大象传媒

Denis Edwards.
I was a 19-year old Airborne Sniper carried in the first Horsa glider to land in near total darkness, just after midnight of 5th/6th June 1944, adjacent to the bridge over the Caen Canal (later re-named Pegasus Bridge by the French government in recognition of it being the first place in France to be liberated on D-Day).
This special force, led by the late Major John Howard, DSO, CdeG; was called the Coup de Main force and consisted of 180 men carried in six 30-man wooden Horsa gliders. Three were allocated to the canal bridge and all landed within minutes of each other and very close to their objective. The other three were due to land by the nearby bridge over the Orne river. Unfortunately one was tugged off course and landed beside a bridge over the River Dives - some 7 miles East of its target. Within 20 minutes both of these vital bridges were captured intact.
Since I retired I have acted as correspondent to the 24 known survivors and will always be happy to hear from others who are not in touch, or their relatives and friends. (I can be contacted by email: pegasuseddie@ntlworld.com and, for those seeking more info. they may care to see if their local library carries my book 'The Devil's Own Luck' From Pegasus Bridge to the Baltic coast as an Airborne Sniper 1944/45 published by Pen and Sword Books Ltd under their Leo Cooper imprint).
All Best Wishes,
Denis Edwards
PS. While we were in the Transit Camp the Company Clerk listed all those in each glider. This was needed in case any of them ended in the sea, so that the authorities knew who had been lost. Each of the known survivors has long held a copy of that hand-written list so PLEASE, if you were NOT AT Pegasus Bridge, do not make false claims as I do not enjoy having to tell families that their relative has told them a very tall story!