D Day veterans from across Yorkshire, Jack Mortimer, Ken Cooke and Cyril Booth talk to the Yorkshire Post about their experiences in Normandy and why it is important to remember the war ahead of the D Day 80th anniversary.
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00:00We just landed in kind of two or three feet of water, very easy, very easy landing.
00:09The beachmaster was there shouting, trying to clear the beach. Don't forget that I'm only one
00:17boat really, one thing there. Don't forget that all along the 50 mile stretch of D-Day
00:24all these things were happening to thousands of other soldiers.
00:31I remember seeing a military policeman on the little road as we came off the beach
00:42and he said to us, where is 12th Ordnance Beach Detachment? And he told us where to go.
00:48So and then I met up with my compatriots there because they landed from an LCT Infantry,
00:55I didn't. We knew that it was an invasion, we knew it was a battle that had to be won
01:03to win the war and we all did our little, as I said before, we all did our little 130,000th bit
01:12and all those bits together made a gigantic effort.
01:18But the sorry part about it was, as I said before to many people,
01:27I'm grateful to be alive. I'm grateful to have survived. I'm so sorry so many had to die
01:38and there they lie in Normandy. Those are the heroes. I don't like the word hero at all because
01:50I'm not a hero. All the heroes are behind the gravestones in Bayeux and Rathkill.
02:00You can't describe the feelings that you think when you're walking there with so many
02:06so many other veterans and they're all saying to you, we're not heroes,
02:14we're simply here to pay tribute to and remembrance of. That's the main thought.
02:21All that every time I've been there and I've been back, I think I've been back six times,
02:25I'm not sure now. Last things I remember, how did you sleep? Where did you sleep?
02:36How did you sleep? How did you eat? And all these things come on and somebody shouts
02:45aircraft action and you dive into your slit trench.
02:51It was a funny life really. Work, work, work, work, work.
02:57Oh, as I said before, those drivers of those amphibious vehicles, they did a marvellous job.
03:07Ships all over the place, there was aircraft flying over, there was guns going off
03:12and all the time you were looking at thousands and thousands of cans of petrol,
03:21thousands of cans of petrol and of course we were in charge of all the ammunition as well
03:27and ammunition, you have to be very careful with ammunition.
03:31Trust me, I hope I make it anyway but as I say I'm 100 years old and I could just go like that but
03:41those thoughts never went to my mind. It's important that we remember because the
03:47the soldiers gave up their life, they gave their all and those are the people that
03:56we should not forget. Can I tell you the words? They shall not grow old as we that are left grow old.
04:05Age shall not weary them, nor the years condemn. At the going down of the sun and in the morning
04:14we will remember them.
04:22Well in a way it's a sad occasion because it's going to be the last one
04:28I think because our members are dwindling
04:35so it'll be a moving occasion.
04:44Emotions will be over the top I suppose. Sometimes when I'm either watching telly,
04:52reading a book or a paper and then all of a sudden something will click up here.
05:00It takes me back to then. I've had those occasions but they're gradually dwindling away now.
05:10Oh it's very important, we stress too. Wherever we go to the schools and different
05:19people we talk to, the army cadets, navy cadets, air force cadets, we've spoken to those as well
05:28and we do the same with those what we do with the school children that we
05:35say to them when we've finished all these questions and answers
05:40we say tell them that it's up to them now to these youngsters to make sure that what we
05:49went through never happens again and that's what we stress that to them
05:56and you know there's some really bright pupils in these schools.
06:06I was employed at Greens and I was still studying after leaving school at 16
06:14and of course when I got to 18 and a half I could have been reserved but like so many others
06:21I thought I ought to be doing my part and so I volunteered to go in and we did some infantry
06:30training type bit drill and so on to begin with and then they asked what I wanted to do
06:36and I said well I was a qualified mechanical engineer but I wanted to learn something. I'd
06:41like something electrical and luckily I got put into the signals and we had a morse code test
06:51which I failed dismally fortunately and eventually I got appointed as a trainee
07:01electrician, radio electrician, well all electrical stuff really. Anyway after that I was then
07:08transferred to the artillery to this 20th anti-tank regiment. I say anti-tank either
07:16anti-tank or AK. I'm not sure which they're called precisely and that was part of the 11th
07:24armoured division and I stayed with them mainly up around Winsley doing trials and things exercises
07:33and so on. Then we moved down when D-Day area time just before D-Day moved down to Salisbury
07:42then across to Kent and from there on the 12th of June we set off for Germany and
07:51as I say it was a peaceful journey expecting to be torpedoed every minute nothing happened.
07:58We'd got command of the sea and the skies I think and when we landed on the beach
08:04there were a lot of fires and flashes and bangs and so on but we didn't actually get any fire
08:11ourselves and it wasn't until we got settled in and the first thing we had was a creeping garage
08:20barrage and that's a bit frightening because you can feel the clashes getting nearer and nearer
08:26and then going past you and you think oh still here. Anyway then after that it was a matter of
08:34when I had to go to the front at night where the tanks were doing the repairs and so on
08:44and it brought it back to me one time I went up there were three forts
08:50and we'd to be away by four in the morning otherwise we probably wouldn't be there next day
08:57you know you could see us travelling. I used to go in a three-ton lorry and this was a fault
09:06and a sort of, forget what you call it, but it was a hit and miss fault which is difficult to find
09:17because if it's a fault there you can't find it. Anyway I managed to solve it just as I got a
09:23message saying would you go to such-and-such a map reference camouflage up because German tanks were
09:29coming and I thought if it had gotten to go there without a radio what would it have been like you
09:36know stuck out and in the wild with tanks approaching and no warning of it and so it
09:43made me realise that it was a pretty important job as far as they were concerned.