Britain says farewell to a D-Day giant as emotional funeral held for WW2 hero

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EXCLUSIVE: Henry Rice, who survived the 1944 Normandy Invasion but lived for 82 wracked with guilt, has been laid to rest.

Veteran Henry Rice was given a farewell fit for a hero as he was laid to rest today. The Royal Navy braveheart, part of the mighty Normandy Invasion to liberate Nazi-occupied Europe in 1944, died last month aged 100. His funeral cortege was escorted by two fire engines in a nod to his post-war career.

At Guildford Crematorium where 200 mourners gathered to say their goodbyes his coffin was given a guard of honour by the Royal Naval Association, Royal British Legion, HMS Collingwood, the naval training establishment, and Surrey Fire and Rescue Service.

Great grandfather-of-five Henry from Cranleigh, Surrey, served aboard the landing ship HMS Eastway as part of Convoy ETM13, and arrived off Juno Beach on D-Day +5.

His job was to ferry soldiers and supplies to blood-drenched beaches during the Normandy Landings which started on June 6, 1944.

He was awarded the Legion of Honour, France’s highest order of military merit, for his service.

After the war Henry joined the fire service and was one of the first men called to what was thought to have been a catastrophic gas explosion at a pub in Guildford on October 5, 1974.

Henry arrived shortly after two 6-pound (2.7kg) gelignite bombs were set off at two pubs by the IRA in an attack which killed four off-duty British soldiers and one civilian and wounded 65.

His son Stuart, 70, who followed in his father’s footsteps and also became a firefighter, led a series of tear-jerking eulogies and said: “He was quite simply the best father anyone could wish for. We owe him everything.

“He was kind, loving, and generous to a fault. Behind the facade of jokes and leg-pulling was a man who cared and worried about other people - all at the expense of himself. But no amount of telling him would have changed that.

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