Second World War hero celebrates his 100th birthday out in the street

Second World War veteran George Simpson celebrated his 100th birthday yesterday surrounded by family and neighbours in a socially-distanced street celebration outside his home in Danderhall.

Pipers from the Regimental Association Pipe Band played Mr Simpson’s favourite tune, the Black Bear, and the Provost of Midlothian Peter Smaill sent him a birthday card.

He joined the Royal Scots in 1937 aged just 17 and sailed to Cherbourg as part of the British Expeditionary Force in 1939.

Mr Simpson was wounded at Le Paradis in May 1940 while the Royal Scots were ordered to delay the enemy for the evacuation of other troops at Dunkirk.

He was captured, spending five years as a prisoner of war in Poland.

“We came to Dunkirk and I got wounded, I got shrapnel in my leg – it’s still there,” he said.

“There was no way I could be taken home, so I was taken prisoner. I felt terror at Dunkirk. We couldn’t get away, we knew we were going to be prisoners. We knew, all together, the wounded.”

Mr Simpson has memories of his time as a POW, but did not want to share too many details as they are too painful.

He was boarded on to cattle trucks with other prisoners.

After a week they arrived at a camp in Thorn, Poland, where conditions were harsh.

“There was no food at all ... there was no water ... we were put in a camp,” he recalled. “We worked daily, I could tell you all sorts of stories, only I don’t like telling you about them.”

The prisoners were set to work on the railways loading material to be sent to the front, but as they did not know if this material would be used against the British, many including Mr Simpson refused.

They were given three months’ detention as a punishment.

Mr Simpson was eventually liberated by Russian soldiers and was taken back to Britain and put on a train to Edinburgh Waverley, from where he went home to Stockbridge.

“My mother met me coming down the stairs,” he said.

“It was wonderful because she knew I was a prisoner.”

Mr Simpson later took up a post at the Military Training School Lanark and then worked for 40 years at Duncan’s chocolate factory in Edinburgh.

Mr Smaill said: “It’s an honour to gift Mr Simpson a card and quaich on behalf of the council, which we will have engraved. I’m only sorry I can’t do that in person on the day because of lockdown. I’m really looking forward to visiting Mr Simpson later in the year, when safe to do so, to hear more about his remarkable century and service to his country.”

Vera Clachers, 97, also joined the war effort as a teenager.

Then Vera Kendrew, she joined the RAF as a LACW at 19 in 1943, after a year of training at Melksham.

“I knew I had to do something, I wanted to do my duty,” she said.

But with one brother in the army and another already in the RAF, as well as a father who was mounted Cavalry in World War One, Mrs Clachers did not want to work in a munitions factory like many other women, and instead became one of the first female electrical engineers in the RAF.

She was posted to several bases around the UK, including North Coates in Lincolnshire.

“When you see a plane land and burst into flames and you lose the pilot, it is a funny thing. You forget because you want to forget,” she said.

Mrs Clachers and her husband Thomas, also in the RAF, did not speak about the war when it was over.

She said her experience in the RAF shaped the rest of her life. “The feeling is there, it will always be there, the training and everything, it stays there,” she said. “But you carry on with your life.”