Bill Millin, commonly known as Piper Bill, was personal piper to Brigadier Lord Lovat, commander of 1 Special Service Brigade at D-Day.
Pipers had traditionally led Scottish troops into battle, but the death toll in World War I was so high that the practice was banned by the British high command. However, Lord Lovat asked Bill Millin, then 21, to ignore instructions and to pipe the Commandos ashore at Sword Beach. Wearing his kilt and armed only with his bagpipes, Bill marched up and down the shore playing "Hielan' Laddie" and "The Road to the Isles" as his comrades fell around him. German snipers later attested, they did not target Millin because they believed him to be mad.The action was portrayed in the 1962 film "The Longest Day". The actor playing Millin was Pipe Major Leslie de Laspee, the official piper to Her Majesty The Queen Mother in 1961.
Cross-posted at Roncesvalles.
5 comments:
Great film, what a cast...thanks for posting.
What a strange story. How many German snipers were there? Let's say there were only 50. It's hard to believe that not one sniper out of 50 would have gotten the idea to simply shut the bagpipes the hell up.
You know?
There must have been more at work here than mere sympathy for an, apparently, insane man.
Nazi Germany was not renown for the sympathy it showed towards weakness, especially the weakness in it's enemies.
"There must have been more at work here than mere sympathy for an, apparently, insane man."
ABSOLUTELY!
However:
"Nazi Germany was not renown for the sympathy it showed towards weakness, especially the weakness in it's enemies."
I don't think that every sniper was a dyed-in-the-wool indoctrinated Nazi. A lot of German soldiers were just doing what they thought to be their duty as men and as Germans. Be it that they had no other explanation for NOT shooting the piper, be it that they really thought he was mad, it remains a miracle.
Editrix,
Yes, I agree, and it ought to be obvious to any thinking person that not all Germans who served in the German army were Nazis at heart.
However, one would think that, even if there were as few as 50 snipers (and I'm guessing there were a lot more than that at Normandy) at least one of them would have killed the guy.
Yeah, I agree, it's a miracle.
Could be they were more intersted in shooting at the guys shooting at them than some crazy musician (ancestor of yours, Pasto?)(I can see Pasto, beating a snare drum, marching up a and down the beaches of Jeddah or Aden) who couldn't return fire.
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