FRESH from the finals of Britain’s Got Talent, the D-Day Darlings attended a commemorative event alongside 38 D-Day veterans at the National Memorial Arboretum to mark the 74th anniversary of the historic Second World War event. 

Many veterans in attendance were on a tour organised by the travel arm of the Royal British Legion made possible by LIBOR funding, enabling them to return to where they served to ‘lay old ghosts to rest’.

The Royal British Legion organised the tour for D-Day veterans who are now unable to return to France for health reasons, but still want to pay their respects to their fallen comrades.

Nichola Rowlands-Smith, the charity’s head of travel, explained: “We’ve very grateful to the Treasury for funding these tours. Thanks to their support we’ve been able to take hundreds of WWII veterans back to where they served in a journey of remembrance. All commemorations are always moving experiences and it’s lovely to see the veterans get together and share stories and remember.

“The D-Day Darlings provided the ‘icing on the cake’ they performed four songs and mingled with all of the veterans, which really made their day!”

D-Day Darlings director Katie Ashby added: “We were honoured to attend the event at the National Memorial Arboretum to commemorate D-Day. To again stand with our heroes, who gave so much for us, and to hear stories and anecdotes of their time serving for their country was truly breath-taking and left us immensely proud of every one of them, we can’t wait to see them all again soon.”

The Royal British Legion has been running Libor-funded tours for the past four years. The tours are now available for all veterans who served in WWII. To find out more or to sign-up to one, call Arena Travel on 01473 660800 or visit arenatravel.com/our-holidays/remembrance-travel

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