'The French are more polite than most of us'

Supplies in the mess tins included meat and oat blocks, biscuits, chocolate and tea

A fascinating insight into the vital supplies carried by soldiers on D-Day has been put on display as part of a special 80th anniversary exhibition.

Mess tins full of essential supplies - including four sheets of toilet paper - are on show at Weedon Depot in Northamptonshire, where some of the guns for the allied invasion of Normandy were prepared.

The tins also contain food such as biscuits and an early form of instant tea.

The exhibition also includes a guide given to soldiers about how to behave in once in France - warning them "the French are more polite than most of us".

Weedon Depot was originally built to help protect England from invasion by Napoleon during the early 19th Century and it was still being used as an ammunition store in the 1940s.

Sandra Lee, one of the guides at the Depot's visitor centre, said it played its part in supplying weapons for D-Day: "The guns came into the depot, they were inspected, prepared at the armouries because they'd come in with grease and everything on, and sent out to the soldiers."

Sandra Lee guides people around the visitor's centre in uniform

People from the surrounding villages were pressed into service to pack the mess tins of supplies.

One of the exhibition's cabinets shows the contents of each of the cans.

Ms Lee said: "They've got the Tommy pack, the cooker, the water.

"Each soldier needed 4,000 calories to last that day - it had all been worked out.

"The people here prepared it all {including] the tea - they'd get it ground down, add in milk powder, add in sugar, because you're not doing that on the beaches."

The supplies were individually wrapped in brown paper packages, which were then packed into little tins which served as plates on the beaches.

Four sheets of "latrine paper" were included with the supplies

Alongside the food and drink was a small ration of another essential item.

Ms Lee added: "They've got onto the beaches, they're being fired at, and all they've been given is four sheets of toilet paper, and I'm not sure that four sheets would be enough if I was running onto a beach and being fired at."

The visitor centre will be hosting the exhibition until October

'Call them Monsieur'

The display also includes essential behaviour guidance for the soldiers, many of whom had never have left the British Isles before.

Typical instructions included: "The French are more polite than most of us, remember to call them Monsieur, Madame or Mademoiselle, and not just 'Oy'."

"Don't criticise the French army's defeat of 1940."

And, to make sure the work of the good people of Weedon didn't go to waste, "Don't sell or give away your food or equipment."

The visitor centre is open from Wednesday to Sunday and the exhibition will continue until October.