Essex D-Day veteran who helped liberate Bergen-Belsen dies aged 104

Don Sheppard. Credit: PA

A D-Day veteran who helped liberate the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp has died aged 104.

Donald 'Don' Sheppard, a dispatch rider for the Royal Engineers, landed on Juno beach on 6 June 1944 in a landing ship tank.

Some 156,000 British, American and Canadian troops launched from the sea and air on to French soil in one of the most successful military operations in history, which this year celebrated its 80th anniversary.

To commemorate it, Mr Sheppard travelled in a police escort to the Living Memorial in the village of Rettendon near Chelmsford in Essex.

On Sunday, the British Normandy Memorial account posted on X: "We are saddened to hear of the death of 104-year-old D-Day veteran Donald Sheppard.

Don Sheppard also served in North Africa and Sicily during his military career. Credit: PA

"Donald attended the virtual opening of the Memorial in 2021 & features in the Winston Churchill Centre @PoppyLegion exhibition.

"Thinking of Donald's wife Sandra & family. Rest in Peace Don."

Speaking in 2019, Mr Sheppard, from Basildon, Essex, described D-Day as a "waste of life", but recognised the landings as being "so important".

He said: "I know we had to defend ourselves… but young guys like me 20, 21, who never lasted five minutes, some of them got killed before they got off the boat.

"Tragic, absolutely."

When he arrived at Juno beach at around 4.30pm, Mr Sheppard said the Germans had "really got the distance and shells were coming over like rain", with battleships also firing over their heads.

Mr Sheppard served as a dispatch rider during the Second World War. Credit: PA

"We lost quite a few guys," he said. "We [the survivors] were lucky really."

After breaking through Nazi lines in the August, he continued through to Belgium, Holland and eventually Germany - including to the Bergen-Belsen concentration camp.

Speaking of his experience, Mr Sheppard said: "I shall never forget that for the rest of my life. How one human could do that to another."

The only wound he received during the war was a cut to his leg as he took cover in a ditch as German bombs fell.

But after medical tests and scans some seven decades later, it was discovered he had a sliver of shrapnel sitting in his lung.

Mr Sheppard said the piece of metal had never caused any health problems.

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