Airdrie & Coatbridge Advertiser
Soldier tribute
Son pays respects to dad’s childhood pal
An Airdrie musician was “deeply honoured” to fulfil a long-time ambition of his late father to visit the grave of his close soldier friend killed during the Second World War.
Matthew Kelly and his David Bowie tribute band were offered the opportunity to perform a gig in the small Dutch town of Bergen op Zoom and the singer “instantly recognised” the location as being the final resting place of his dad Tommy’s childhood pal John ‘Jake’ Hyland.
Whinhall man Jake was killed in action aged just 24 on November 8, 1944, and Tommy sadly never got the chance to visit his grave before he passed away back in 1998.
But Matthew was able to represent his dad by paying his respects to Jake and said afterwards: “I was amazed when the band got an invitation to play at Bergen op Zoom as I instantly recognised that name as being the last resting place of Jake.
“My dad had never managed to visit his grave and often spoke about wanting to do so and I think that he felt, in some way, that he had let his mate down by not being able to make the trip to Holland.
“As children, we grew up knowing Jake’s name and seeing his photos and dad telling stories of them playing cowboys and Indians in the Bluebell Woods near Whinhall and of stealing ‘jeely jars’ to get a penny back to allow them to get into the Rialto Hall cinema on a Saturday morning to see the latest Roy Rodgers or Laurel and Hardy films.
“As teenagers they went to the dancing together and sneaked their first underage pint at a pub in Bargeddie.
“However their young lives soon changed in 1939 when they were forced to go their separate ways and head to war. My dad told us that they were well aware of the evils of fascism and what the Nazis were about and of the atrocities they were committing in Europe, and that it was coming our way soon and they had to go.
“In early November 1944 an operation was planned to drive the Nazis from the island of Walcheren, off the Dutch coast.
“Jake was an engineer in a commando assault squadron. He was killed on November 8, apparently in the last hours of the action, when a vehicle he was in was hit, killing all inside.
“My dad was sent to Belgium in December 1944, to the Ardennes for the Battle of The Bulge. It was there that he got the letter informing him of the death of his friend. I don’t think that he ever got over it but he never forgot Jake.”
Humbled Matthew added: “I am so proud to have visited Jake’s grave on my dad’s behalf and know he will be proud that I have done so.
“Jake had no children and only one sister – who I met many times – who never married. To my knowledge, I am the only person that has paid respects at his resting place; the corner of a foreign land that he sought to free from Fascism.
“Before I left for Holland, I took some turf from my dad’s grave and placed it on Jake’s and he now has a bit of Airdrie over him. I then cut the same from there to place on dad’s for a wee token of togetherness.
“They were just two little boys from Whinhall with their own dreams and aspirations whose lives were ripped apart by war. It was not about King and Country nor was it about politics. It was about pals.”