I was born in 1995 in Picardie, a region located to the north of Paris where many battles of world war 1 were fought, from a British mother and a French father.
My family moved back to Normandy in 2010, back to our french roots essentially.
My grandmother on the French side of the family was a true Norman, and she fled the region when she was 9 years old due to the destruction of her village of Aunay-sur-Odon in the early days of the battle of Normandy. This village was both a major crossroad in the area, and a choke point where many German soldiers gathered when they were heading towards the frontline. Her village ended up being completely and entirely flattened by the British bombers. Deeply traumatised for her whole life, she never came back to Normandy.
When I was a kid myself, we always thought with my siblings that she was an incredibly cowardly woman because she would hide in the toilets everytime a thunderstorm went on outside ! She never explained why she did that, so it took time for us to finally understand on our own why she acted like so. No one talked about the war in my French family, especially since my grandfather; her husband; was himself traumatised from the war he fought in Algeria in the 60’s !
On the British side of my family on the other-hand, my world war 2 time-period ancestor was “lucky” enough to suffer from a flat-foot, so he never got to see the horrors of war. Earlier than that, The Great War took the lives of 3 brothers of my ancestor, and my relatives on the other side of the british channel still proudly own medals of the “1st Devonshire regiment”, as a testimony of their sacrifice. This is the Dare family. Same family that gave its name to the american state of Virginia, named after Virginia Dare, first british girl born on american soil ever in 1587, in the “lost colony” of Roanoke !
I have always been passionate about history in its entirety, and I remember visiting the D-Day landing beaches on holidays when I was a kid and still living in the north of France. It was good fun to run in the bomb craters and explore the abandoned German bunkers ! Visiting the American cemetery of Colleville less so. Seeing this sea of perfectly aligned white headstones is probably one of my oldest memories.
Unfortunately for me, I chose to not study history but management when I started university in my twenties. After a decade of not enjoying my career and not knowing exactly what to do in my work-life, I finally started my new career as a tour-guide for the 80th anniversary of D-Day in 2024, and I finally found a job that I love ! I did a splendid first season, and Overlord Tours hired me after that, trusting me just because of the sheer amount of 5 stars reviews mentioning me by name online. Since then, I learn more and more about the battle of Normandy everyday, with the sole purpose of making my tours more and more enjoyable for you.
A scan of the official letter of 1921, posthumously decorating Albert George Dare with the British War Medal, brother of my ancestor.
What’s left of the village of Aunay-sur-Odon after the war. Destroyed at 100%, the unstable steeple had to be brought down. My grandmother escaped on her barefoot in between 2 waves of bombers.
The family record book of my grandmother. That’s one of the few things my ancestors managed to retrieve from the rubbles of their home.
