SPECIAL signs to commemorate the 80th anniversary of D-Day in Gretna were torn down only a day after being put up.
Gretna and Rigg Community Councillor Andrew Lynch put the plaques and Tommy silhouettes up at the weekend.
Fellow community councillors Kirsty Herbst-Gray and Nicola Moffat also helped with the project after the group had successfully raised funds for the commemorative items thanks to EDF/Beck Burn.
Ten plaques were attached to various lampposts, and two Tommy silhouettes were placed next to the memorial at All Saints Church ahead of the 80th anniversary of the Normandy Landings on June 6.
Andrew feels very passionate about this. He had family members in the war and used to know veterans in Gretna.
Only a day after putting the D-Day 80 up, the community councillor was distraught at having to pick up five of the signs which had been ripped off the lampposts.
He says it was very disheartening to see, adding: “We raised the funds and got ten plaques and two Tommy silhouettes to go on display for the D-Day anniversary.
“I went round putting all of them up, and by the Monday there was one left.
“They had just been ripped off and they were cabled tied on. It’s disheartening.
“It was for the people in Gretna and any visitors to be able to remember. It’s so disrespectful.
“It’s not about the money we’ve spent, it’s about the disrespect for the people who went through it on that day. What they did needs remembered. We would not be living the way we are today without them.
“There’s no respect at all nowadays.”
A post on the Gretna and Rigg Community Council Facebook page said: “Whether this is simply an act of vandalism, whether whoever did it was bored or whether they simply don’t agree with the message, there is no excuse for destroying items which had been purchased through funding – it is not as easy as it sounds – and which had been put up to allow reflection.”
