Sharing stories of D-Day

People in the Kingswood area made sure they marked the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings.

A beacon was lit on Siston Common, with about 300 people attending the ceremony on the evening of June 6, the anniversary of the start of the Allied invasion of Normandy which hastened the end of the Second World War.

The event included songs from the 1940s sung a cappella by The Songsmiths Quartet and a bagpipe performance by James Meiklejohn. A service by Rev Rosemary Radcliffe culminated in the beacon being lit simultaneously with more than 1,000 others across the UK, Channel Islands and Overseas Territories.

At Kingswood Court Care Home, residents watched the events in Portsmouth and in France, attended by the King and Queen.

Dave Needham, son of Kingswood Court resident Gloria, gave a testimony of what his grand-father went through during the war, and Ian Campbell, former chairman of the British Legion talked about his experience in the RAF and praised veterans and their families.