Richard Loring to be in Guernsey’s 80th Anniversary Liberation Parade
with ‘Timothy the Tortoise’!
Friday, 9 May 2025
Theatre impresario Richard Loring will be returning to his home-island of Guernsey to take part in the Guernsey 80thAnniversary Liberation Parade on Friday, 9 May , in celebration of the Liberation of the Channel Islands from Nazi Occupation. There will be cheers and flags will again be flying as the islanders celebrate their Liberation Day.
Now 88, Richard will travel in the Parade with another Octogenarian – his fit and feisty friend, Maggie Talbot Cul, in an old red Fiat. In a cage on the roof of the Fiat will be Maggie’s pet, Guernsey celebrity, ‘Timothy the Tortoise’. Born in 1940, Timothy (who, it was recently discovered, is actually female!) is also a Wartime occupation survivor!
In 1940, 4-Year-Old Richard, his siblings and mother were amongst the thousands of women and children who evacuated Guernsey. Leaving the men behind, bound for England, they sailed away in a Red Cross ship, as Nazi’s bombed the harbour and occupied the island. The Channel Islands were the only British Crown land to have been occupied with the intension of using the islands as a stepping-stone for the invasion of Britain.
In Bradford, Richard was separated from his family and billeted out for a traumatic year before he and his siblings were able to live together with their mother. Back in Guernsey, his father was forced into slave labour, driving for the Nazis, particularly hurtful because of his memories of fighting in WW1.
In 1945, after the war, as the evacuees returned to their island home aboard SS Antonio, Richard clearly remembers the moment when his mother pointed to someone on the dock and said, “That’s your father.” Richard still has the postcard his father gave him of a Guernsey donkey (the island symbol) kicking a Nazi soldier off the island. The celebrations of the Liberation began, and Richard has fond memories of the camaraderie of the Liberation Street Parties.
There was an extraordinary co-incidence in 1989 when during the 50th anniversary of the outbreak of WW2, Richard produced his hit show, “We’ll Meet Again”, at his Sound Stage Supper Theatre in Midrand in remembrance of the contribution of entertainers to the wartime effort.
Visiting Guernsey a few months later, he discovered that his childhood singing partner, his brother John, had produced an exceptional musical about the wartime evacuation of the island, entitled “A La Perchoine” meaning “We’ll Meet Again”!
Reuniting with his friends and family this week, Richard will have much fun reminiscing about his early days of performance in a Minstrel show and “The Guernsey Quartet” which Richard recently received a digital BBC recording of. There will be merriment and laughter, and a few tears, before he and his wife, Jeanette, depart from the island with the words,” We’ll Meet Again.”
Richard states, with deep emotion; “It is a great privilege and I feel a strong sense of nostalgia and pride to be in the Liberation Parade in Guernsey on Friday, especially as I will be wearing my father’s medals from WW1 and sharing the moment with my childhood friend Maggie Talbot-Cul.”
Richard concludes; “These words of the Island Anthem will be sung with love….
Sarnia Cherie, gem of the sea,
Home of my childhood, my heart longs for thee.
They voice calls me ever, forget thee I’ll never.
Island of Beauty.
Sarnia Cherie– George Deighton 1911 –
