Saturday, June 6, is the 65th anniversary of the day Allied troops began liberating mainland Europe in World War II.

With the ranks of D-Day veterans dwindling, 10 men who took part in that battle are returning to Normandy with students from the College of the Ozarks.

College students Eden Doss and Ben Wilson are getting a perspective of World War II, straight from the heart from veterans of D-Day.

"It was intense. If you saw some of the casualties coming in, you would understand why."

Buster Simmons saw it all a lifetime ago. He and nine other D-Day veterans came here with students from Missouri's College of the Ozarks. The want this youngest generation to really understand their war.

Ben: "what did you see when you went over"
Buster: "they were shooting at me and I had to shoot back
Ben "I can't imagine having to run there from a boat and having machine guns firing at you the whole way. I was barely 20"

Ben: "When you're sitting on a boat waiting to go in, time just kind of runs together, because that's all you've got to do, just sit there and wait, look at the planes that's trying to knock you out of the water///We started taking casualties in immediately, //they were fighting back. Believe me, they were fighting back."

Ben: What weapons did you have?
Buster: I didn't have any weapons.
Ben: No weapons at all???
Buster. No. I was a combat medic///We had a Red Cross arm band.

Ben: "How did you cope with that?"
Buster: "Well, I didn't stop to think about how I coped with it. You just cope."
"Brings back memories."

Buster remembers so much. Like the day his unit found Jewish women and children locked in rail cars, destined by the Nazis for cremation. Buster's unit freed them all.

Buster: "In the name of freedom, that's what we were fighting for."

That fight, though, took his little brother, Bill -- shot down and killed.

BUSTER: "And I remember getting the cable. And I cried for two hours, (he's emotional) because it was a great loss"

Ben: "When I'm standing on the beach at Normandy, I want to realize that men died there, men with families and men with dreams."

Ben is nearly the same age Buster was on D-Day.

Ben: "It's something I've been thinking about a lot lately // if people my age today were put in the same situation."

Buster "If you were placed in the same situation we were then, you and your comrades would rise to the occasion. You're an American."

It is likely this trip will be the last of its kind for many of these veterans, now well into their 80s...a point not lost on them or the students traveling with them.

Eden Doss says "It's so important that no one forget what these men have done for our freedom"

Buster: "We often wondered was it all worthwhile and I see these kids and I know it's worthwhile."

Since World War II, American presidents have traveled to Normandy to pay their respects.

President Obama will visit the graves with French president Sarkozy on Saturday.