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In honour of the D-Day landings, does anyone have any tales of family or friends who were involved that day?
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My uncle falsified his age to get into the army. Before achieving his aim he used to get my grandfather, a musketry instructor in WW1, to give him drill practice every day.
He's been just outside Bayeux for nearly 70 years.
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www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-sussex-27735086
This chap gets my vote.
Do the people that run these homes think they are some sort of prison? What a damned cheek.
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Many of the hundreds of staff sent by the BBC and Sky to the D Day commemoration were the sort of pretty, kind, ladylike and intelligent young women who abound in TV companies.
You could see that the old buffers - I can call them that because they are all older than I am - enjoyed being caressed and wheedled by these young charmers. Indeed the experience brought out some long-dormant spraunce here and there... 'Doing anything later are you Debbie?'
Someone here said they had heard the rumble of Rolls-Royce Merlins in the skies a day or so back. I didn't hear them but no doubt they were there.
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>>>This chap gets my vote.
Saw him on the news this morning after hearing about him on local news last night.
He is an absolute gem and totally lapping up the attention - good on him.
To clarify the nursing home was worried about his well being as he had just disappeared. The manager is an ex-military man as I understand it and enjoyed long chats with him and apparently has arranged to accompany him next year.
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"To clarify the nursing home was worried "
Yes, it looks as though the media (Mail, Telegraph) had blown it into a 'Great Escape' story that didn't really exist.
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They were just following a basic rule of journalism, never let the truth get in the way of a good story.
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Operation Overlord was run from Poole. An older friend was working there as a W.R.N.S. plotter on the occasion. On some urgent mission, she brushed past an American service man who was in the way of the table. She was mortified later to learn that she had been rude to General Dwight Eisenhower.
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My father was in the RASC attached to the Guards Armoured Division. Everyone in his mob was given a copy of the batallion diary on demob. I still have this and it makes interesting reading. The 1940s language is also quaint. He wasn't involved on D Day, they sailed 10 days afterwards and then sat at anchor for nearly a week while the next storm blew through. Then they landed dry-shod on Sword beach on D+20 and went through Northern France, Belgium and the Netherlands then into Germany.
He never talked about the grateful local ladies but I have my suspicions :-) He did liberate some fine Brussels lace and linen. He also "borrowed" a Voigtlander camera from a German soldier who had no further use for it!
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My brother wasn't in this show but was part of the Rhine crossing later on, shot up but only with baggage damage. His regiment (The Royals, now part of Prince Harry's Blues and Royals) was told off by Churchill to rush fast to Denmark in their armoured vehicles, to secure the country from Russian occupation. My erstwhile office boy brother, now Captain, personally accepted the handover (really too jolly to be called a surrender) of one major town. Years later, he told me that not everyone wanted the British in, some being Nazi, which took me aback.
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D-Day 70th Anniversary - Mike Hannon
