Veterans of D-Day can mark event on home soil
VETERANS unable to travel to Normandy because of Covid-19 travel restrictions are invited to mark the 77th anniversary of the DDay landings at a commemorative event in England.
The gathering at the National Memorial Arboretum in Staffordshire on June 6 will include a live broadcast of the official opening of the newly completed British Normandy Memorial in Versur-Mer.
Veterans and their families will see coverage of the Royal British Legion’s service of remembrance at the Bayeux Commonwealth War Graves Cemetery recorded earlier that morning.
There will also be an opportunity for Normandy veterans to have their Legion d’honneur formally presented to them by the French Ambassador to the UK.
It will be the first major commemorative event of the year at which veterans from around the country will be invited to gather.
The British Normandy Memorial, designed by British architect Liam O’Connor, records the names of the 22,442 servicemen and women under British command who fell on D-Day and during the Battle of Normandy in the summer of 1944.
The official opening of the memorial is the culmination of nearly six years of work by the Normandy Memorial Trust.
The memorial, which cost almost £30 million and was funded by the British Government and private benefactors, stands on a hillside overlooking Gold Beach, one of three beaches where British forces landed on the morning of June 6 1944 to begin the liberation of Western Europe.
The memorial features the D-Day Sculpture by British sculptor David Williams-Ellis, the D-Day Wall featuring the names of those who fell on D-Day itself and, on 160 stone columns, the names of those others who lost their lives between D-Day and the Liberation of Paris at the end of August 1944.
The site also includes a French memorial dedicated to the memory of French civilians who died during this time.
The official opening of the memorial will be presided over by the British Ambassador to France, Lord Edward Llewellyn, accompanied by senior French guests.