Penfield WWII Vet Receives France's 'Legion of Honor' Medal

PENFIELD, N.Y.-- Nearly 70 years after his service in World War II, U.S. Air Force Veteran Lt. Colonel Colin Storey is being decorated by a country across the pond. "This is unbelievable, there are thousands of other guys that deserve this too," Storey said. "Not just me." At the age of 23, Storey fought from above to regain France's freedom. He was a command pilot of a B-17 Flying Fortress named 'Round Trip Ticket' in the Air Force's 8th Division. This picture shows his squadron, part of the 94th bomber group. "We flew out of England for our missions," Storey explained. "We would get up about 3 a.m. [and] take briefing about the target we were going to bomb that day." One out of every six B-17's never made it back. In March of 1945, Storey was almost one of them. He was shot down during his 27th mission, crash landing near Brussels, Belgium. "Fortunately, the plane didn't catch on fire," Storey said. On Sunday, his heroic actions on that day resulted in him receiving France's highest military award. "Dear Mr. Storey, I am very pleased to inform you that you have been awarded the insignia of Chevalier of the Legion on Honor by the President of the French Republic, Mr. Francois Hollande," a man read. "We knew dad had been in the military and served in WWII but, we didn't realize the magnitude of his sacrifice," said David Storey, Colin's son. David said seeing his father receive such a distinguished award proves the devotion he and his generation had to save the world. "I'm sure there was a lot of fear, but his response was, 'We needed to do what we needed to do because there was a mad man in Europe who needed to be contained," David said. Storey, who's now in his 90's, said he volunteered to fly then and would do it again now if he could. "It's a huge honor to receive this," Storey said. Storey is one of 93,000 people to have received France's ‘Legion of Honor.’