Operation Overlord, from Dover Castle

My father was Charles Shepherd. My father married my Mum Marjorie in Buckingham because that's where she came from in 1936. Charles was born on the 17th November 1910. My mother's father was a goods clerk on the railway. And then they bought a house in Addison Road, Banbury, in 1936 and they both actually died in that house (Charles died in 1979). I was born in 1940. And my brother Anthony Charles Shepherd was born in 1942.

He served in the Royal Corps of Signals. Before the War he was in the Post Office and his Uncle suggested he join the territorial army to earn more money. My father always wanted to fly. And he actually tried to go into the RAF, but for some reason they wouldn't accept him. I guess because he was in the post office they thought he'd be better off doing signals. He was called up and was posted to Dover Castle for the duration. Our Father got home a few times. I know he sort of hitchhiked a lot and got home whenever he could. He built me a doll's house which I still have made from bits of wood he found in Dover and he brought it home on his back. He built my brother a Fort. He made several toys because I suppose they had spare time.

At the end of the War he went to Belgium doing signals work, because he brought us some lovely Christmas decorations from Belgium and Holland. When he came back, he went back into the post office and was there until he retired. He was counter clerk.

And my brother did get his pilot’s licence but my father always wanted to fly. My father and my brother created this buff-coloured folder that looks like an official top secret dossier, filled with all the research they did about the work of the Royal Signals for the preparation of Operation Overlord, the D-Day landings and the Normandy invasion. It is dedicated to my sister-in-law's father. Copies were given to the family and sent to The Imperial War Museum.