Overview
- The British Normandy Memorial announced on Sunday that Ken Hay, an ambassador for the site, had died at the age of 101.
- Hay served with the 4th Dorset infantry, was captured during a night patrol on 7–8 July 1944 and was sent to Zabrze in Poland to work in a coal mine as a prisoner of war.
- As Soviet forces advanced, he endured a roughly three-month march of about 1,000 miles that left many dead and was liberated by American troops before returning to the UK via Reims on 4 May 1945.
- After the war he received an MBE and France’s Legion d’Honneur and spent decades visiting schools and commemorations, earning the nickname ‘Grandad Ken’ and leaving behind sons Chris and Jeremy.
- His death reduces the number of surviving first‑hand D‑Day witnesses and underlines how commemoration and school outreach will increasingly rely on memorials, recorded testimony and younger advocates to pass on the history.