Nova Scotia/Nunavut Command of The Royal Canadian Legion www.ns.legion.ca 133 my head but I couldn't. I was there all night. The next evening at Cita Rosa there was a make shift hospital set up after line went by. In the meantime, we took some prisoners and one of them grabbed the helmet from my head and took it off. My head bled a lot. The nurse at the hospital told me to get on the stretcher. I said that I was fine, I didn't need a stretcher, but she said to get on the stretcher. They pulled two bullets out of my head with tweezers. The doctor said if I lived till morning, I would have a 50/50 chance of getting better. They checked the next day and I was still alive. I spent about six or seven days in the hospital altogether. I don't remember much about the rest of time in hospital. Except that one day I was standing by door in the hospital someone came along and asked me if I wanted to go for a drive. They drove me up to the front line. We walked right up to the dyke with the enemy on the other side. I still had the bandage on my head and I was helpless. He drove me back. That guy got a talking-to for taking me up there. In January 1945, I had a bullet go right through my nose. It injured my eye a bit and I was laid up for awhile. We were there until February 23 or 24 which was the last battle in Italy. One morning, they got a truce. There was so many of the enemy killed. I looked out over the dyke and the field was full of wounded and dead. We got a truce and a cease-fire. We had to gather up the wounded. That was the last battle in Italy. We came out of the line the that day. Came back down to and stopped at Ortonail one of the staging depots and came across to Leghorn one depot and came across to Marseilles in France and some sort of landing. We came up through France to Belgium and went to the Refall Forest for a time. In April, crossed the Ijessel River to go up to Holland (boundary of Holland) In river big boxes called Buffalo. Each one carried a platoon of about solders. Shelling landed in the middle of one of the Buffalo and everyone was killed. There is a picture in one of the books of a Buffalo. We sent up to Grebbe Line, the most fortified line in Holland. There was a truce and cease fire 25th day of April. Before we got to the Grebbe Line, before we went over the dyke, a tank opened up and shells were going past us. When it was over we took the tank out. One of the soldiers told me to take my tunic off. I did and looked at the back of it. The whole back was burned off. I felt something on my back but nothing hit. I was one of the guards in the room where the truce was signed where the picture was taken. The Canadians fought for Holland and brought in so much food for the Holland natives that it lasted till after the war ended. I remember the words of General Foulkes to the German General - "the war will soon be over; if you keep the war going, you get the death sentence". The German General agreed to a truce and cease fire no violations. The German General asked that as soon as his soldiers laid down their arms that the Canadians escort them out of Holland to Germany. It was agreed upon. After the war was over, there was a victory parade in Amsterdam, Holland. I took sick and was sent back to Halifax on the hospital ship the Lady Nelson. On leave in the 40's continued ... continued ...
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