The tragic story behind a photograph taken on the eve of D-Day

Two years ago, after my daughter had missed out on a school trip, I took my family to Normandy to see the battlefields and the beaches. I didn’t want her to miss out on the experience.

After we had seen the remains of the Mulberry Harbour, at what was once Gold Beach, we headed up the hill to a little cemetery in Bazenville. It was the first to be created to take the casualties of D-Day.

Like all the Commonwealth War Graves, they are beautiful places, and always immaculately kept.

As we walked along the lines of white headstones, we were drawn to one grave which had pinned to it the black and white photograph of a young man.

The inscription was for an F. J. Jones, of the South Wales Borderers, who died on June 9th 1944 - aged just 19.

Pte Frederick Jones' grave at Ryes War Cemetery, Bazenville Credit: Jonathan Hill

My daughter, who was just 12 at the time, was very moved.

We took a photograph, and two years later, as the 75th anniversary of the D-Day landings approached, I recalled that afternoon in the cemetery in France. I decided I wanted to find out who this young man was.

Our research first provided a name - Pte Frederick James Jones. And then his hometown - Neyland, Pembrokeshire.

This led me to his niece, Shirley Thomas, who agreed to meet with me to tell me about her uncle

Shirley looks at old photographs of her Uncle Freddie.

“Truly, I am so proud of what he did,'' she told me in her farmhouse, before producing a wonderful photograph of her Uncle Freddie, throwing his hat into the air on the eve of D-Day.

And joining him in the photograph was his best pal, Bill Evans.

Freddie’s best friend Bill Evans pictured here on the far left. Credit: Shirley Thomas

“Bill told me he [Freddie] was always jovial, no matter the circumstances,” said Shirley.

She told me Bill and Freddie had landed on Gold Beach on D-Day, but days later, Freddie was gravely wounded by a shell burst. Bill had tried desperately to save his friend.

“Bill ran over to him,” Shirley said. “He got hold of his field dressing and wrapped it around his head and the next minute his Sargeant Major shouted ‘come on Evans, leave him there for the stretcher bearers’. And Bill said ‘if I didn’t go, he’d have had the right to shoot me’.

“It was, you could tell, the worst moment of his life, having to leave him.

A poppy grows in the fields overlooking Ryes War Cemetery, Bazenville

“They’re all heroes,” Shirley told me. “Any man who goes to war like that. We are here because he lost his life.”

For this, the 75th anniversary of D-Day, I was able to tell my family the story of Pte Freddie Jones. Just one Welshman, among so many, who made the ultimate sacrifice - so that we could enjoy our freedoms.