A Second World War veteran who survived the battle of Normandy shared his story with local high school students for the very first time.

Stan Egerton, whose two brothers died in the war, fought as a gunner with the Toronto Scottish Regiment. His father had served in the Great War.

Students from Don Bosco Catholic Secondary School listened to Egerton, 87, as he shared some of his memories of the war during a special ceremony to commemorate Remembrance Day on Wednesday.

Some of the memories are still fresh for the veteran.

“There’s certain things that happened to me that make me very emotional,” he said, choking up in front of the crowded auditorium. “The first time I saw a dead body on the side of the road I thought, ‘Oh this is for real.’”

Egerton told the audience that while he has no regrets, the pain of losing his brothers eventually changed his outlook on war.

“It didn’t bother me, but then after the war I come home and I seen my mother and how she took it about my two brothers. I said to myself, ‘I hope I wasn’t responsible for some mother in Germany (who) has lost a son,’” he said.

“I often wonder how it might have been like if they had come home,” he later added. “It gets lonely sometimes.”

After his talk, Egerton posed for photos with the students, who told CTV Toronto they valued Egerton’s talk.

“We know what it’s like and we appreciate what they do for us,” said one female student of Canada’s veterans.

With a report from CTV Toronto’s Naomi Parness