This project came about after I had just watched Stephen Spielberg's epic film "Saving Private Ryan". Due to my own military background I knew that not only the Americans had participated in the largest military seaborne operation in history on the morning of 6th June 1944. British, Canadian and many other nations on the Allied side took part.
After initial research I contacted the local branch of the Normandy Veterans Association and I was invited to accompany them on one of their annual pilgrimages to Normandy. This was a very educational and emotional journey for me. I later returned to Normandy to continue research and photography upon this project.
Out of all my projects to date this one has being the most emotionally charged out of them all. If you have visited Normandy and the battle sites and more importantly the many war cemeteries there must be something seriously wrong with you if you were not moved to tears.
From the outset of this project I never meant to glorify war (there are never any winners in war only losers). This was a project that I had to do to tell a story in some small way about a generation that is fast fading from living memory. In my opinion we all owe this generation so much for our present day freedom and way of life.
I spent a total of four years working with and for this branch upon this project, in that time I came to know many of the Veterans (some who had being evacuated from the beaches of Dunkirk, fought in the Desert against the Africa Korps and then landed on either Sword or Gold Beaches on D-Day).
Sadly the ravages of time have caught up with many of these old warriors and many are now longer with us. Therefore the resulting exhibition touring programme and relevant publicity hopefully made their stories known to a new audience and a different generation.
This Project is dedicated to the memory of the following: Bob Thompson, Tom Lyons, Len Pounder, Maxwell Vernon Hearst, John Smith and Alf Mellors. And many other like them.
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