PEMBROKE Ladies Probus Club welcomed Gareth Mills to its November meeting as guest speaker.

After his retirement from a long career in education he sought a new interest and became a volunteer at the Sunderland Trust.

He was asked by John Evans to do something different to commemorate the D Day landings. Knowing that Pembrokeshire had been swamped by American GIs in 1943 he decided to explore the possibility of finding residents with experiences and memories of this happening.

Gareth was amazed by the response he had from people throughout Pembrokeshire who could recall events, meetings with GIs and were able to supply stories and anecdotes.

From this exercise he decided to collate the information and to write a book which he called The Friendly Invasion.

His book recalls the life of the American 110th Infantry Regiment and the American Navy who were stationed in Pembrokeshire in the run up to D Day.

It tells of initial reactions to the GIs, of the GIs feelings about their new ‘posting’, of lasting friendships and finally the decimation of the unit on the Belgian/German border.

The Probus ladies were enthralled by his tale of a GI bride Emmeline Picton, his description of Eisenhower’s visit to Pembroke Dock and the fascinating account of a GI baby who Gareth assisted in tracing her birth father.

His talk was informative, entertaining and thought provoking.

When Rosalie Lilwall gave the vote of thanks she revealed that she had helped a local woman trace relatives in the USA too.

The next meeting is on December 21.