What They Came Up

A limestone stack standing off the cliff at Pointe du Hoc, with dark water behind it.

Rudder's Rangers of the 2nd Battalion came up this cliff on the morning of 6 June under fire, on ropes and on extension ladders borrowed from the London Fire Brigade, to take a battery of guns that had already been moved inland. They held the ground anyway, and were cut off on it for two days.

You can stand at the top and look down at it, and it does not get any easier to believe.

Pointe du Hoc, Cricqueville-en-Bessin, Normandy. August 2026. Fujifilm X-T2, 18–55mm.

Printed at 30 × 45 cm through WhiteWall in Berlin. Choose Ilford or Baryta paper, as a plain print or framed — what the finishes actually mean.