Veterans share their memories of D-Day
TWO former servicemen spoke to children about their memories of D-Day at an event aboard HMS Belfast in London.
D-Day veterans Bernard Morgan, 98, and George Chandler, 99, spoke to schoolchildren taking part in ‘D-Day 80: The ultimate history lesson’.
Able Seaman George Chandler was 19 when deployed with the Royal Navy on D-Day to Omaha Beach, where his boat provided security to American forces as they landed. And Royal Air Force Sergeant Bernard Morgan was a 20-year-old code and cipher operator with the 2nd Tactical Air Force, deployed to Gold Beach.
Meanwhile, a Royal Navy veteran has recalled the “unbelievable” sight of the ships sailing to Normandy on D-Day – and how he felt “grateful” to be heading back to England afterwards.
John Dennett, from Wallasey, remembers thinking “nothing can happen to us, there’s too many of us” as he saw the boats on June 6, 1944. Speaking ahead of the 80th anniversary of the invasion, the 99-year-old said: “We couldn’t sail on the 5th, which everybody knows now, but we were already in our anchorage outside in the Channel.
“We stayed overnight and then we set off, it must’ve been on the 6th around about midnight.
“There was that many ships, you thought, well what’s going to happen? You had to see it to believe it.”
Mr Dennett plans to travel to Normandy with the Spirit of Normandy Trust for the 80th anniversary. Asked why it is important for him to travel back to Normandy, Mr Dennett said: “It’s nice to think that everybody who gave their life is remembered properly.”
Akshata Murty, wife of Prime Minister Rishi Sunak, welcomed children, to 10 Downing Street, attending a D-Day history lesson on the role of Prime Minister Winston Churchill during the Second World War and on D-Day.