D Day and The Magnificent Eleven

While Robert Capa took many notorious photos in his day, none were more famous than The Magnificent Eleven. One of the many places that Robert Capa took pictures throughout his career was on Omaha Beach on the morning of June 6th, 1944: D Day. Robert Capa was a part of the 16th Regiment of the 1st Infantry, Company E as they went into battle on the beaches of Normandy, France.

Soldiers running onto Omaha Beach
on June 6th, 1944.

As the flat bottom barge of soldiers landed on Omaha Beach, Capa was ready, armed not with a rifle, but with his camera, ready to take in all of the sights that appeared before him and capture them on film for all the world to see. He headed off the boat, and started taking picture after picture as he headed for an abandoned, disabled American tank. Once Capa had reached the tank, he realized the danger of the situation and his body took over his mind. Without thinking about what he was doing, he started running back towards the boats, trying to get out safely with the pictures he had taken. Capa had taken 106 photos on three roles of film during his short time on Omaha Beach that morning. From there, he was shipped off straight to London, England by train where the photos could be developed and shared with the world.

Soldiers using a blockade as a shield
on Omaha Beach.

The darkroom technician in London was almost as anxious as Capa to see these photos. So much in fact that he tried to expedite the development process by using a higher heat to dry the photos. However, this would prove to be a huge mistake on his part. The heat of the room caused the development solution to melt on the negatives, ruining all but 11 of the pictures, and even these were blurry. These pictures would be known the world over as The Magnificent Eleven. They may have turned out somewhat blurry, but the images that these pictures depicted showed something that nobody in their wildest dreams could have imagined. The Magnificent Eleven were able to show the whole world the chaos of what happened on the beaches of Normandy, France on June 6th, 1944. To this day, these pictures are infamous for giving the world access to what really happened on D Day.