NOT long after the D-Day landings in 1944, Hugh Maguire performed a remarkable act of courage.
As the Royal Ulster Rifles advanced on the city of Caen in Normandy, they came under heavy attack from German artillery.
"A good mate of mine took a direct hit and was blown to pieces. I was blown 12 feet in the air and had shrapnel in my back, neck and shoulders," Hugh recalled.
His commanding officer tried to send the young Fermanagh man to first aid but he instead asked permission to take down the machine gun that had peppered the men all that morning.
"He looked at me and said that I wasn't to blame him if I got shot. I said that was okay as I wouldn't be there to worry about it."
With bullets flying around him, Hugh began a long, painful crawl through hay and across a stream until he finally reached the back of the machine-gun nest.
On one knee, with his little Sten gun aimed, he shouted at the enemy soldiers to surrender.
"I shot two of them as they turned their guns towards me - everything happened very quickly," he said.
"The other two surrendered, one of them an SS officer, whom I marched back to headquarters."
Hugh could not have known that his prisoner was Anton Gecas, head of a notorious police unit accused of the murder of tens of thousands of Jews, partisans and Communist Party members in Lithuania and Belarus in 1941.
And it would not be the last time their paths would cross.
Hugh was sent home for surgery and recuperated in hospital in England and Bangor, Co Down, where he was visited by an aunt from near Enniskillen.
Although born in Scotland to Irish parents, his resilience and adaptability had been forged while growing up from the age of four on his grandparents' farm at Drumboughlin in Fermanagh following his mother's death aged 32.
Life there involved three-mile walks to school in Maguiresbridge, driving milk churns to the creamery in a horse-drawn cart, competing in horse races, playing the concertina in a local band, and playing soccer and hurling until injury intervened.
He joined the Irish army initially - and met his wife Bridget Boyle on a blind date while stationed in Letterkenny - but left when he was refused leave to visit his sick father in Scotland.
Instead, he signed up for war in a British uniform and after recovering from his shrapnel wounds re-joined his regiment's advance through Belgium and Germany.
After the war, he and Bridget made their home in Midlothian in Scotland, where he worked for the National Coal Board.
Remarkably, so did Gecas and the two men came face to face again when Hugh was asked to report to his new supervisor at Bilston Glen colliery in 1960.
"We meet again," he said. Gecas replied: "Me never saw you before", until he was reminded of their battlefield encounter and said "Ja, Ja."
Hugh reported him to the local police, but nothing was done.
It was not until 20 years later that Gecas was outed as an alleged war criminal. He denied involvement and died in 2001 in Scotland while wanted by foreign authorities including Lithuania.
His captor still had the regimental medal he ripped from his SS uniform in July 1944.
Following his retirement as a coal mine manager, Hugh drove long-distance lorries and was involved with several sports bodies and charities including the Scottish War Blinded.
He was a trainer for the Loanhead Mayflower soccer team, enjoyed competition bowls and was a Grand Knight of the Knights of St Columba, organising help for the vulnerable.
Having already been awarded the UK Gallantry Medal, Hugh became the proud recipient in 2015 of the Legion d'Honneur, France's highest honour for bravery.
He died aged 98 on August 29, the last surviving member of his regiment that landed on Sword Beach in 1944.
His daughter Maria said he had a "zest for life".
"His repartee made him a welcome invitee to any social gathering and he will be sorely missed by his beloved family and numerous friends who delighted in his witty, wicked sense of humour."
Predeceased by his wife, Hugh Maguire is survived by six of their seven children.
