GRAVES OF “ANGELS OF DELIVERANCE”

Putaruru Press, Volume XXI, Issue 1238, 10 July 1947, Page 5

GRAVES OF “ANGELS OF DELIVERANCE”

PILGRIMAGE TO NORMANDY “Moving and Emotional Day” The first party of next-of-kin of British war dead to visit the Normandy battlefields has reached the British military cemeteay fhere, according to a despatch from Normandy, dated June 6. It contains the graves of 1250 airborne soldiers who dropped a few hours before the invasion to seize the key bridges over the Ome and the Caen Canal on the extreme left of the invading armies. There are also 1000 graves of other ■ soldiers and airmen and of 200 Germans. it has been a moving and ertiotiom£“"'day. When the party reached here at midnight after a turbulent crossing and a long road journey, it was to find; The approaches to Pegasu3 Bridge over the. canal lit by strings of light; .The roads festooned with flowers, k foliage and flags; and *— iA procession of villagers bearing Chinese lanterns waiting to welcome the visitors. Sleeping Among Friends Speaking here in the presence of deputations from half a dozen surrounding towns and villages, the Mayor of Breville assured the relatives that they were not leaving their • menfoik like strangers buried in a foreign land, but as angels of deliverance sleeping among friends they had come to deliver. 'Brigadier J. H. N. Poett, who commanded the sth Parachute Brigade in the operation and led the pilgrims on behalf of the Airborne Forces’ Security Fund, replied. Many wives and parents had received from French people photographs showing their men’s graves carefully planted and decked with flowers.. When they came to-day on the third anniversary of D Day they found the cemetery practically bare. Last October it was taken over by the War Graves Commission which shares responsibility with the War Office. f Cause of Criticism The IFrench children have been prohibited from setting plants on graves or from retaining charge of the graves they adopted immediately after the invasion and had tended ever since. But they are allowed, a local official of the War Graves Commission stated, to place loose flowers on the graves. The absence of an official list of names and location of graves was the cause of criticism. 'Happily a French schoolgirl had made it a labour of love to compile in an exercise book a complete alphabetical index to the cemetery. An official of the Imperial War Graves Commission, who visited Ranville cemetery recently, said last night that it was unfortunate that the pilgrims had visited the cemetery during the transitional stage of development. “Ranville is being beautified in the same way as all other cemeteries which are the responsibility of the commission,” he said. “The scheme provides for a continuous flower border in front of the crosses, with grass Covering the graves. It is obvious that the barren appearance of which the pilgrims eomplain is the result of the grass not yeit being above the ground.”