It may be 60 years since the end of the Second World War but the memory of that day is still as fresh in my mind as if it was yesterday.

Towards the end of April 1945, there had been eight days of continuous fighting on the advance towards Bremen. The city had taken a final battering from 800 heavy bombers which enabled us to take it with minimal casualties.

On May 5, it was confirmed the war in Europe had ended and as a celebration, we were given a double rum ration. Our thoughts were all about when we would return home.

Among our group was a lad named William McCarea from Glasgow. Willie was the eldest in our platoon, aged 32, and married with five children. He was the most unassuming man one could wish to meet. We cheered him up by saying he would be one of the first to return home.

The sergeant arrived with orders to prepare to be moved four miles outside Bremen and return on foot, searching for German troops who were unaware of the ceasefire.

Everything went smoothly until we got to a wood on a steep hill. At the bottom was a ditch and a road. The first three of us started to cross the road when a short burst of machine-gun fire opened up.

We dived back into the ditch but one lad was left lying face down in the road. Just before reaching the ditch, I had glanced down the road and realised the firing had come from our own troops.

A pal and I returned to the road and retrieve the injured lad. We collected a few handkerchiefs, tied them to our rifles and returned to the road.

We turned the lad over but he was dead. It was Willie.

We advanced down the road to remonstrate with whoever had fired, only to learn it had come from our own division. Our sergeant had read his map wrong and no other British troops were expected in the area. Willie was just another casualty "killed in action".

Our "victory parade", two days later, was through Bremen's bomb-ravaged streets. The only building left standing was used by our senior officer to take the salute. There were about 50 spectators on the route.

-Frank Edwards, Brighton