´óÏó´«Ã½

Le lycee Eugene Guillaume de Montbard France

In September 2003 Mr Don Sheppard The Chairman of the Southend on Sea branch of The Normandy Veterans Association , and I were contacted by Professor Martine Ossola who taught at the above school about our willingness to take part in a school project she was researching with her class of students the Normandy landings of 1944 ,and the subsequent battles in Normandy which led eventually to the liberation of Europe from its domination by the Nazis.
As both Don and I were computer wise , and had our own PCs and access to the Internet we both agreed to add our contributions to this very worthwhile project.
So we would both sit at our computers every Wednesday answering various questions tendered by the class ,there was much sending of old wartime photographs , information of how we felt at the time , and of how we were living now .the names of our units and Divisions , in fact everything except the kitchen sink. From what information they were able to obtain from us and with much research were able to determine our individual Divisions progress from the Beaches of Normandy across France , and what routes we took , that in all honesty was far more than we knew at the time , as in my case Normandy was a series of battles and the name of the town or village concerned a piece of information relegated to the back of ones mind , i.e Cheux was our very first battle and is remembered as such ,and not the geographical significance of the place .
The whole project culminated in an Inaugural Exhibition at the school on May 7th 2004. we were both invited to the school on this date to attend this exhibition , which we were both very pleased to accept.
So on Wednesday 5th of May 2004 saw Don and I heading for Ashford in Kent to catch the Eurostar to Lille , where we had a six hour wait for a connection to Montbard ,as due to the threat of terrorism we were unable to leave our baggage at the left luggage office , so this meant having to keep it with us , and rendering our plans to spend the time looking around Lille as null and void. So we managed to take our baggage into a restaurant on the station , had lunch managed to drag it out for quite some time , and then took up residence in the waiting room on hard old seats . Time dragged as it always does on these occasions we occasionally took a walk around the station singly as someone had to watch our bags ,as leaving them would have meant they would be taken away and exploded . We were visited several times by Security complete with a Rottweiler and a German Shepherd ,however we escaped their close scrutiny , but did witness an ejection of one unfortunate soul probably a ‘Dosser ‘
Eventually we boarded the train for Montbard and departed from the boredom of Lille, now French trains are very different from ours ,they are on time , they travel around 150kph , they are very silent and smooth and thay have carriages where smoking is permitted naturally being a smoker I opted for this one,it also was very close to the Restaurant car so we both indulged a Monsieur le Croque and a a coffee , the le croque is cheese on toast but again how different from its British Rail counterpart it was hot very large and delicious , in fact so filling that we were unable to eat the delicious curried lamb that had been prepared for us by Martine (We are very sorry about that Martine.)
We arrived at around 8 50 pm at Montbard where we were greeted by Martine her husband Dominique , their friends Patrick and Chantal and their daughter Emille who was draped in our honour with a Union Jack , and the Principal of the school M.Bruno Julia .We were duly whipped off to Martine’s house a delightful old pre revolution building ,the house was very old and gave off an aura of real peace and calm , in fact I cannot recall the time when I felt so relaxed in a building. After a typical French meal which lasted two hours ,we did eat some fruit and had coffee, and conversation flowed like water. We eventually called it a day and went to bed Don sleeping in Patrick’s house and I the lucky one slept in Martine’s house.
Day2 Thursday 6th May
We visited the school , and were introduced to the staff and students involved in the project at the outset there was a certain amount of shyness on the part of the students which during the next two days was overcome and we all parted the greatest of friends.We had a preview of all the exhibits and were very very impressed with what had been achieved.Before our arrival the whole class with their tutors had visited Normandy ,and had visited places we had named in our Internet periods ,and they had brought back with them sand and seashells from the beaches where we landed .The sand and shells were laid on a display showing the four Portraits of Don and I and two American veterans , the portraits were copied from photographs we had previously sent .We were then presented with a small box of the Normandy sand ,a couple of shells, and a small medal dealing with the Invasion, also many documents of all aspects of the project. We were then given a guided tour of the school by M.Julia ,and as I had been the Principal of a similar vocational school in Malawi I felt we had a lot in common. It is a great school and I was very impressed with the range of modern electronic equipment they had.
We then adjourned for lunch in the school cafeteria , and after lunch we visited a French veteran who was resident in a Hospice , this was very touching , and made us realise that we were indeed very lucky having the degree of mobility which we did have.
After this touching experience we went on to The Local Prefecture where we met several dignitaries posed for a photograph with the students and staff and the dignitaries for the local press nearly got imbibed on the local version of Champagne Don was occupied chatting up the American lady who was destined to be our interpreter over the next couple of days .When this finished Martine gave us a conducted tour of Montbard which proved to be a really delightful old town beautiful old stone buildings ,a town with character bisected by a really lovely river . That evening we were all entertained to a dinner given and hosted by M.Bruno Julia , and very entertaining it was too .
Day 3 Friday 7th of May
