Beards of Longhope & D-Day Memories of Richard Todd OBE. (General)

by Jefff , West London, Middlesex, Saturday, March 30, 2013, 16:59 (4260 days ago) @ jospp

Hi Jo,
first thanks for highlighting this very interesting new photo which I hadn't seen.
Secondly, please accept my sincere apologies for not yet replying to your email, I will very soon indeed, have had a busy few weeks elsewhere. Before I replied I wanted to discuss it with the Beard family, as I now know you have too.
I will also contact my Beard contacts re this photo, I'm sure they will be very interested indeed, especially as they have just recently obtained some more old family photos and are about to have something of a family reunion to view them.
I too would very much like to contact the photo's poster, thanks.

Many thanks again and I'll email you very soon.
Enjoy a pleasant White Easter !, Jeff.

PS UPDATE re Richard Todd OBE, Para at D-Day and subsequent film actor.
My halfsister, grandaughter of Fred's father Henry Beard, found Longhope life a little quiet in the supposedly-swinging 60s, so on leaving EDGS she also joined the Service where she met her future husband. Like so many ex-RAF they setup their family home in Grantham, Lincolnshire, near their last posting. Nowadays this spacious flat county on the North Sea is known locally as Bomber County due to it being the home of so many RAF Bomber Command Stations during and after WW2. By coincidence the aforementioned actor Richard Todd also lived locally and used a newspaper shop that my halfsister worked in from the late 1970s. She recalls "I remember Richard as a quiet gentleman always dressed in tweed jacket, cavalry twill trousers and cap and always polite. He was quite short - I didn`t recognize him the first time I saw him".
Richard Todd had retired there after an illustrious military & acting career which included playing Wing Commander Guy Gibson in the 1955 film "The Dam Busters". This famous Squadron, 617, flew from Scampton,Lincs from 1943 until 1981, and may partly explain why Todd retired in the area. He was a keen supporter of Remembrance events especially those associated with the Normandy landings and the Dambusters which the British public long-associated him with. He appeared at many Dambusters' anniversaries, his final appearance was in May 2008 with Les Munro, the last surviving pilot from the raid on the Ruhr dams. He also narrated at least one TV documentary and contributed forewords to many books on this subject.
Finally, here are Richard's personal recollections of the D-Day actions in Normandy. I've only just read them for the first time and they bring a serious edge to my earlier rather amateur attempt at telling the tale, strongly recommended reading.
http://www.britisharmedforces.org/pages/nat_richard_todd.htm

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Richard_Todd
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/No._617_Squadron_RAF
http://home.clara.net/heureka/lincolnshire/lincs-aviation.htm