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2008 MEMORIAL SERVICE, ST. NAZAIRE
This year the Secretary, Mark Hirst, attended the memorial services in France on behalf of the LAS. As always the local French officials at La Baule-Escoublac, Pornic and St. Nazaire went to some effort to hold services at their war cemeteries which hold victims of the Lancastria disaster.
Association wreaths were laid at all three cemeteries. The largest memorial service takes place at the Lancastria memorial at the sea front in St. Nazaire. A guard of honour and local dignitaries along with French veterans organisations were present. Representatives of the HMT Lancastria Association were also present and this year Stan Forrester was the sole survivor representative. Captain Philip Stonor, UK Naval Attaché based in Paris was also present. 
This year the locally well known folk group Tri Yann sang a tribute to the victims of the Lancastria which appears on their latest album, Abysses. Some local people from the town turned out waving Saltires, presumably in recognition of the Scottish Government’s move to award the commemorative Lancastria medal.
After the ceremony the guests were invited to the Mayor’s office for a special reception. Survivor Stan Forrester was then presented with the Lancastria Commemorative Medal along Sadie Hutchieson on behalf of her late husband, survivor Tom Hutchieson.
In the afternoon relatives made their way by a variety of craft out towards the Lancastria wreck site, 9 miles from St. Nazaire. The weather conditions were bright, sunny with a slight swell; exactly as they were 68 years before. At 3:48 David Glossip played Last Post, followed by two minutes silence before the memorial wreaths were dropped into the sea. Then the four boats present, the NZ army training craft, the two pilot boats from the Loire Pilotage Service and Jean-Pierre Lagarde’s boat (who kindly takes our members out to the wreck site when they visit France) sounded their horns. 
< Secretary, Mark Hirst holds the Association memorial wreath over the exact site of the Lancastria wreck.
Due to the tide that were running at the time silt surrounding the wreck was churned upwards and changed the colour of the surface water to a light beige so that it was possible to discern the outline of the Lancastria a few meters below the surface.
On the pilot boat Captained by LAS stalwart Yves Beaujuge was William (Bill) and Steven Taws. Bill’s older brother Stanley was killed aboard the Lancastria and it was his first chance to travel to the site for what was understandably an emotional pilgrimage.
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