Honours and Awards
When he met the German commander of the battery in 1993 he admitted that he did not have the guts to refuse the proferred hand, but said afterwards that he could not forget his men, shot by the Germans as they hung helpless in trees. He shooed away picknickers from the battery, which is now a memorial and museum, declaring: "I don't like people eating and drinking where my men died."
The citizens of Merville-Franceville-Plage in Normandy, France, decided to honour Otway by the placing of a bust depicting him at the age of 29 at the time of D-Day and the assault on the battery. This was unveiled in the grounds of the Merville Battery Museum on 7 June 1997 by himself, Raymond Triboulet, a leader of the French Resistance during the war, and Olivier Paz, the Mayor. The bust was sculpted by Vivienne Mallock who had also created busts of Montgomery and Richard Gale. There was a large family gathering to witness the ceremony and twenty-one people sat down to dinner that night at the Moulin du Pre, a local restaurant, converted from a farmhouse, coincidentally the same farmhouse against which Otway landed on the night before D-Day.
In 2001, he was awarded the Legion d'Honneur, and more recently had a new road near the battery named after him (Rue Colonel Otway).
In 2007 his medals and beret were donated to the Merville Battery Museum by his wife, Jean. Visitors can now see the DSO and Légion d'honneur, along with a description of the battle by Terence taken from a BBC documentary.
Read more about this topic: Terence Otway
Famous quotes containing the word honours:
“Vain men delight in telling what Honours have been done them, what great Company they have kept, and the like; by which they plainly confess, that these Honours were more than their Due, and such as their Friends would not believe if they had not been told: Whereas a Man truly proud, thinks the greatest Honours below his Merit, and consequently scorns to boast. I therefore deliver it as a Maxim that whoever desires the Character of a proud Man, ought to conceal his Vanity.”
—Jonathan Swift (1667–1745)