From Galicia to Normandy: this is the place where the only Spaniard who fought on D-Day died

June 6, 1944, has gone down in history as the day of the Normandy landings. Among the soldiers who died that day was a Spaniard: Manuel Otero, born in Outes (La Coruña).

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Born on April 27, 1916, Manuel emigrated to the United States after the Spanish Civil War —he had fought on the Republican side, which left a mark on him in his hometown—and there he enlisted as a volunteer in the American Army on March 19, 1943, receiving the tag number 32,868,826. On D-Day, Manuel Otero was 28 years old, and he wore on his arm the Private First Class (PFC) stripe and the emblem of the Big Red One, the nickname given in the US Army to the 1st Infantry Division. Specifically, Manuel was assigned to Company A of the 1st Battalion of the 16th Infantry Regiment. This regiment crossed the Channel embarked on two American ships (the USS Samuel Chase and the USS Henrico) and one British ship (the HMS Empire Anvil). This unit landed in Normandy at 7:40 a.m. on D-Day.

On May 1st, Tropa Guripa dedicated a first video to him, in which he spoke with Manuel Arenas, bookseller from La Coruña and president of the Historical-Cultural Association "The Royal Green Jackets", to whom we owe the recovery of the story of this Spaniard who fell in combat in Normandy:

Yesterday, Tropa Guripa released a second video dedicated to Manuel Otero, this time retracing the route his unit took from landing in the "Easy Red" subsector of Omaha Beach until he died while crossing a minefield, shortly before reaching a German anti-tank ditch. The video shows the approximate location where he met his death.

Last year, Librería Arenas published a book by Antonio Osende titled "Normandía Día D. Manuel Otero Martínez: Un gallego en Omaha Beach" (Normandy D-Day: Manuel Otero Martínez: A Galician on Omaha Beach). The book is an excellent compilation of the documents and testimonies we have about Manuel. I bought it last year at the Ariete reenactment event in A Coruña, and I also had the opportunity to chat with the author for a while. You can buy the book at Librería Arenas in La Coruña (at Cantón Pequeño, 25) and also on Amazon. As a Spaniard and as a Galician, I thank Antonio Osende, Manuel Arenas, the Royal Green Jackets, Óscar Galansky and Tropa Guripa for all the work they have done to rescue from oblivion this compatriot who fought and died in the Battle of Normandy.

By the way: if you don't already know it, I encourage you to follow the website tropaguripa.com and subscribe to their YouTube channel, as well as follow , Twitter account, and Instagram profile. Óscar Galansky, the creator of this project, is doing an excellent job in this third season of this series about military history.