Association pour le
Souvenir des Ailes de la Victoire en Normandie.
After the end of the Second World War many
of those who had served with Hawker Typhoon squadrons quickly began to
feel that they and their fallen comrades had been forgotten, throughout
the 1950s and 1960s little could be found or heard on the Hawker Typhoon
let alone its pilots and ground crews.
It is a sad fact that during this time, and
to some extent even today, Britain was more preoccupied with Spitfires
and Hurricanes than remembering an aircraft which made a major
contribution to winning the land battles for Western Europe and bringing
the war with Germany to an end.
Even during the 60th Anniversary year of the
D Day landings it seemed that while New Zealand and Australia could send
their Prime Ministers abroad to remember Hawker Typhoon pilots killed
sixty years ago the UK couldn't be bothered.
However,
thanks to the gratitude and generosity of France some fourteen years
earlier in June 1990 a permanent memorial had been unveiled at
Noyers
Bocage which was dedicated to all Hawker Typhoon pilots and ground crews
who had lost their lives in the course of liberating France in 1944.
The "Typhoon
Memorial", as it is known, was the brainchild of Jacques Brehin, of
Normandy, France, who is the President and founder of the Association pour
le Souvenir des Ailes de la Victoire en Normandie. (ASAVN) Through
determined commitment Jacques managed to obtain the necessary support from
the French government for the memorial, then having found and secured a
construction site at Noyers Bocage proceeded to raise funds for it. During
September of 2003 the Canadian Governor General, Her Excellency the Right
Honourable Adrienne Clarkson, awarded him a Meritorous Service Medal for
his unstinting efforts in bringing the memorial into being and
subsequently in June of 2004 he was made an MBE. Those who have attended
any of the remembrance services at or near the memorial cannot fail to be
moved by the ASAVN's undying gratitude to surviving Hawker Typhoon pilots
and ground crews, and for those who never came home.
(To visit the ASAVN's website a link can
be found on the "Links" page
or click
here)