This day saw the opening of the exhibition ,and what a truly commendable opening it was ,at the school entrance flew five full size flags , The Tricolour of France ,The Stars and Stripes of the USA ,the Maple leaf of Canada ,the Union Jack, and the Scottish Cross of St Andrew the latter being flown purely in honour of Don and I as we had both served in Scottish Divisions Don in the 51st Highland Div , and I in the 15th Scottish Div.
The exhibition was very well attended by the public , very many dignitaries among them being Madam Claire Lovisi the rector of Dijon Academy , M.Michel Protte the Mayor of Montard , Members of the Montbard Prefecture , The Chief of Police , the French Air Force Colonel who will be responsible for the French Air forces activities on the coming 60th Anniversary celebrations in Normandy ,members of the Resistance ,an American Ranger who represented the USA. , but what was most touching was a lady who had been incarcerated in Belsen concentration camp during the war , who supplied us with her written story . We were asked many questions by many people ,and trust we gave satisfactory answers .We were interviewed by the press , televised and the whole morning passed before we knew it , it was then time for speeches which were given by Martine ,and then all the dignitaries paid tribute to her for the enormous task she had undertaken with this project , and its very successful completion . I made a very brief speech in which I managed to sum up the whole project with one word ,which was ‘
‘ Cest magnifique ‘ .Don then recited the Normandy Prayer and the Exhortation ,and at the conclusion Martine echoed the line We will remember them’ in French . This was very well received.
Then it was time for another hearty French lunch in the Cafeteria , in the afternoon we paid a very interesting visit to the Fontenay Abbey in Montbard founded in I 118 by St Bernard truly a lovely old historic building and well worth a visit .
In the evening we had a very entertaining dinner at Martines house with all the staff concerned with the project , this took the usual two or three hours and entertainment was in the vocal sense with both Don and I rendering The White Cliffs of Dover in a very out of tune version both singing different words ,then we gave our Pidgin French version of J’attendrai ,and then we got She’ll be coming round the Mountain sung in French by the long suffering audience ,and we added the English version a great night and a great ending to a really great day
Day 4 Saturday May 8th
May the 8th ? how many people in this country know what that date means ? not many. It was the day that the war ended in Europe in 1945,and as such it was proclaimed a Public Holiday in France .This day we were taken to the War Memorial in Montbard it was raining cats and dogs , but this did not deter the public attending this ceremony of remembrance .On our arrival we alighted from the cars , and many French veterans came forward to shake our hands , and the fuss we were made of was such that any outsider would think that Don and I were the only two people to have fought in Normandy .We attended a service in the church ,afterwards we stood at the monument while tribute was paid , with drums and bugles sounding out the French equivalent of The Last Post. A student held an umbrella over our old grey heads ,and there were a few misty eyes about including ours .Then the whole gathering marched behind the band to the local Cemetery where wreaths were laid ,prayers were said ,the band played a very eerie sounding Death March then our attention was drawn to the grave of a British Soldier killed in 1916 , Don and I gave a salute and the rest of the French veterans did likewise .We then marched down to the Montbard Town Hall were we formed up on three sides but then there was a delay in our entering the town Hall out of the rain , and I found out it was all down to my smoking a cigarette ,out of sheer politeness the dignitaries had waited for me to finish my smoke before making the next move. OK fag out so everyone entered the Town Hall and upstairs to a room which we were told was the Chamber of Honour with Napoleonic connections in fact there was a large portrait of
Napoleon on the wall of this room. Don , a French Normandy veteran , and I were placed in the front of the room , and then the Mayor made a speech , some of it was translated via Martine , he told us how thankful they were that we had come to Montbard and that we would always be welcome there ,and concluded the proceedings by presenting the three of us with a medal bearing the Montbard crest ,speaking personally I will always treasure that medal. After a couple of glasses of Burgundy Red Wine (I was in grave danger of becoming an alcoholic in Montbard ) we left for lunch at Patricks house.( The asparagus was gorgeous. )
In the afternoon we had a very wet drive to a village some distance away where we visited the American Lady ,who was exhibiting the paintings of her late husband , this was very interesting, especially seeing his artistic way of showing movement in his subjects.
In the evening we joined all the teaching staff of the lycee who had been involved in the project at a restaurant for a farewell dinner, this was a really lovely evening and we both enjoyed it immensely.
Sunday 9th May.
All good things have to come to an end ,and this was the end of our stay in Montbard , we were taken to Montbard station by Martine ,her husband and the same good people who had met us a few days earlier as strangers,and now regarded by us both as firm friends, we said our good byes ,I believe they had tears in their eyes , I know Don and I did in fact we both felt really low as the train pulled away from them and Montbard.
In conclusion I would like to tender our heartfelt thanks to Martine for allowing us the privilege and honour of being able to contribute in our small way to this really brilliantly executed project .Also our thanks for the splendid hospitality shown by yourself,and all concerned ,I would like to congratulate all those involved in making this project so successful , everyone concerned must have really worked extremely hard in achieving this, and again I quote ‘Cest Magnifique’
Les Dyer

© Copyright of content contributed to this Archive rests with the author. Find out how you can use this.