A D-Day veteran who spent his later years educating schoolchildren about the Second World War has died at the age of 101.
Ken Hay, from Upminster, served with the 4th Dorset infantry regiment and landed at Courseulles-sur-Mer in Normandy just days after the Allied invasion in June 1944. He was captured during a night patrol on July 7-8 and taken to Zabrze, Poland, where he was forced to work in a coal mine as a prisoner of war.
His death was announced by the British Normandy Memorial, where he served as an ambassador.
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A spokesman for the organisation said: "His passion for education was unwavering. The countless schoolchildren whose lives he touched with his stories of courage and resilience nicknamed him 'Grandad Ken.'
"We extend our most sincere condolences to Ken’s sons Chris and Jeremy, all the Hay family and his very many friends.
"Ken Hay MBE Leg d’Hon. An extraordinary gentleman whose remarkable life will never be forgotten."
In a 2024 interview with the Press Association, Mr Hay described his capture during the war.
He said: "We went out on night patrol, was supposed to be doing a blow up of a self-propelled gun in no man's land, but in fact, it was behind their lines. So they let us through and then very unfriendly, they sealed it and wouldn't let us back, so we had a battle.
"We had 30 went out on our patrol, 16 including my brother, who was a corporal, got back, five of us got captured and then presumably nine got killed."
As Soviet forces advanced, the prisoners were forced to march around 1,000 miles to a new camp.
During the three-month journey, Mr Hay said he once "lay down to die" from exhaustion, but two friends turned back and helped him continue. He was eventually liberated by American troops and returned to the UK via Reims on May 4, 1945. He recalled the emotional homecoming in Barking.
He said: "They came running down the road to greet me. They were having breakfast, I'd had breakfast with the Army, so I just had a cup of tea with them and we all went off to mass.
"I'm a Catholic, and we all went off to mass and I was home in time for VE Day on the 8th of May."
After the war, Mr Hay was appointed an MBE for services to the community and received the Legion d’Honneur, France’s highest order of merit. He dedicated much of his later life to speaking with schoolchildren about the realities of war.
One pupil once asked how wars could be stopped.
He said: "I was stumped. How do you stop wars? And then Saint Paul came to my rescue… I said to her, 'Love.
"Love yourself, your friends, your family at home, the people you met today, the people you met yesterday.' If we could all do that, there'd be no wars."
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