Category Archives: 1st Lt FT Gillespie

Normandy 2017 Day 9 – Estry, Deep Purple, barbed wire and beer

June 30, 2017 – 10:00 pm

Day 9 – Wednesday 7th June A walk around Estry This morning we spent time looking around the village of Estry. Taking photographs of the locations of damaged and destroyed Churchill tanks following the battle to liberate the village. Colin needed these in relation to his war gaming group, and his military history society.   […]

By ColinAuthor | Also posted in Flt Lt John W Harder, M/Sgt Morris Sheppard, Major Ray Elledge Jnr, Normandy Trips, Pvt Gerald Willen | Tagged , , , , , , | Comments (0)

Normandy 2017 Day 8 – Chasing Ray Elledge and other Americans

June 30, 2017 – 9:25 pm

Day 8 – Tuesday 6th June A late start! We had a late start today. Partly as we’d decided on a leisurely lie-in, but more to do with the previous night’s socialising! Chasing Ray Elledge and other Americans (again!) Our plan for the day was to use the narrative in Ray Elledge’s manuscript to try […]

By ColinAuthor | Also posted in M/Sgt Morris Sheppard, Major Ray Elledge Jnr, Normandy Trips, Pvt Gerald Willen | Comments (0)

Normandy 2017 Day 4 – Mixing history and beers; a heady cocktail

June 27, 2017 – 8:44 pm

Day 4 – Friday 2nd June Mixing history An early start saw us arrive at the Eurotunnel terminal in time to catch a train prior to that on which we were scheduled. Arriving earlier in France than planned allowed us to spend an hour walking around Cap Gris-Nez. Here we took photographs of both the […]

By ColinAuthor | Also posted in M/Sgt Morris Sheppard, Major Ray Elledge Jnr, Normandy Trips, Pvt Gerald Willen | Tagged , | Comments (0)

Normandy June 2014 – Day#04 Monday 2nd June

May 27, 2015 – 5:24 pm

German Military Cemetery at Marigny Initially, we’d planned to use this day checking out again Ray Elledge’s crash site where we would have dug up some of the metal. However, as this had now been confirmed as not a crash site, we decided to do something different and decided to head off to Coutances as […]

By ColinAuthor | Also posted in Flt Lt John W Harder, Normandy Trips | Tagged , , , | Comments (0)

Normandy 2013 – Day#8 Saturday 8th June

December 17, 2013 – 9:45 pm

Presentations and P47s in Normandy With Peter Findlay So, as is usual on these trips, we got up in the morning & immediately amended the plans that we had for the day! The reason for this was that Peter Findlay, one of our hosts, was being honoured with the presentation of a medal from the […]

By ColinAuthor | Also posted in Major Ray Elledge Jnr, Normandy Trips | Tagged , , , , , , | Comments (0)

Day 6: 5th June

September 8, 2012 – 3:46 pm

This was quite a busy day, covering Operation EPSOM, the “Scottish Corridor” and Hill 112 and then on the trail of Ray Elledge and Francis Gillespie with some “Calvados hunting” in between. Operation EPSOM, the “Scottish Corridor” and Hill 112 Last year, we had visited the “shoulder” of the Operation EPSOM battlefield when we took a look around Rauray & […]

By ColinAuthor | Also posted in M/Sgt Morris Sheppard, Major Ray Elledge Jnr, Normandy Trips | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments (2)

Visit to Normandy – July 2010

May 28, 2011 – 5:41 pm

This year’s trip was always going to have the opportunity to be special ever since earlier in the year when I’d received an email from Jesse Sheppard (Grandson of Morris Sheppard, one of the “names” in the Shed). The anticipation was increased once it also looked as ‘though Jim, Jesse’s father & Morris’ son would […]

By ColinAuthor | Also posted in Flt Lt John W Harder, M/Sgt Morris Sheppard, Major Ray Elledge Jnr, Pvt Gerald Willen | Comments (0)

Visit to Normandy – July 2009

May 28, 2011 – 5:20 pm

Friday 24th July Flt Lt John Worthington Harder We (Glyn, Benoît (our translator – local lad interested in local history & with very good English) and me) set out on our 2 hour drive (having driven over 8 to get to “the Shed” the day before!) down to Evron, the town where John had crashed […]

By ColinAuthor | Also posted in Flt Lt John W Harder, M/Sgt Morris Sheppard, Major Ray Elledge Jnr, Pvt Gerald Willen, Uncategorized | Comments (0)