Tribute traced on to beach to honour D-Day troops

Harry Maddox said the troops' "sacrifice and memory must continue to be honoured"

A tribute to the troops that carried out the D-Day landings has been etched into the sands of a Cornish beach.

It took six hours for Harry Maddox and Stephen Rolfe to trace the words from a song about the Normandy landings on Tregirls Beach, Padstow on Sunday.

Mr Maddox said the drawing was "a tribute to all the lads that took part that day and those that never came home".

On 6 June 1944 alone, the first day of the campaign, as many as 4,400 troops died from the combined allied forces with some 9,000 being wounded or going missing.

The drawing featured four lines from a song by folk singer Jim Radford who took part in the D-Day landings

The beach script, measuring 120ft (37m) x 90ft (27m), featured four lines from a song by Jim Radford, a folk singer who was 15-years-old when he took part in the landings as a member of the Merchant Navy.

The excerpt from 'The Shores of Normandy' read: "And those of you who were unborn, who've lived in liberty, remember those who made it so, on the shores of Normandy."

Mr Maddox said: "It’s difficult to know what to draw for the commemoration of such brutal and horrific day but this is about remembrance.

"As time goes on there are now very few of them left, yet it’s because of them that we have the freedom we have.

"Their sacrifice and memory must continue to be honoured."

Thursday will mark the 80th anniversary of the D-Day landings.