SUITED up in military finery, war veteran Sam Langford has earned a free ride to collect his D-Day medal.

The decorated former soldier, 93, will receive the Legion d’honneur on Tuesday for his fight against the Germans.

Wantage-born Mr Langford, who grew up in Didcot where he still lives, summed up his service in five words: “War is a terrible thing.”

The father-of-two, who joined the army aged 17, enlisted the help of the Oxford Mail after struggling to find transport to the medal ceremony.

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Cue taxi driver Colin Dobson, local Twitter legend of @theabingdontaxi fame.

He said: “War isn’t something that’s in my generation’s consciousness, which is why I’m doing it.

“I didn’t hesitate when I was asked. I’m not in the business of giving away free rides but I’ve done it a few times for Second World War veterans.

“He didn’t have transport of his own so it’s something I can do at a minimal cost to myself.”

Mr Dobson will pick up Mr Langford at his Hayden Road house, which he shares with his wife Edna, pack up his wheelchair and whizz him off to Oxford Town Hall where a French official will present his medal.

Mr Langford was in the 5th Royal Berkshire Regiment, bound for the June 6 D-Day landings in 1944.

He said: “We boarded a ship from Sandbanks headed for Normandy. We anchored off the beach because the sea was rough.”

Mr Langford had not been prepared for the carnage he witnessed on Juno Beach, part of the German-held coastline that was attacked by 156,000 allied troops.

He said: “We stopped and had to get out to wade ashore – that’s when all the action was going on. To my left ships were firing their guns and rocket launchers.

“When a shell comes down it makes a crater. One of the soldiers suddenly disappeared – he couldn’t see the hole.

“We marched inland. Until that day I had never seen a dead human being, but on my right-hand side there was a British soldier lying there with a tin helmet on his face.

“A French woman had been carrying on with a German soldier who died – she was so upset she was shooting. He had a bullet through his head. I remember seeing that. We had to dig trenches. That night was the biggest firework display you’ve ever seen. Better than the ones on New Year’s Eve.”

But Mr Langford wasn’t really talking about fireworks. He added: “The Germans were bombing. The sky was absolutely full of explosions.”

Far from cowering in the trenches, he and his friend “decided to go exploring” once the gunfire had quietened.

He said: “I had a narrow escape with my life. We went to a little wood and went down a path and suddenly came upon German soldiers.

“Unfortunately when you’re in a position like that you’ve not got time to think – let’s just say they were disposed of.”

He swapped his black beret for a red one after volunteering for the airborne services, tempted by the shilling-a-day ‘danger money’.

Choking back tears, he remembers the Rhine Crossing tragedy that still haunts him 60 years on.

He said: “We took off in these wooden gliders, headed for Germany. We had two trailer loads of ammunition. Sitting at the back together was Corporal Tapping and me.”

The plane was shot down, killing the corporal and leaving Mr Langford ‘walking wounded’, lacerated with shrapnel.

He was released back to ‘Civvy Street’, where he served as an officer in Thames Valley Police until retirement.

The grandfather-of-four said: “I’ve been back to France on holiday and seen the cemeteries. It’s so depressing to think those thousands of people were living at one time.

“You go through it, but it’s a horrible thing. Killing people. You can put what you like on TV, but you have got to experience it to know what it’s like.”