...who played highland tunes as his fellow commandos landed at Normandy beach on D-Day, died Wednesday at age 88.Mr. Millin was a 21-year-old private in Britain’s First Special Service Brigade when his unit landed on the strip of coast the Allies code-named Sword Beach, near the French city of Caen at the eastern end of the invasion front chosen by the Allies for the landings on June 6, 1944.
By one estimate, about 4,400 Allied troops died in the first 24 hours of the landings, about two-thirds of them Americans.
The young piper was approached shortly before the landings by the brigade’s commanding officer, Brig. Simon Fraser, who as the 15th Lord Lovat was the hereditary chief of the Clan Fraser and one of Scotland’s most celebrated aristocrats. Against orders from World War I that forbade playing bagpipes on the battlefield because of the high risk of attracting enemy fire, Lord Lovat, then 32, asked Private Millin to play on the beachhead to raise morale.
When Private Millin demurred, citing the regulations, he recalled later, Lord Lovat replied: “Ah, but that’s the English War Office. You and I are both Scottish, and that doesn’t apply.”
Is that really how that conversation took place? Or was it something a little more like this:
"By the by, Millin, we all thought it would be just smashing if you would play the bagpipes when you got ashore."
"Huh? You mean, play the bagpipes instead of shooting at the enemy?"
"Quite right, old man."
"But I didn't bring my bagpipes."
"Oh, no worries. I just happen to have a set right here."
"But how will I carry my rifle and bagpipes?"
"Leave the rifle behind. You won't be needing it."
"Wha-"
After wading ashore in waist-high water that he said caused his kilt to float, Private Millin reached the beach, then marched up and down, unarmed, playing the tunes Lord Lovat had requested, including “Highland Laddie” and “Road to the Isles.”
Caused his kilt to float? This guy didn't wear pants to the Normandy Invasion?
With German troops raking the beach with artillery and machine-gun fire, the young piper played on as his fellow soldiers advanced through smoke and flame on the German positions, or fell on the beach. The scene provided an emotional high point in “The Longest Day.”
In later years Mr. Millin told the BBC he did not regard what he had done as heroic. When Lord Lovat insisted that he play, he said, “I just said ‘O.K.,’ and got on with it.” He added: “I didn’t notice I was being shot at. When you’re young, you do things you wouldn’t dream of doing when you’re older.”
He said he found out later, after meeting Germans who had manned guns above the beach, that they didn’t shoot him “because they thought I was crazy.”
Other British commandos cheered and waved, Mr. Millin recalled, though he said he felt bad as he marched among ranks of wounded soldiers needing medical help.
"Nasty cut you have there. Wish I could help but I've got to keep on playing. Good for morale, you know."
After seeing the opening scene of "Saving Private Ryan," it's hard to believe someone could survive the Normandy Invasion by marching up and down the beach playing bagpipes.
From the beach, Private Millin moved inland with the commandos to relieve British paratroopers who had seized a bridge near the village of Ouistreham that was vital to German attempts to move reinforcements toward the beaches. As the commandos crossed the bridge under German fire, Lord Lovat again asked Private Millin to play his pipes.
"Give us back the rifle, old boy. We're going to need you to play 'Danny Boy' again."
"But we're getting shot at!"
"Come on, now. Don't be a stick in the mud."
Again, somehow Private Millin managed to live through the rest of the war and return to Scotland to live out his life. I'll bet he was relieved never to see that whack-job Lord Lovat again.
After the war, he worked on Lord Lovat’s estate near Inverness...
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