King’s personal battle to get to Normandy: Cancer-stricken Charles was ‘adamant’ he would be at D-Day anniversary events in the UK and abroad and made it his ‘personal goal’ to attend

King Charles was convinced he would attend the D-Day commemoration events in Britain and Normandy and made it a personal goal to attend, it is understood.

The 75-year-old monarch will attend both today’s British national commemoration event in Portsmouth and tomorrow’s commemorations in northern France – his first major international event since beginning cancer treatment.

Charles is said to have been determined to celebrate the 80th anniversary as it will be the last event of its kind that D-Day veterans would be able to witness.

This was helped by a good recovery that allowed his public duties to be brought forward by “about a month”, a source said. The times.

Charles and Queen Camilla will attend the Ministry of Defense and Royal British Legion commemoration event at the British Normandy Memorial in Ver-sur-Mer.

Meanwhile, William will attend the Canadian ceremony at the Juno Beach Center in Courseulles-sur-Mer, hosted by the Canadian government, along with World War II veterans and Canadian Armed Forces personnel.

The Prince of Wales will then attend the international commemoration ceremony on Omaha Beach, Saint Laurent sur Mer, on June 6, together with 25 heads of state and veterans from around the world.

The Princess of Wales is not expected to travel to France.

Charles and Camilla welcomed four D-Day veterans to Buckingham Palace yesterday, where they heard moving personal stories and saw their poignant memories.

Football boots worn on the straps of a military backpack, dog tags that still had blood on them, and photos of a much-loved woman were among the memories shared with Charles and Camilla.

Charles in turn read from his grandfather’s handwritten diary, recounting George VI’s D-Day entry detailing the latest news of the ‘successful landings’ in June 1944.

The special meeting was filmed and will be broadcast as part of BBC One’s D-Day 80: Tribute to The Fallen on June 5.

The King and Queen listened attentively as Arthur Oborne, 100, of the 49th Division of the 6th Battalion Duke of Wellington’s Regiment, told how he was shot in the lung three days after arriving at Gold Beach.

His life was saved by his friend Walter, who was killed the next day along with the rest of his entire unit.

Mr Oborne, from Portishead, near Bristol, said: ‘These are the dog tags that were recovered after I was shot in the lung, and some of them still have blood on them… He saved me, and if family we will never forget. We found out he had been murdered the day after… We visited his grave a number of times.”

Camilla said, “It must be very hard to remember all this.”

The King appeared moved and nodded his head in agreement as John Dennett, 99, from Wallasey, told him: “If you look back at the boys we lost, it was colossal. It’s scary. But then you are grateful for what you have experienced.’

Mr Dennett, who was a naval gunner on a landing craft at Sword Beach, took with him a photo of his wife Joyce, to whom he wrote love letters throughout the war after meeting her in England before leaving for D-Day.

They married two years after the end of the war.

He added: ‘I consider myself someone who has been very lucky and I appreciate that I can now do what I can and enjoy the life we ​​have all fought for.’

Camilla asked 100-year-old RAF codebreaker Bernard Morgan, the youngest RAF sergeant to land on Gold Beach: “What are your memories of D-Day itself?”

Mr Morgan, from Crewe, Cheshire, replied: ‘When we came out of the landing ship tank onto the beach the army was there picking up the poor soldiers who had been drowned on the first landing.’

He showed Charles and Camilla the sturdy brown football boots he had brought with him and strapped to his backpack in an attempt to play whenever he could to forget his surroundings – and revealed he had even played a match when they sailed to Normandy.

‘These are football boots that I wore throughout the war. “I played 12 games of football, including one on the landing craft going to Normandy,” he said.

The king said to him, ‘I don’t believe it… How wonderful. They are remarkably well preserved.’

Mr Morgan joked that they were ‘way past their sell-by date’ and revealed that the match between the Army and the RAF had ended in a draw heading into D-Day.

There was also Jim Miller, who just turned 100 and made headlines last week after being personally presented with a 100th birthday card by the king.

Mr Miller, who was born in Hackney, east London, but now lives in South Wales, served in the 11th Hussars Reconnaissance Regiment during the Second World War and landed at Juno Beach.

‘Commemoration is so important. The younger generation must learn from it and take it to heart,” he told the king and queen.

The king showed a photo of George VI with General Montgomery and spoke of the monarch’s wartime frustration at not being allowed to travel to Normandy immediately.

‘My grandfather was so determined to go. “He got very frustrated because they wouldn’t let him go until a few days later,” Charles said.

Reading from George VI’s diary of June 6, entitled D-Day, Charles said: ‘This was my grandfather’s diary. That was his entry for D-Day. ‘At 8am the news was spread that the invasion of the European continent had begun last night.

“The airborne troops had made successful landings during the night and captured their objectives.”

“So that was something.”