Having achieved success in the Normandy invasion, the Allies gained momentum in their push east.
When the battle of Normandy ended, the war continued for another year. But the tide had been turned against the German forces.
In July of that year, Hitler survived a third attempt on his life at his headquarters in Rastenberg, East Prussia.
The next month, French troops were the first Allied forces to march into Paris. On the evening of August 25, 1944 exiled leader of the free French Charles de Gaulle returns to the capital to declare:
"We are here in Paris -- Paris which stood erect and rose in order to free herself. Paris oppressed, downtrodden and martyred but still Paris -- free now, freed by the hands of Frenchmen, the capital of Fighting France, France the great eternal."
The war continues, but another major hurdle had been knocked down.
In January 1945, less than a week after the Polish capital was liberated from five-and-a-half years of German occupation, the Russian army captured the Nazis' most notorious concentration camp, Auschwitz in south-west Poland.
In February of 1945, British, American and Russian leaders met at a secret location on the Black Sea, to begin drawing up plans for the final phase of the war against Germany, while Canadians join Allied forces pushing back the German army on its home turf.
On April 30, Adolf Hitler commited suicide, two days after Italian partisans execute former dictator Benito Mussolini.
Within days, German soldiers in Italy laid down their arms, followed soon after by the forces left in northwest Europe.
Then Germany signed an unconditional surrender, bringing to an end six years of global war.
To mark the occasion, Britain declares a national holiday to mark Victory in Europe Day -- VE Day.
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CTV's Tom Kennedy travels to France to dig up new information about the crash of a Canadian plane, almost 60 years ago during the D-Day Invasion. more.
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More than 15,000 Canadians participated in the D-Day landing force
1,017 Canadians died during the first six days of the Normandy campaign, and by the end, about 5,020 Canadians were dead
For the first time since 1940, three RCAF squadrons flew from French soil as they fought Luftwaffe and bombed key ground targets
The Royal Canadian Navy provided 109 vessels, and 10,000 sailors to the 7,000-strong Allied armada
By the end of D-Day, the Allies had landed as many as 155,000 troops in France by sea and air, 6,000 vehicles including 900 tanks, 600 guns and about 4,000 tons of supplies
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