He was, by all accounts, a lovely old bloke. Arthur Green was a pigeon fancier and would often be seen waiting anxiously for his little flyers to arrive back in Greets Green, West Bromwich, from races which began in France.
Or as the Rev Andrew Farrington put it lyrically at yesterday's funeral: "Waiting for souls to fly back from the land of D-Day, to be restored with him."
At 84, Mr Green was a father, grandfather and great-grandfather with the big, rugged features of a prize-fighter who once boxed for the Army. But hardly anyone knew about his war years because, like so many old soldiers, he kept quiet.
"He never talked about it, never went back, never even applied for his medals," says his granddaughter Mandy. "I had to apply for him."
Over the years, piece by piece, she extracted the story from him.
Arthur Green, who died in Sandwell Hospital ten days ago after a heart attack, was a Commando in one of the fittest, hardest units ever sent into battle.
He volunteered for the South Staffordshire Regiment in 1939 and later leapt at the chance to join the newly-formed Commandos.
By June 6, 1944, he was part of Lord Lovat's 1st Commando Brigade, swarming ashore on the Normandy coast to begin the D-Day liberation of Nazi-occupied Europe.
It was a desperate mission. While infantry divisions waited prudently for tanks and guns before moving inland, the Commandos - armed with little more than machine guns and boundless self-belief - raced for their objective. Their task was to link up with Major John Howard's glider-borne infantry unit which had seized Pegasus Bridge a few hours earlier, and hold the bridge against all German attacks.
Led by bagpipes and scorning steel helmets for their green berets, the 2,500 Commandos fought like lions and did the job, but paid a terrible price.
Arthur Green, just 23 and married to Mary the year before, saw his best mate killed beside him.
"It was kill or be killed," he explained many years later. Against the odds, he survived and was still serving when the war ended.
In 1946 he came home to the Black Country and took up his old trade as a roofer with the local council, retiring in 1981.
It was, as Mr Farrington, a Methodist minister, put it "a life well-lived and well served."
The hymns at West Bromwich Crematorium were the solid, traditional hymns that mark the passing of so many old warriors, the 23rd Psalm and Abide With Me.
Bugler Alf Cooper played the Last Post and Reveille. Bill Smith, on behalf of the South Staffordshires, lowered the regimental standard as the curtain slowly closed.
To the echo of martial music and a whisper of sobbing, Arthur Green's body was committed to dust and his soul to the eternal company of his comrades.
And if we who were there shed a tear, it was not only for him but for all those of his remarkable generation, a band of brothers diminishing by the day.
They are the ones who took up arms against the terrorism of tyrants and gave us a land so peaceful and so fervently committed to liberty that we don't even have ID cards.
And having wiped the floor with Hitler's jackbooted thugs, these extraordinary men came home, said little about the war, followed football with a passion and spoke softly to racing pigeons.
Outside the crem, Andrew Farrington reflects on the curious, infuriating vow of silence among men who hate to be called heroes. His own grandfather fought in Burma.
"They tell you everything and yet they tell you nothing," he smiles. "I know all about the food he had and the tents they were given. But nothing about what they actually did."
Maybe the lads of 39-45 thought they had done nothing special. Maybe they wanted to shield their loved ones from the disgusting reality of warfare. Or maybe keeping mum was a form of self-protection. Don't stir the nightmares, they might go away.
While others joined the British Legion and returned year after year to the battlefields, Arthur Green never joined anything and never went back.
But his granddaughter, fascinated with the story of this "lovely, gorgeous man," made her own pilgrimage.
In 2004, on the 60th anniversary of D-Day, Mandy was in Normandy and rang her grandad from the little cafe beside Pegasus Bridge which is proud to be known as the first building in France to be liberated.
"I'm at Pegasus Bridge," she told him.
"To be quite honest," replied the old man, "the last time I was there I didn't do much sightseeing."
