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'Ah, but that's the English War Office. You and I are both Scottish, and that doesn't apply.'
Bill Millin, a Scottish bagpiper who played highland tunes as his fellow commandos landed on a Normandy beach on D-Day and lived to see his bravado immortalized in the 1962 film The Longest Day, died on Wednesday in a hospital in the western England county of Devon. He was 88. Mr. Millin was a 21-year-old private in Britains First Special Service Brigade when his unit landed on the strip of coast the Allies code-named Sword Beach, near the French city of Caen at the eastern end of the invasion front chosen by the Allies for the landings on June 6, 1944. The young piper was approached shortly before the landings by the brigades commanding officer, Brig. Simon Fraser, who as the 15th Lord Lovat was the hereditary chief of the Clan Fraser and one of Scotlands most celebrated aristocrats. Against orders from World War I that forbade playing bagpipes on the battlefield because of the high risk of attracting enemy fire, Lord Lovat, then 32, asked Private Millin to play on the beachhead to raise morale. When Private Millin demurred, citing the regulations, he recalled later, Lord Lovat replied: Ah, but thats the English War Office. You and I are both Scottish, and that doesnt apply. Posted by: Anonymoose 2010-08-21 |
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