Pub Quiz Query

[Jaimsieboy]

Does anybody know what the "D" in D-Day meant ?

[didoatwork]

Group all your questions into one thread

[Jaimsieboy]

OK this is the last one... thanks

[Fibonacci]

apparently
D-day etymology
from 1918, "date set for the beginning of a military operation," with D as an abbreviation of day, cf. H-hour, also from the same military order of Sept. 7, 1918

[JudieJaws]

Nothing - it derives from the word day

[jd_here]

David ... I was born on D Day!

[bookbinder]

It didn't mean anything. It's just something that the military did to emphasise that that was the actual, the one, day on which some operation would happen. The same thing was done when they wanted to emphasise the hour at which some operation would start: they called it H-Hour. It's just for emphasis, and the letter D or H didn't mean anything in itself.

[jd_here]

Although my dad apparantly wanted to call me Dwight Montgomery .... than goodness my mother over ruled him!

[Quizmonster]

As a matter of interest, the French refer to it as ‘J-Jour' on precisely the same basis as we say 'D-Day'...ie ‘jour' is their word for ‘day'.
The earliest written record of the phrase comes from a World War I Field Order of 7th September 1918. That's a whole generation before THE D-Day of 6th June 1944 in Normandy. The Order reads:-"The First Army will attack at H-hour on D-Day with the object of forcing the evacuation of the St Mihiel salient."
The reason for the code was so that planners could say 'D-Day minus one' to mean the day before the off or 'D-Day plus two' to mean 'Two days after the start' etc. Also, of course, it concealed the actual date from the enemy. All-in-all, D-Day both is and means 'Day with a capital D'. It's what we might call today 'The big one!'

[barney15c]

I heard it was 'deliverence' but I don't know if it really is

[MarkRae]

Jour J, to be precise...

[Quizmonster]

Of course! Who can recall ALL of the peculiarities of French usage, eh? A "people odd" they are, indeed!

[gollob]

Doris