Today is the Solstice, and speaking of the
longest day, I found out today that an old mate of mine had died. Yes, Bill
Millen, the piper who led the troops ashore on D-Day was a friend of mine. He is
best remembered for playing the bagpipes whilst under fire during the D-Day
landing in Normandy. Pipers had traditionally been used in battle by Scottish
and Irish soldiers. However, the use of bagpipes was restricted to rear areas by
the time of the Second World War by the British Army. Lord Lovat, nevertheless,
ignored these orders and ordered Millin, then aged 21, to play. When Private
Millin demurred, citing the regulations, he recalled later, Lord Lovat replied:
“Ah, but that’s the English War Office. You and I are both Scottish, and that
doesn’t apply.” He played "Hielan' Laddie" and "The Road to the Isles" as his
comrades fell around him on Sword Beach. Millin states that he later talked to
captured German snipers who claimed they did not shoot at him because they
thought he was crazy. Millin, whom Lovat had appointed his personal piper during
commando training at Achnacarry, near Fort William in Scotland, was the only man
during the landing who wore a kilt – it was the same Cameron tartan kilt his
father had worn in Flanders during World War I – and he was armed only with his
pipes and the sgian-dubh, or "black knife", sheathed inside his kilt-hose on the
right side.
In the mid 1980s when I was a student nurse
and he was the Senior Nurse (nights) we bonded over cheap whisky in the Staff
Social Club at Langdon Hospital near Dawlish. I hadn't seen him for over 25
years, but it was still a pang when I found out that he had died back in 2010.
This week, however, I found that he has been commemorated by a life sized bronze
statue of him which was unveiled on 8 June 2013 at Colleville-Montgomery, near
Sword Beach, in France.
Rest in peace old
friend.
* The Gonzo Daily is a two way process. If you have any news or
want to write for us, please contact me at jon@eclipse.co.uk.
If you are an artist and want to showcase your work, or even just say hello
please write to me at gonzo@cfz.org.uk.
Please copy, paste and spread the word about this magazine as widely as
possible. We need people to read us in order to grow, and as soon as it is
viable we shall be invading more traditional magaziney areas. Join in the fun,
spread the word, and maybe if we all chant loud enough we CAN stop it raining.
See you tomorrow...* The Gonzo Daily is - as the name
implies - a daily online magazine (mostly) about artists connected to the Gonzo
Multimedia group of companies. But it also has other stuff as and when the
editor feels like it. The same team also do a weekly newsletter called -
imaginatively - The Gonzo Weekly. Find out about it at this link: http://gonzo-multimedia.blogspot.com/2012/11/all-gonzo-news-wots-fit-to-print.html
* We should probably mention here, that some of our posts are links
to things we have found on the internet that we think are of interest. We are
not responsible for spelling or factual errors in other people's websites.
Honest guv!
* Jon Downes, the Editor of all these ventures (and several
others) is an old hippy of 53 who - together with his orange cat (who is
currently on sick leave in Staffordshire) and two very small kittens (one of
whom is also orange) puts it all together from a converted potato shed in a
tumbledown cottage deep in rural Devon which he shares with various fish, and
sometimes a small Indian frog. He is ably assisted by his lovely wife Corinna,
his bulldog/boxer Prudence, his elderly mother-in-law, and a motley collection
of social malcontents. Plus.. did we mention the orange
cat?
Economists at Large, 2013. The $200 million question: How much does trophy hunting really contribute to African communities?, a report for the African Lion Coalition, prepared by Economists at Large, Melbourne, Australia. Advocates for the African trophy hunting industry invariably claim that hunting revenues provide benefits to rural communities. Analysis of literature on the economics of trophy hunting reveals, however, that communities in the areas where hunting occurs derive very little benefit from this revenue. 
