A war veteran has been recalling his role in the D-day landing on its 70th anniversary.

Thousands of men lost their lives on the beaches at Normandy as the Allies launched the biggest sea-borne invasion in history.

Harry Paintin, 90, who was born and bred in Accrington, was one of the men responsible for ferrying soldiers to the beaches on June 6, 1944.

Harry said he has very vivid memories of the landings at Normandy.

He also drove the amphibious vehicles, bringing goods ashore.

Harry said: “Obviously it was very frightening.

“There was a very steep drop from the landing craft into the water. It was very hairy to begin with, I lost some good friends.

“I can remember being out on the water trying to get to five miles an hour and hearing the German machine gun fire raining down around us.”

Harry was called up in 1942 when he was 18.

His brother Jack had joined up with the RAF a year earlier and served in Africa as an air crew wireless operator. Harry said: “I had to go for a medical in Blackburn and I was given a train ticket and told that I had to report to Sheffield for six weeks of training. “The amenities were very basic. We had no hot water, we had to wash and shave from a bucket of cold water.”

Following his training, Harry, who now lives in Longridge, was sent to Newcastle on a compassionate posting, because he was considered too young for active service.

He said: “We were each given a wagon and we called at different posts picking up members of the home guard and taking them to different sites.

“I remember one very hairy night when the Germans were flying overhead, shining searchlights and firing into the huts where we were sleeping.

“I was then sent from Newcastle to Liverpool docks to pick up the Ducks, which were the amphibious vehicles sent over from America, and we went to Scotland to train on them.

“There were three Duck companies, and mine was considered to be the best. The first company were sent in on D-day with 85 per cent losses, the second were expected to have 50 per cent losses.

“My company was expected to have 25 per cent when we went in on June 10, but we only lost one. We would unload the ships at Mulberry harbour, and when they built the pier we had American mac wagons and we drove supplies up to the front lines.” Harry served in France, Belgium, Holland, Germany and Italy until he returned home in 1947.

During the First World war, Harry’s father Harold was a mounted policeman in the town until he was called up by the Grenadier Guards. He was later captured at the Menin crossroads, taken prisoner and made to work in a chemical plant before eventually escaping with two Frenchmen. During his escape he smuggled a vial from the chemical plant out in a syrup tin, containing mustard gas, which had been developed by the Germans, exposing it to the rest of the world.

He received the Military Medal as a result.

Because of the Cold War, Harry was posted to Italy after VE day, serving there until demobilisation in 1947.

After working for a firm of dry salters for 21 years, he started his own household textile business at Queens Mill in Oswaldtwistle and named the business H Mops. He then bought Scaitcliffe Mill in Accrington before retiring in 1978.

Harry remarried in 1980 and has two sons, Mark and Matthew, and two granddaughters.