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210728 F/O Gordon Robert "Gordie" Lauder Royal Air Foirce 419 Squadron from:Montreal, Que. (d.25th May 1944) My father was Flying Officer Gordon Robert Lauder. I was five weeks old when he lost his life in battle and I grew up in a world as a young child where his name was only mentioned in a whisper. It seemed too painful a subject for my family to discuss. My father's only brother was the one to fill in the blanks for me when I was an inquisitive teenager. I was fortunate to know he was one of the finest men to walk this earth. I have read many times the letter my Mother received after my Father learned of my birth. He wanted me and he was delighted that I was a girl. I am one of so many to grow up and now be a senior not ever knowing my real Father. I often think how different it all would have been had my Father returned home. When I was twenty-one my Mother and Step-Father gave me a special gift. I travelled with a group of wonderful people to Holland and witnessed how they were so truly grateful for men like my Father. It was the celebration of twenty years of liberation. It took this experience for the young me to completely understand all that had happened during World War Two. I realized who I was when I knelt before his grave in Tilburg, Holland and cried the first ever tears for my Father and began the journey of grief. I don't have any stories to tell about my Dad and so wish that I did. But he is not completely gone because I have four daughters who grew up proudly telling the story of their Brave Grandfather on Remembrance Day at school. Now it is my Grandchildren taking the medals to school and telling the same story. So Gordon Robert Lauder lives on in our family and will be mentioned and never will his name be a whisper.
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