Nova Scotia/Nunavut Command of The Royal Canadian Legion www.ns.legion.ca 21 continued ... MURDERS IN NORMANDY The word “execution” implies that some sort of legal decision had been made, by some sort of designated authority, directing the death of an individual; while the word “murder” clearly means the deliberate illegal taking of life. History records that 156 Canadian POWs were murdered during the Normandy campaign. “Died whilst POW (murdered by the enemy),” was the stated cause of death, recorded by the Canadian Army, on the personal files of the murdered. John explained to us the crimes committed by soldiers of the 12th SS Panzer Division Hitlerjugend. The Abbaye d’Ardenne was where SS-Colonel Kurt Meyer ordered the murder of Canadian prisoners of war – of whom 12 were members of the North Nova Scotia Highlanders (NNSH). Rather than adhering to the Geneva Convention on the treatment of POWs, some other German commanders opted to order the killing of the prisoners - whom they unsympathetically viewed as an ‘inconvenience’ that could be easily eliminated. Other than the Abbaye d’Ardenne, the sites of mass murder remain unmarked and mostly forgotten. At the Chateau d’Audrieu we quietly walked down a forest path to a spot where Canadian POWs were once marched to their deaths. On the edge of another wheat field John pointed out where, on 8 June 1944, 35 Canadian POWs were massacred. In the town of Authie we stopped at a lovely little park named ‘Place des 37 Canadiens.’ It is the location where a group of soldiers of the NNSH, all disarmed POWs, were killed by members of the Hitlerjugend; during an evening frenzy of torture, murder, atrocity and desecration. WHEAT FIELDS, A CANAL & A STUNTED TREE On the outskirts of Authie we stood at the corner of an orchard on a patch of ground that a farmer might use to park his tractor. Before us was a wheat field; about 900 meters across that field was a stand of trees where the heavily armed German forces were well entrenched on 7 June 1944. John explained how C Company, and a platoon fromACompany, of the NNSH, of the 9th Infantry Brigade, desperately defended that position for 2 hours using 3 heavy machine guns they had stripped from disabled Sherman tanks and one 17-pounder self-propelled anti-tank gun. The 9th Brigade’s butcher’s bill for 7 June was 110 killed, 192 wounded, and 120 taken prisoner, as well as 21 tanks destroyed. At Carpiquet we viewed the wheat field that the North Shore Regiment (NSR) attacked across on 4 July 1944. That battle would become known as the ‘graveyard of the regiment.’Amongst the NSR soldiers killed at Carpiquet were nine soldiers from Nova Scotia (see story - Nova Scotia soldiers of the NSR). We stood silently in the wheat field at Verrières Ridge where, on 25 July 1944, soldiers of the Black Watch (Royal Highland Regiment) of Canada conducted a futile attack against an entrenched enemy. Of the 325 Black Watch soldiers who stepped off into that wheat field, 123 were killed, including Private Daniel Hinkley of North-West Arm, Cape Breton; while another 184 were wounded or taken prisoner. Chateau d’Audrieu forest path continued ... Verrieres Ridge
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MTM0NTk1OA==