It was at Le Paradis in Northern France on May 27th, 1940, that 97 men from the Royal Norfolk Regiment, the Royal Scots Regiment and a few others were rounded up by Nazi troops after surrendering. They were physically abused, marched along a road into a farmyard and massacred.
Two of them survived - Private Bert Pooley from London and Private Bill O'Callaghan from Dereham in Norfolk.
Every year a special service is held in Dereham in Bill's memory and this year it took place last Sunday.
A few years ago a number of us set up the Le Paradis Commemoration group and we have a web site at www.leparadismassacre.com. We also have a group of trustees looking into having a permanent memorial to the 97 who lost their lives. We will be updating our website to give news of this memorial in the near future. In the meantime If you want to learn more about the massacre please have a look at the website where you will find hundreds of pages, photos and documents.
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Everyone knows about fake news but now there seems to be another category - nonsense news.
These are news stories that whilst technically correct are also complete nonsense. They lead the reader in with emotive headlines that capture attention. But when you get in you will find that the story is very weak.
There are many many examples of this. One that comes to mind involves two weather presenters on Breakfast Television. I am a big fan of this programme and watch it over breakfast most mornings. I particularly like Dan Walker who seems like a genuinely nice guy and an antidote to dreadful presenters like Piers Morgan who think that they are far more important than they really are.
I turned on my laptop not long ago to be faced with the headline something along the lines of "Matt Taylor takes over weather slot from Carol Kirkwood." This was made to sound as if Ms Kirkwood had been sacked and replaced by Mr Taylor. The story was nothing more than that he had replaced her for one Saturday when she could well have been on holiday, off sick or just taking a day off.
Then we have other stories that treat the reader as if we are morons. It usually involves Carol Vorderman or Amanda Holden who these people seem to have an obsession with.
Headlines are usually of the ilk of
"Fans left speechless by Carol's black jump suit" or
"Amanda Holden spotted wearing a jaw dropping mini dress."
There is absolutely nothing in the story other than the two aforementioned waring clothes that we are told will have a huge affect on us. Quite patently it's all a heap of nonsense designed to grab our attention and make us read advertising.
Yesterday morning Mr Walker and Ms Kirkwood had a laugh over a news story (although it has to be said that there wasn't anything funny about it). Arundel Castle had been broken into and a number of irreplaceable artefacts stolen including Mary Queen of Scots' rosary beads.
Dan pointed out that Carol had done a live broadcast from Arundel Castle a few weeks ago.
"I'm not suggesting that you had anything to do with the theft," said Dan and they had a good laugh about it. I can see the nonsense story coming from this:
"Dan Walker accuses weather girl of being involved in major Castle theft."
Is this really where journalism is going?"
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Final bit on Eurovision (well final bit until next year's contest). On Sunday night I proved just what an anorak I am by turning to You Tube and watching all the Eurovision winners, all the songs that have come second, all those that came last, all the UK entries and all the songs that accrued no points (that's if you can accrue a negative).
One song featured in the last category is one of my favourites and would certainly be in my top 20 Eurovision songs of all time. It gained no points from the people's juries - although it did get a few from the professionals. It was Sisters by S!sters the German entry (and that exclamation mark is correct). It ended 24th out of 26. You can listen to it on You Tube. See what you think, but I really like it.