So I was doing a little reading on this today. It's amazing how few details we've learned over the years, even after all those classes and movies and books. Here's one story I hadn't heard:
The place is called La Pointe du Hoc. Here's a map:
https://maps.google.com/maps?q=LA+POINTE+DU+HOC&ie=UTF-8&ei=oGWxUYzeDvbF4APbvIDoCA&ved=0CAsQ_AUoAg
As you can see, it's a raised bit of land that sticks out into the sea. Perfect for gun emplacements. The long guns there commanded two of the invasion beaches, in easy range. It had to be taken.
These are the long guns:
So the Rangers landed there early that day. Now, imagine: you're a ranger. You ride the rough craft onto the beach, under fire. There's infantry on the cliffs above you, and you're exposed to machine gun emplacements on your left flank. You run like heck for the base of the cliff, because there's a small curve just east of you, where the machine gun fire can't reach. The land is torn to heck from last night's shelling. You need to supress the fire from above, without exposing yourself to those machine guns as you climb the cliff. Oh, and the ropes they gave you are heavy and wet with seawater.
Here's the cliff they had to climb:
You and your companions fight your way to the top of those cliffs, because you know it has to be done. And you get past the traps, and the barbed wire, and the opposing infantry. People are falling all around you. But you make it to the gun emplacements.
Only to find out the guns have been replaced with wood decoys. The opposing forces knew they couldn't be defended, so they moved them well inland. 225 Rangers landed at the base of those cliffs. By the time it was over, only 90 were left.
Original story here:
http://www.normandiememoire.com/histoire.page.php?rubrique=debarquement&page=hoc#ancre
If you zoom in on that map, you can still see the shell holes, all these years later.
Here's the memorial for those Rangers: