Nova Scotia/Nunavut Command of The Royal Canadian Legion www.ns.legion.ca 109 fire, threw grenades and began to put the enemy on the run. Shortly into the wooded area, I came across a sight that has remained in my memory ever since. There was Jeff Nicklin, hanging in a tree about fifteen feet off the ground, arms out stretched, his middle riddled with machine gun bullets. After the initial skirmishes, we began to make our way through Germany in a north-easterly direction. In the beginning, fighting was fairly stiff and we did what was know as infantry-tank cooperation. Our men rode on the outside of tanks until they came across small arms fire. Then they jumped off the tanks and dispersed. The big tank guns blasted away at whatever fortification was protecting the machine guns. When this was completed, the men returned to the tanks and we continued on our way. Whenever we came upon a heavy artillery gun, the men jumped off their tank, did a pincer movement behind the enemy, destroyed the position and cleared the area for the tanks. This type of infantry-tank cooperation served us well as we proceeded across the country. Each day the resistance grew weaker until we were merely taking prisoners, literally by the thousands. The big satisfaction was coming across many prisoner-of-war camps and setting free allied prisoners of all description. The tough parts were discovering mass graves - who were these people and what did they do to deserve such treatment. Our trek across Germany is well documented in the book Out of the Clouds. We finally arrived at the city of Wismar on the south shore of the North Sea. This was our rendezvous with the Russians. We were scheduled to meet them on May 6th, but we arrived four days early on May 2nd, and for us the war was over. From then on, the gap between the Russians and the Allies closed in a southward direction until it was finally completed. From May 2nd we had a real picnic in Wismar. The Russian Officers were great party people; vodka flowed freely and we had a tremendous time. The Russian soldiers, however, were a bit of a nuisance to our men. As their equipment was generally old and shoddy, they were always wanting to trade it with our boys - watches, revolvers, etc. One time I made mention of this problem to one of their officers, and he said if his men bothered our people, we should feel free to shoot them on the spot. I though he was half kidding, until I saw how the Russian officers treated their troops. After a few weeks in Wismar, it was time to return to Bulford and then back to Canada to get ready for the Pacific Theatre. Col. Fraser Eadie called me to pick another officer, take Tom Jackson and head across Europe to set up camp in northern France and make ready to cross the Channel. I asked Jimmy Gregor of Winnipeg to accompany me, and we had a real ball traveling by a stripped down airborne jeep sans windshield, for one thousand miles to our predetermined campsite. Some days later the battalion arrived; we crossed the English Channel and returned to Bulford. It was now time to make preparations to return to Canada. We went up to Scotland, boarded the Isle de France once again, and headed for Halifax. This time the sea was very quiet and I really enjoyed the trip. After all, who could be sick at a time like this. We landed in Halifax on June 22nd and what a celebration that was! We were the first unit back from overseas and it seemed the whole city was there for us. For me, there was only one person for whom I had any interest in all that crowd. We disembarked at Pier 21, assembled the entire battalion and had a big parade up Barrington Street. The parade terminated at the Grand Parade Square where Col. Eadie received the keys of the city from the Mayor. We were then dismissed after being granted a thirty day leave and told to report at Niagara-on-the-Lake. Eventually it was time to return to the unit at Niagara-on-the-Lake. Here we were to re-group and get ready to join an American paratroop unit in preparation for the Pacific campaign. While at Niagara, the boys were not terribly busy; the farmers in the area were short of labour to pick their peaches, so a lot of our guys did some extra-curricular work. At last V J Day came along, and for us, the war was finally over. That night some of our boys went across the International Bridge to celebrate in Niagara Falls, New York. continued ... continued ...
RkJQdWJsaXNoZXIy MTM0NTk1OA==