Guest blog by Captain Peter Lambourn RN, UK Defence Attaché to the Benelux
Only around 100 people were there, when Private Lewis Curtis was finally and properly laid to rest yesterday, compared to the 5000 or so who packed the Oosterbeek Airborne Cemetery 11 days ago for the annual Arnhem commemoration. But that did not make it any less moving. On the contrary, it was more personal, with 10 members of his family having travelled from England for the occasion.
As the three volleys of rifle fire pierced the air, and the bugle rang out to herald the two minute silence, there can have been few people who were not thinking about how this 19 year old Cornishman spent his last few desperate days in October 1944, fighting for the survival of D Company, 5th Battalion the Wiltshire Regiment, during operation Market Garden. About how his parents must have lived with the pain of never knowing how he died and where he lay. And about how fitting it was that today, with that story now known and the book closed, he should be laid to rest, with full military honours, alongside his comrades.
Lest we forget!