Day of days.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5zBEdcBvUQA&feature=watch_response

The day of days was drawing to a close. The first French citizens were truly free, the liberation had begun. As Peter says, special Church services were held to pray for the success of the endeavour. People across the world and particularly in the occupied Countries were at last daring to hope that an end was in sight, that in the fullness of time the awfulness would cease.

But over the next few days many families were to be visited by a boy on a bicycle. A few, very few, refused to accept the telegram in the vain hope that if they didn’t read it it couldn’t possibly be true. The sharp fear felt by residents of many streets that the telegram was for them, the relief when they realised it wasn’t and the guilt they felt for feeling such emotions when it was delivered to a neighbour or friend was ever present.

Over the next few days at least eight families in Walsall were to receive the news that they had lost a loved one on that day of days.

Regards,

kev35

All so brave.
I remember still my mother taking us to a special church service the next day to pray for their success.
Many years later I was manager of a road surfacing company. One of our expert rake hands, who i had known for many years, retired. and, after his trip to the pub at lunch time I took him home. He had never spoken of his service experience but by his age he must have done something, so I asked him.
He told me he had landed the day before D-Day, that his war lasted four days, and the only weapon he used was his knife. He was at Pegasus Bridge.

Thank you one and all,they are braver than i could ever be.

Well put as usual Kev35, I was quietly proud last night as my 10 year old son reminded me of the date and the invasion. One of the next generation will remember, and I hope that his children will too.

nicely put Kev..

they should never be forgotten ,I visited normndy a few times, and to see the graves from all sides is quite a humbling experience.. to go there and see the neat row upon row of headstones.. you cant help look, and think every one of them, was a young man, full of life , somebody’s father,husband,or son.
life cut short, to give us the freedoms we have today..

we Will Remember them .

Nicely put as ever Kev

I spent the evening sitting peacefully in my garden midway between the RAF bases of Feltwell and Methwold.

In the warm quiet of the evening I too reflected that 64 years back the area would have been alive with the roar of aircraft setting off from those bases to interdict the communication lines in Normandy

Four years ago on Pegasus Bridge at midnight I shared the commemoration with thousands of people, many of them veterans. It was intensely moving.

At that time I also thought of my friend Derek (Tom) Bowden, a highly trained warrior in the airborne who spent his D-Day on a small boat mid-Channel fuming as his role in the greatest invasion ever known was to be to flick a switch on the transmitter beacon used as a nav-aid by the parachute drop aircraft and gliders. “Any effing sailor could have done it” he once complained bitterly to me. He was to get all the excitement he needed and a lot more a few months later at Arnhem.

As dawn has broken let’s now think of the allies pinned down on Omaha Beach.

Moggy

Well said Kev. Emotional anniversary for lots of families, including mine.

If the politicians had their way then they would be forgotten and all memories of the debt we owe would very quietly be brushed under the carpet.

Magnificently said, kev. Eloquent and so moving, they will never be forgotten.

And as for the fallen, may they Rest In Peace in the knowledge (hopefully) that they were not lost in vain.

My wholehearted agreement on that one.
We will remember them.

Seconded, and well said Kev.

I have similar thoughts tonight. I am reminded of the time a couple of years ago that I visited the Normandy beaches, it is hard to beleive the scenes that took place there 60 years previous.

We will remember them.

Watched a couple of programes on Dunkirk this evening; who’d want to have been there? doubtless many that were, were back on a beach in Normandy, 4 years later, imagine what that was like, they were made of sterner stuff.

kev 35. Thank you for those kind words ! I was not there, but my father was … luckily he returned … but was never able to talk much of his time on the beaches …. but sometimes the look on his face was enough !!!!

For all of those who gave the ultimate for those of us who are here today to enjoy what we have !!! Thank You !!

My wholehearted agreement on that one.
We will remember them.