joshua
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By Kerry.Ashdown | Posted: October 22, 2014
Don Gray
A VETERAN of the perilous Arctic Convoys during the Second World War will be lighting up Stafford at this year’s Christmas switch-on.
Don Gray, 91, endured freezing conditions and the constant threat of deadly attack from enemy planes and boats 70 years ago, when he served as a boiler and engine rooms below deck on the destroyer HMS Caprice.
But next month he will be illuminating the Stafford skyline when he switches on the town centre’s Christmas lights in Market Square on November 22.
Don, who lives in Eccleshall, was nominated for the honour following an appeal for a military hero, in light of 2014 being the centenary of the outbreak of World War One.
Councillor Mike Heenan, Leader of the Borough Council, said: “The word hero is often banded around all too easily these days. But everyone standing in that crowd, watching those wonderful lights illuminate the Stafford sky, can be thankful that Don, and his compatriots, endured some of the darkest days in history to allow us all to enjoy a brighter future that so many of his colleagues were never to experience.”
But Don said the honour of switching on the Christmas Lights was not just for him.
He said: “I am honoured to be asked to do it and grateful for those who nominated me. It will be a pleasure to turn on the lights but it is not about me, I am representing all those who never came back – and there was an awful lot of them that did not.”
Local heroes who have turned on the lights in previous years include brave PC, the late David Rathband, inspirational youngster Orla Fielder, and Stafford’s 2012 Olympic Torchbearers.
The day’s fun will begin around 3pm with popular local covers band The Cartoon Kings, before a top ABBA tribute act take to the stage. The lights will be switched on at 5pm with a firework display from the roof of the Guildhall Shopping Centre immediately after, which organisers say will be their biggest yet.
http://www.staffordshirenewsletter....-s-Christmas/story-23351456-detail/story.html
Don Gray
A VETERAN of the perilous Arctic Convoys during the Second World War will be lighting up Stafford at this year’s Christmas switch-on.
Don Gray, 91, endured freezing conditions and the constant threat of deadly attack from enemy planes and boats 70 years ago, when he served as a boiler and engine rooms below deck on the destroyer HMS Caprice.
But next month he will be illuminating the Stafford skyline when he switches on the town centre’s Christmas lights in Market Square on November 22.
Don, who lives in Eccleshall, was nominated for the honour following an appeal for a military hero, in light of 2014 being the centenary of the outbreak of World War One.
Councillor Mike Heenan, Leader of the Borough Council, said: “The word hero is often banded around all too easily these days. But everyone standing in that crowd, watching those wonderful lights illuminate the Stafford sky, can be thankful that Don, and his compatriots, endured some of the darkest days in history to allow us all to enjoy a brighter future that so many of his colleagues were never to experience.”
But Don said the honour of switching on the Christmas Lights was not just for him.
He said: “I am honoured to be asked to do it and grateful for those who nominated me. It will be a pleasure to turn on the lights but it is not about me, I am representing all those who never came back – and there was an awful lot of them that did not.”
Local heroes who have turned on the lights in previous years include brave PC, the late David Rathband, inspirational youngster Orla Fielder, and Stafford’s 2012 Olympic Torchbearers.
The day’s fun will begin around 3pm with popular local covers band The Cartoon Kings, before a top ABBA tribute act take to the stage. The lights will be switched on at 5pm with a firework display from the roof of the Guildhall Shopping Centre immediately after, which organisers say will be their biggest yet.
http://www.staffordshirenewsletter....-s-Christmas/story-23351456-detail/story.html