In the summer of 1138, war between King Stephen and the Empress Maud takes brother Cadfael from the quiet world of his garden to the bloody battlefield. Not far from the safety of the Abbey walls, Shrewsbury Castle falls, leaving its 94 defenders loyal to the empress to hang as traitors. With a heavy heart, Brother Cadfael agrees to bury the dead, only to make a grisly discovery: 95 bodies lie in a row, and the extra corpse tells Cadfael that the killer is both clever and ruthless.
This programme focuses on the largest sea-borne invasion in modern history and one of the world's most tightly kept secrets. It brings together despatches from the BBC War Correspondents who brought up-to-the-minute, graphic descriptions of the events to the listening public. This is a unique collection, a chance to hear history in the making: the day and the hour of D-Day June 1944.