Where were you on D-Day?

We were relinquished to a minor role and we had to stand by to attack specific targets; centres of German resistance. Probably the worst attack was carried out in the city of Caen in North France where the Germans had very strong resistance. Unfortunately when we bombed Caen there were an awful lot of French people killed, but that was inevitable. There was a deadlock, our troops couldn’t move eastwards to reach Paris and reach the heart of France until Caen was destroyed. When it was destroyed the resistance of the German Army broke so it was very important.

We had complete air domination at that time. There was practically no German fighters intercepting any of the allied aircraft and this was due to the Americans P51 fighter which dominated in the sky over Europe from mid 1944 to the end of the war. They eliminated all the German fighters and this prevented them attacking soldiers, prevented them interfering with any bombing raids to be carried out. This was a tremendous boost for the Allied forces. Without the contribution of the aircrafts. I don’t think the landings in France would have been successful.

Looking back now, how do you feel about D-Day?

Well, it’s a long while ago. We do have quite a few reunions down in England and when I go down to these reunions, I find out about a few of my friends who went missing during bombing raids. One friend I had assumed had died because we had no communication for them, was sitting at the table with my wife and myself alive and kicking, and it was a very dramatic event this; to find that people who we thought had perished was alive. It was a great meeting some of the WAFs and some Civilian people who worked in the ?room in the war. And I was quite surprised that a large majority were young people who organized the reunions for us. They gave us a beautiful meal and they entertained us in the old halls where we used to dance during the war and took us out into the old aerodromes where we saw the remains of the hangers and the offices .A fly past of a Lancaster and a Spitfire was arranged to entertain us.