Crowds waving Union and D-Day flags gathered on the Round Tower and harbour walls in Old Portsmouth to see the ship off.
D-Day veterans told of having “mixed feelings” after they set sail for Normandy for the 80th anniversary commemorations.
Several small boats and yachts also waited outside the harbour to see the ferry off on its journey to Caen.The Jedburgh Pipe Band played the ferry out of the harbour and a Royal Air Force flypast circled low overhead. Jack Mortimer, 100, from Leeds, who landed on Sword Beach, said: “When I go back there, I cry. I saw bodies being brought off that beach.”
The Royal British Legion is escorting just 22 D-Day veterans to Normandy, compared with 255 who travelled to commemorate the 75th anniversary in 2019.One of those waving the veterans off was Janet Welling, 71, from Portsmouth, who said: “I came here to remember the day and to reminisce. “Being the younger generation, and my dad and my uncles being in the Navy, I feel it’s always important to remember and never to forget.”
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