Funeral held for Manchester D-Day veteran who fought in Normandy at just 19-years-old

The funeral of a Manchester veteran who served in D-Day during the Second World War has taken place after he passed away aged 97.

Jim Healy, from Withington, was just 19 when he landed on the beaches of Normandy on 6 June 1944.

He was the coxwain in a landing craft assault boat carrying Canadian troops onto Juno Beach.

The service, at St Peter's church in Middleton, was attended by Jim's friends, family and members of the Royal British Legion.

Stuart Steel, of the Royal British Legion, said: "The forgotten story of D-Day is the people who were driving the landing craft in to drop the soldiers onto the beach to do the fighting.

"That would have lived with him for the rest of his life, not knowing the fate of those he dropped off."

The weather conditions were poor on D-Day, and Jim landed soldiers onto the beach 10 times whilst under heavy fire.

Jim only started to talk about his experiences in Normandy much later in his life and was interviewed back in 2019 on the 75th anniversary of D-Day.

Jennifer Stack, his daughter, said: "We've got photographs of him as a Royal Marine and just to look at him and think how wonderful he was.

"He didn't question it at all, he just did it."

Jim later received the Legion D'honneur from the French Government for his deeds in back in 1944. He also saw action in Myanmar (also known as Burma) later in the war.

He had a military career his family are rightly proud of.