History of Sussex airfields around Sussex. During the lead-up to the D-Day landings, the people of Sussex were witness to the build-up of military personnel and materials, including the assembly of landing crafts and construction of Mulberry harbours off the county's coast. Five new airfields were built to provide additional support for the D-Day landings, four near Chichester and one near Billingshurst. A legacy of the D-Day landings are the sections of Mulberry harbour that lay broken and abandoned on the sea floor off the coast, of Selsey Bill, having missed the invasion. Sussex was an industrial county, from the stone age, with
British Army during the Second World War (Gerard Bucknall, later Brian Horrocks) took part in the D-Day landings on 6 June 1944 at Sword Beach and Gold Beach, during Operation Overlord. VIII Corps (Richard O'Connor, later Evelyn Barker) entered the line during mid-June to add its weight to the assault, followed by XII Corps (Neil Ritchie) and II Canadian Corps On 23 July 1944 I Corps was transferred to the newly activated Canadian First Army, where it would remain until March 1945, followed by the II Canadian Corps at noon on 31 July. The Eighth Army was formed from the Western Desert Force in September 1941, under