--- title: After D-Day: Color Photos From Normandy, Summer 1944 description: Color photos -- none of them published in LIFE magazine -- from northwestern France, detailing the devastating impact of the D-Day invasion. canonical: https://time.com/3880091/after-d-day-unpublished-color-photos-from-normandy-summer-1944/ author: Ben Cosgrove article:opinion: false article:content_tier: free article:published_time: 2014-06-07T15:40:47.000Z article:modified_time: 2026-05-11T05:03:40.928Z og:title: After D-Day: Color Photos From Normandy, Summer 1944 og:description: Color photos -- none of them published in LIFE magazine -- from northwestern France, detailing the devastating impact of the D-Day invasion. og:url: https://time.com/3880091/after-d-day-unpublished-color-photos-from-normandy-summer-1944/ og:site_name: TIME og:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt9cb8b0250b2e87d4/69884a37cd1bba269a6fab70/11_112104688.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 og:image:width: 1500 og:image:height: 844 og:image:alt: D-Day, color photo, 1944 og:type: article twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:title: After D-Day: Color Photos From Normandy, Summer 1944 twitter:description: Color photos -- none of them published in LIFE magazine -- from northwestern France, detailing the devastating impact of the D-Day invasion. twitter:image: https://static.time.com/v3/assets/bltea6093859af6183b/blt9cb8b0250b2e87d4/69884a37cd1bba269a6fab70/11_112104688.jpg?branch=production&width=1200&quality=75&auto=webp&crop=16:9 ---  # The Ruins of Normandy: Color Photos From France, 1944 > Sponsored content. 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They are at time.com/newsletters and are separate from a paid subscription. by [Ben Cosgrove](https://time.com/author/ben-cosgrove/) ## Ben Cosgrove Jun 7, 2014 3:40 PM UTC  Ruins of a town in northwestern France, summer 1944. Ruins of a town in northwestern France, summer 1944. Frank Scherschel—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images by [Ben Cosgrove](https://time.com/author/ben-cosgrove/) ## Ben Cosgrove Jun 7, 2014 3:40 PM UTC The ruins left behind after warfare speak a language of their own. Even more strikingly, no matter where the conflict has taken place — whether it’s in northern Europe or the South Pacific, the Middle East or Central Africa — the vernacular of destruction is often the same. Buildings reduced to rubble and dust. A scarred, tortured landscape seemingly devoid of life, aside from small human forms trying to piece it back together. Twisted, rusting, abandoned vehicles. And always, above it all, the indifferent sky. [\[Buy the book, _D-Day: Remembering the Battle that Won the War – 70 Years Later_\]](http://www.amazon.com/LIFE-D-Day-Remembering-Battle-Years/dp/1618931024/) Here, LIFE.com presents a series color photos — none of which were published in LIFE magazine — made in northwestern France by LIFE photographer Frank Scherschel and detailing the devastating impact of the invasion and its aftermath. The impulse behind posting the gallery, meanwhile, is really no more complicated than this: to commemorate those Allied troops who fought and died; to honor those who fought and lived; and to mark the occasion by also remembering what happened to countless towns — and townspeople — in France and around the globe when the Second World War unleashed hell in the midst of their lives. **A note on the photographer:** Frank Scherschel (1907-1981) was an award-winning staff photographer for LIFE well into the 1950s. His younger brother Joe was a LIFE photographer, as well. In addition to the Normandy invasion, Frank Scherschel photographed the war in the Pacific, the 1947 wedding of Princess Elizabeth, the 1956 Democratic National Convention, collective farming in Czechoslovakia, Sir Winston Churchill (many times), art collector Peggy Guggenheim, road racing at Le Mans, baseball, football, boxing, a beard-growing contest in Michigan and countless other people and events, both epic and forgotten. Finally: Information on the specific locations or people who appear in the photographs in this gallery is not always available; Scherschel and his colleagues simply did not have the means to provide that sort of data for every single one of the countless photographs they made throughout the war. When the locale or person depicted in an image in this gallery is known, it is noted in the caption.  Ruins, northwestern France, summer 1944, after D-Day. Frank Scherschel—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  American troops clear wreckage in Saint-Lô, Normandy, 1944. Frank Scherschel—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Saint-Lô, Normandy, summer 1944. Frank Scherschel—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Destroyed town in northwest France, summer 1944. Frank Scherschel—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Armored vehicles on the move past civic buildings in Avranches, summer 1944. Frank Scherschel—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  American troops in courtyard of ruined building, northwestern France, summer 1944. Frank Scherschel—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Post-D-Day destruction, northern France, 1944. Frank Scherschel—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Jeeps (including a press vehicle) in the town square, Marigny (Manche), Normandy, 1944. Frank Scherschel—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Ruined tank near St. Gilles (or perhaps Hambye), France, 1944. Frank Scherschel—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  American troops, northwestern France, summer 1944. Frank Scherschel—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Ruins of a town in northwestern France, summer 1944. Frank Scherschel—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Ruined tank near St. Gilles (or perhaps Hambye), France, 1944. Frank Scherschel—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Unloading vehicles and supplies from an LST (landing ship, tank) at Normandy beachhead, summer 1944. Frank Scherschel—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  An amphibious "duck" comes ashore from its landing craft, Normandy, summer 1944. Frank Scherschel—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Beached shipping, Allied beachhead, Normandy, summer 1944. Frank Scherschel—The LIFE Picture Collection/Getty Images  Ruined building and sign in French and German, northwestern France, summer 1944. 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