Royals lead VE Day commemorations to mark 80 years since end of WW2

The King and other senior royals will join Second World War veterans to mark the start of commemorations for the 80th anniversary of VE Day today.

The Royal Family are scheduled to take part in engagements over the next four days, as they hope “nothing will detract or distract” from the commemorations following the Duke of Sussex’s bombshell interview with the BBC.

Prince Harry said on Friday that he would “love reconciliation” with the rest of the family but the King will no longer speak to him over his legal battle for taxpayer-funded security in the UK.

Charles and Queen Camilla are “looking forward” to the week of events, and it is understood that, out of respect for the surviving veterans, Buckingham Palace hopes “nothing will detract or distract from celebrating with full cheer and proud hearts that precious victory and those brave souls, on this most special and poignant of anniversaries”.

On Monday, the Royal British Legion has worked with the families of veterans and the Government to ensure as many as possible can be there to see 1,300 members of the armed forces take part in a procession through London.

The charity will also host a VE Day tea party and service of remembrance at the National Memorial Arboretum in Staffordshire on 8 May, the actual anniversary of VE Day, where they expect to see more than 40 Second World War veterans.

The war veterans will also meet the King at a Buckingham Palace tea party in a special event, the Royal British Legion has said.

Crowds started to gather on The Mall on Monday morning, with some arriving the day before to secure a good viewing spot.

A total of 31 veterans are to attend official events on Monday, including 26 who will watch the parade, which will head from Parliament Square to Whitehall, then to Trafalgar Square, Admiralty Arch, The Mall, and finally to Buckingham Palace.

RAF veteran Alan Kennett, who will turn 101 on 29 May, will formally start the parade as he receives the Commonwealth War Graves’ Torch For Peace from air cadet warrant officer Emmy Jones.

Mr Kennett was in a cinema in Celle, north-central Germany, when the doors burst open as a soldier drove a jeep into the venue and shouted: “The war is over.”

He said the cinema erupted with joy, and celebrations soon spread through the streets.

Albert Keir, a 99-year-old veteran who served in the Royal Navy for three years from 1942, was part of the crew ferrying US troops onto Utah Beach in Normandy on D-Day.

He remembers: “At night when it was dark, the sky was lit up with all different sorts of colours, tracer bullets and different things. And the noise was colossal…

“And the firing from the sea over our heads blasting the beaches was very bad. Took some standing that did. It’s very difficult to try and get it out of your mind.”

Gilbert Clarke, 98, lied about his age to join the RAF in 1943 and trained in Kingston Palisades RAF camp in Jamaica, before being sent on a troop-carrying ship to Britain via the United States.

Alfred Littlefield, aged 101, joined the Royal Engineers and served during D-Day, when he swam in with supplies from the launches under shell fire.

His unit stayed on to build the temporary Mulberry Harbours, which facilitated the rapid offloading of cargo onto beaches during the Allied invasion of Normandy in June 1944.

Ann Johnson, aged 101, served in the Land Army during the war as a tractor driver.

Arthur Oborne, aged 99, joined the army in 1942 aged 18 and later became part of the 30th Corp – also known as the “Desert Rats” – which took part in the D-Day landings and subsequent advance across France.

Barbara Hurman, who is soon to turn 100, volunteered to join the Auxiliary Territorial Service – the first all-women’s branch of the British Army, formed in 1938 – when she was just 17 years old.

Bernard Morgan, a 101-year-old RAF veteran, worked as a codebreaker during the war.

He landed on Gold Beach at 6.30pm on D-Day, becoming the youngest RAF sergeant to land in Normandy during the war.

He remembers receiving a secret telegraph message two days before VE Day which read: “German war now over, surrender effective sometime tomorrow.”

When the end of the war was officially confirmed on May 8, Mr Morgan and his comrades lit a huge bonfire and celebrated until late into the night.

He said: “It’s so important that we make the most of these opportunities to remember what happened, not just to celebrate the achievement, but also to ensure that such horrors never happen again.”

A veteran of the Women’s Royal Naval Service, Betty Hollingberry was one of six sent to work on HMS Pembroke V in Eastcote, west London, where she helped operate the Bombe machines designed to break German Enigma codes.

Royal Navy veteran Cyril Jones Alston, 98, began his service on his 18th birthday in February 1945 to serve “until the end of the period of the present emergency.”

Douglas Hyde, soon to turn 99, joined the Merchant Navy in 1944 aged 18.

He was part of a secret operation to liberate Europe and spent months going back and forth to the beaches deploying munitions and amphibious vehicles.

On VE Day, Mr Hyde bumped into his brother in Antwerp, Belgium, and they celebrated the end of the war together.

John Mortimer, 101, was just 20 when he landed on Sword Beach in Normandy on June 6, 1944.

“There were thousands and thousands of ships on either side of us, loads of vehicles, tanks and artillery,” he recalled.

“It was dangerous, there were snipers all around. It was noisy, smoky, and smelly, and I saw lots of casualties.”

Joyce Wilding, 100, from Surrey, enlisted in the First Aid Nursing Yeomanry (Fany) aged 18.

She was on a day off travelling to London with her colleagues when victory in Europe was announced.

She said: “We went to Piccadilly where there was a stream of people singing and dancing; we joined a crocodile and did the Palais Glide down Piccadilly, there were soldiers up lampposts, it was extraordinary.”

They made their way to Buckingham Palace and witnessed the King, Queen, and Winston Churchill waving to the crowd from the balcony.

“Being outside the palace, you could hardly move – there were so many people cheering and singing,” she added.

Olga Hopkins, 99, from St Albans in Hertfordshire, served in the Women’s Auxiliary Air Force as a wireless mechanic.

Remembering VE Day, she said: “I was lying in bed in my Nissen Hut at midnight, listening to the American Forces Network, when a Tannoy announced, ‘The war is over.’

“We jumped out of bed, threw on our battledress, and joined a party at the sergeant’s mess.”

She recalls singing Don’t Fence Me In with friends, adding: “We had a whale of a time.”

Royal Navy veteran Ruth June Bourne, 98, was a Bombe machine operator and checker at Bletchley Park in Milton Keynes, Buckinghamshire, during the war.

On VE Day, she went to London with a colleague to celebrate. “We waited outside the Palace chanting ‘We want the King’,” she said. “The royal family came out, and we went mad cheering. People were climbing lampposts.

“I climbed onto a window ledge shouting, ‘Three cheers for the British Navy’.”

Sir Keir Starmer has said that “we owe a debt of gratitude to those prepared to make the ultimate sacrifice for our country”, ahead of VE Day commemorations.

In a post on X on Monday morning, the Prime Minister said that the Government is “giving veterans better access to housing, employment, health and welfare support”.

“As we celebrate VE Day, we honour all those who have served in our armed forces,” he added.

Garrison Sergeant Major Vern Stokes, who is in charge of the VE Day military procession, said the participation of Ukrainian and Nato troops is a reminder that “allies really do matter”.

He told BBC Breakfast that it is “right” for Ukrainian and Nato troops to take part in the procession in central London, where from midday 1,300 people will march along The Mall.

He said: “Eighty years ago we were stronger together and today we are stronger together, and it’s just a reminder for us that allies really do matter and it’s nice for them to be able to take part.”

Calling veterans the “VVIPs”, he added: “Today is very much their day and we’re very proud to be able to honour them.”