A Victoria Cross and other medals awarded to one of Canada’s Second World War heroes have been sold at auction in the U.K. for $660,000.

Major David Currie was given the Commonwealth’s highest medal for valour during the 1944 Normandy campaign in France.  His widow sold the medals to a Canadian buyer in 1989 a few years after Currie died.

The man who purchased them, who doesn’t wish to be identified, decided to sell the medals at the auction in England.