouth. They’re still treating me at the Gainesville, Fla. VA.

In 1988, I went back to France. I’ve never mentioned D-Day, never spoke about it. I was a schoolteacher; I never mentioned it to my students. It was a bad dream. But when I looked at these fellows’ graves in the American cemetery, I looked up at my wife and said, “These guys can’t speak anymore. How are people going to know what they did, the heroism they displayed? I have to be their spokesman. God saved me to be their spokesman.”

I never stopped speaking about D-Day after that.