By GB News (World News) | Created at 2026-09-21 02:55:39 | Updated at 2026-09-21 04:06:45
1 hour ago
Ken Hay, a Normandy veteran who was captured weeks after D-Day before devoting years of his life to teaching children about World War Two, has died at the age of 101.
The British Normandy Memorial, where he served as an ambassador, confirmed his death on Sunday.
"His passion for education was unwavering," the organisation said.
"The countless schoolchildren whose lives he touched with his stories of courage and resilience nicknamed him 'Grandad Ken'."
The memorial offered condolences to his sons Chris and Jeremy, along with the wider Hay family.
"Ken Hay MBE Leg d'Hon. An extraordinary gentleman whose remarkable life will never be forgotten," the tribute added.
Born in east London, Mr Hay served with the 4th Dorset infantry regiment and arrived at Courseulles-sur-Mer shortly after the Allied landings in Normandy.
He was seized by the Nazis during a night patrol on July 7-8 and taken to Zabrze in Poland, where he was forced to labour in a coal mine as a prisoner of war.
In a 2024 interview with the Press Association, Mr Hay said his initial reaction to capture was one of "dread" and "fear".
Ken Hay, a Normandy veteran who was captured weeks after D-Day before devoting years of his life to teaching children about World War Two, has died
PA
"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," Mr Hay said.
"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."
With the advance of Russian forces, the prisoners were forced on a march of roughly 1,000 miles to a new location, a journey that claimed many lives.
Mr Hay recalled that during the three-month trek, he once "lay down to die" when the pain became unbearable, but two comrades came back and carried him with an "arm around each shoulder".
American troops eventually freed the prisoners, and Mr Hay made it back to Britain through Reims on May 4 1945.
PICTURED: Ken Hay (right) and his brother Bill, who served in the same platoon as him
BRITISH NORMANDY MEMORIAL
Describing his arrival at his mother's home 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 May 8."
Following the war, Mr Hay received an MBE for his community service and was awarded the Legion d'Honneur, the highest French order of merit.
He made regular visits to schools across Britain to share his wartime experiences, believing it was his "duty to pass it on".
Earlier this year, he joined fellow veteran Henry Rice at a remembrance ceremony at the General Montgomery monument in Colleville-Montgomery for the 82nd anniversary of D-Day.
PICTURED: Ken Hay lays a wreath at the D-Day Wall on June 6 2022, alongside his son Christopher
BRITISH NORMANDY MEMORIAL
There, he spoke to GB News, explaining why he felt it was a duty for him to be there every single year.
"It is our duty to come back... As well as wanting to be back," he said.
Mr Hay described losing one of his fellow soldiers and friends as a "wicked waste" of life - and condemned the "powers that be" for "warming up" for another war.
When a 13-year-old schoolgirl once asked him how wars could be prevented, Mr Hay said he did not know how to answer at first.
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."
