The St. Augustine High School Marching 100 raised its horns in the crisp, cool air at the Brittany American Cemetery in northwestern France today to commemorate the 80th anniversary of D-Day.
The 112 members of New Orleans' Marching 100, along with another four-dozen staffers, chaperones and guests, arrived in France early Tuesday. After seeing the World War II monuments at Arromanches that afternoon, then Omaha Beach — the setting for some of D-Day’s bloodiest fighting on June 6, 1944 — on Wednesday, it was time to get to work.
The bandmembers, in full uniforms, met in the lobby of their hotel in Deauville at 4:45 a.m Thursday. Most dozed off during the two-plus hour ride aboard three charter buses to the staging area near the Brittany American Cemetery.
With 4,410 graves and more than 500 individuals memorialized on a terrace wall, it is smaller than the Normandy American Cemetery, which also hosted an 80th anniversary ceremony on Thursday, attended by U.S. President Joe Biden and French President Emmanuel Macron.
At the Brittany cemetery, the Marching 100 performed as part of a “mass band” consisting of several hundred marching band musicians, mostly from the United States.
Fanning out in front of the cemetery’s stone chapel and flanked by thousands of marble crosses, the massed musicians played “Hymn To the Fallen” midway through the hour-and-15-minute ceremony. They also contributed a mass version of the U.S. national anthem.
Several French officials spoke during the ceremony, as did one of the three World War II veterans in attendance.
St. Augustine rising sophomore Jude Villavaso delivered welcoming remarks in both French and English.
The Marching 100 is also slated to march in an anniversary parade through the French town of Sainte Mere Eglise on Saturday and perform at the Jardin d'Acclimatation, an amusement park in Paris, on Sunday.
More than a year of planning and fundraising preceded the trip. Over $700,000 was raised to cover flights, lodging, food, ground transportation and other costs.
It is the most ambitious field trip ever undertaken by St. Augustine since its 1951 founding by Josephite priests as a college preparatory school for young Black males.
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The @StAugnola Marching 100 warms up at the Brittany American Cemetery in France ahead of the D-Day 80th anniversary ceremony pic.twitter.com/CPbrywrPrb
— Keith Spera (@KeithSpera) June 6, 2024
Check back later for a more detailed account of the Marching 100’s time in France so far.
