Widely seen as a turning point in World War II, the June 6, 1944, invasion of Normandy, often referred to as D-Day, has long been the subject of viral rumors with varying levels of legitimacy. As the world marks its 81st anniversary, we revisit some of the most notable claims we've investigated about that historic day.
One pertains to a mysterious photograph that was widely shared on social media in 2021. According to its caption, half the image depicted paratroopers who landed in France in 1944, and the other half supposedly showed a modern image of them in the same airplane 65 years later.
That caption was far from the truth. While it was possible some of the men on the left parachuted into France on D-Day decades before that photograph was taken, they were not the same men as those pictured in the accompanying black-and-white image.
Another popular online photograph was said to show Red Cross nurses on the beaches of Normandy on D-Day. However, it was actually taken in 1945, seven months after D-Day, in the French Riviera area.
It's worth noting not all photographs related to D-Day that we have fact-checked had incorrect captions.
For instance, the photograph below of three massive coils of pipe was genuine and depicted an actual D-Day invention.
Other D-Day-related fact checks referred to tweets by high-profile people.
For example, in 2022, former White House Press Secretary Sean Spicer indeed tweeted, "Today is Dday," on Dec. 7, which is National Pearl Harbor Remembrance Day. Years earlier, in 2018, U.S. Rep. Drew Ferguson, a Republican lawmaker from Georgia, drew attention online by including a picture of Nazi soldiers in a tweet to commemorate the D-Day anniversary.
Some fact checks pertained to U.S. presidents.
For instance, in 2011, a misleading claim about a congressional bill targeted then-President Barack Obama. The bill was proposed in Congress to add a plaque of Franklin D. Roosevelt's D-Day prayer to the national World War II Memorial, but after receiving House approval, the proposal didn't pass the Senate. Months later, Snopes fact-checked a misleading rumor spread alleging that Obama's administration had "killed" the measure.
In a fact check the following year, we addressed a claim about presidents, specifically Obama, visiting D-Day monuments. Then, in June 2021, Snopes confirmed the legitimacy of claims that U.S. President Joe Biden failed to acknowledge the 77th anniversary of D-Day on or around that year's date.
Another viral rumor pertained to D-Day's death toll. In 2019, a claim alleged that gun violence in the U.S. killed more people in nine weeks than the total number of U.S. combatant deaths on D-Day. The assertion was mostly accurate. When we looked at the numbers, 2,487 gun-related deaths took place between Jan. 1, 2019, and March 6, 2019, which was close to the 2,501 U.S. soldiers known to have died on D-Day.
We also fact-checked a tale supposedly recounting the heroic feats of James Doohan, who is best known for his role as Scotty in the original "Star Trek" television series, that was shared on Facebook in 2018.
According to a meme, Doohan was shot six times on D-Day. It turned out most of that story was true. He was one of thousands of Canadian soldiers who landed in Normandy on June 6, 1944, and it was true that at one point, a cigarette case stopped a bullet from wounding him during the invasion. However, it's unknown how many times he was shot.
With the anniversary of D-Day in June, the Snopes newsroom will continue monitoring rumors about the historic day. When you encounter suspicious claims while scrolling on social media, send them to us and we'll consider them for fact-checking.
Snopes' archives contributed to this report.