All the men on those beaches were heroes'

D-Day veteran Walter dies at 99

- Jan Disley

ONE of Britain's last surviving D-Day veterans has died aged 99, months before the 80th anniversary of the Normandy landings.

Walter Bigland was just 19 when he disembarked from a landing craft on Sword Beach with 45 Commando on June 6, 1944, wheeling a bike with a rubber dinghy on his back plus four grenades and 100 rounds of ammo.

The great-grandfather of Aintree, Liverpool later recalled: "I was carrying around 80lb in my rucksack. I managed to get the bike down the ramp, but I hardly rode it because the roads were just covered in debris.