Guardsman Reginald Mills, No.3 Commando 4 troop, was reported wounded and missing, presumed killed in action, on or shortly after 7 June 1944 during operations at Normandy.

He has no known grave. Son of Herbert Frederick and Ida Emma Mills, of Woolwich, London.

Reg, a former shop lad, was attested into the Coldstream Guards aged 18 on 19 August 1942.

"On this occasion 4 & 5 Troops of No. 3 Commando had attacked the Merville Battery. Captured it, suffering some casualties.  

4 Troop was then sent back - about 200 yards from the battery, we shortly came under fire from an assortment of weapons, one was believed to be 88 inch - a deadly gun - so a fighting patrol was hastily formed, comprising of Lt. Williams, Sgt. Port, L/Cpl. Underwood, Trp. Mills and myself, Herbert Beddows. In fact it was a case of you, you, you & you.

So off we go and, in a very short time, we came under fire, not too serious, but by this time we'd lost Lt Williams and Sgt Port on our left.

So we are now three - L/Cpl Underwood leading, then me with Mills a few yards behind. As L/Cpl Underwood approaches a hedgerow, just by a lane at the side of the wall of the Chateau d' Merville, he was shot and killed by sniper fire. Most sudden. I can assure you he died instantly. No suffering, it's still so clear in my memory!  

Within seconds Mills and I dived into a bomb crater (the site had been heavily bombed).  I then said to Mills, “We cant stay here.”  So I said I would make a run for the hedgerow – which I managed under heavy machine gun fire, but I'm sorry and sad to to say that young Mills got killed by machine gun fire and never made it, he was only 19..."