Charles Shay, lifeguard Charles Shay lives in Omaha Beach as US Army Ement, dies at 101

Charles ShayThe decorated American inventor who was a 19-year-old veteran when he landed on Omaha Beach on D-Day and helped save lives, died Wednesday. He was 101.

Shay died at his home in Breteville-L’orgueteuse in France’s Normandy Region, his longtime friend and carer Marie-Passe-Passe-PasseLe.

Shay, of the Penobscot tribe and from the Indian island of the US State of Maine, was awarded a silver star for intervening from the sea and carrying seriously injured soldiers to relative safety, saving them from the depths. He also received France’s highest award, the Legion of Honor, in 2007.

Shay lived in France since 2018, not far from the beaches of Normandy where about 160,000 troops from Britain, in 1944. The Battle of Normandy cheapened the defeat of Germany, which came less than a year later.

Legrand told tomorrow’s machine in peace, “said Legrand to the amused press.

Shay told CBS News in 2019 That he moved to France to be close to our fallen brothers.

“I’m going to die here,” Shay told CBS News at the time. “I believe I can talk to the souls of the men still wandering the seas here. And I just tried to make sure they weren’t forgotten.”

The Charles Shay Memorial Group, which honors the memory of about 500 Americans who landed on the beaches of Normandy, said in a statement posted on Facebook that Charles Charles Shay … has returned home to the Creator and the spirit world. “

“He had a very loving father, grandfather, father-in-law, and uncle, and a hero to many, and an amazing human being,” the statement said. “Charles leaves a legacy of love, service, courage, spirit, work and a family that continues to shine.”

He is ready to give his life

On D-Day, 4,414 soldiers lost their lives – 2,501 of them American. More than 5,000 were injured. On the German side, several thousand were killed or wounded.

Shay told CBS News in 2019, “It’s the mortar and the artillery that’s getting us.” “When the ramp came down, the men who were standing in front, some of them were killed immediately.”

Some were so badly injured, they couldn’t pull themselves out of the surf.

“Many of the men who were injured were free and did not help themselves in the gang,” Shawu told CBS news.

Shaw survived.

“I think I was ready to give my life if I had to. Fortunately, I didn’t,” said Shawu. “

He recalled: “I was given a job, and the way I look at it, it was up to me to finish my job. “I don’t have time to worry about my situation being there and maybe losing my life. There was no time for this.”

That night, tired, he finally slept in a valley above the sea.

“When I woke up in the morning, it was as if I had slept in a cemetery because there were dead Americans and Germans around me,” he remembers. “I was staying there for not too long and I somehow got on.”

Say then pursued his mission in Normandy for several weeks, rescuing the wounded, before leading American forces into eastern France and Germany, where he was taken prisoner in March 1945 and released a few weeks later.

Spreading the message of peace

After World War II, Shay was transferred to the military because the situation of the Native Americans in his state of Maine was very important due to poverty and discrimination.

Maine would not allow people living on Native American reservations to vote until 1954.

Shay continued to witness history – returning to the military as a Medic during the Korean War, participating in US Nuclear testing in the Marshall Islands and later working at the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna, Austria.

For more than 60 years, he did not talk about his WWII experience.

But he started attending D-Day rallies in 2007 and in recent years, he has taken many occasions to give his powerful testimony and spread the message of peace.

During the Covil-19 pandemic in 2020-2021, Shawulo’s presence was marked as travel restrictions prevented other veterans or families of fallen soldiers in the US, Britain and other countries from making the trip to France.

The sadness of seeing the war return to Europe

For many years, Shay used to hold a sage burning ceremony, to honor those who died, on the bulwark overlooking Omaha Beach, where the monument bears his name.

On June 6, 2022, he commissioned a memorial service for another Native American, Julia Kelly, a Gulf War Veteronan from a driven nation. That was just over three months after Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in what was to be the continent’s worst war since 1945.

Say then expressed his sadness when he saw the war returning to the mainland.

“Ukraine is a sad situation. I sympathize with the people there and I don’t know why this war has to come,” he said. “In 1944, I came to these beaches and we thought we would bring peace to the world. But it is impossible.”