Honouring Canada’s contribution
CEREMONY OBSERVES 74TH ANNIVERSARY OF D-DAY
Late in the evening on June 5 and into the early morning hours of June 6, 1944, 24,000 Allied soldiers took part in night drops behind Adolf Hitler’s Atlantic Wall in Normandy, France.
It was the start of the largest seaborne invasion in history — Operation Neptune, also known as D-Day.
On Wednesday, members of the Royal Canadian Legion General Stewart Branch #4 laid a wreath at the Lethbridge Cenotaph in observance of the 74th anniversary of that day, a turning point in the Second World War.
Joan Ross, a veteran who served in the Royal Air Force from 1962 to 1965, was in attendance. Her late husband, Capt. (Ret.) John Ross, was a Canadian paratrooper who took part in those initial airborne drops. John died in January this year at the age of 97.
“The military was his life,” she said. “He was a great man and he gained the respect of a lot of people. I miss him dreadfully.”
The role of those first airborne drops prior to the amphibious landings were to secure the approaches and flanks of the beaches. This included securing roads, bridges and terrain features which would allow the Allies to protect the beachhead while it was being secured.
John was a Lance Corporal in C Company, 1st Canadian Parachute battalion, 3rd Airborne Brigade, 6th British Airborne Division.
“John was a signaller,” said Ross. “He had to send the word, ‘Blood’ if the attack was successful. And it was.
“He was so proud of the fact he was the one who sent it for their particular battle.”
Joan was a child living in southern England when the Allies stormed the beaches of Normandy. She said that was the day when the people of Britain started to look toward an end to a war which had raged for five years.
“D-Day was sort of the beginning of the end for most of the English people,” she said. “They were just waiting for some kind of relief.”
“We had nothing,” she added. “And we had to carry these stupid gas masks around with us.
“Woe betide you if you were found without your gas mask.”
In the days leading up to the invasion, the area where Ross was living was filled with U.S. soldiers.
“We knew that something was happening because there were so many people, and so many soldiers around,” she said.
The beach landing was codenamed Operation Neptune, often referred to as D-Day. There were five landing points: Utah, Omaha, Gold, Sword and Juno.
The U.S. 4th Infantry Division landed on Utah Beach nearly two kilometres from their intended landing, and as a result were successful in landing some 21,000 men and 1,700 motorized vehicles with only around 300 casualties — though they failed to take many of their objectives.
The U.S. landed the 1st Infantry Division and 29th Infantry Division at Omaha Beach and faced off against the German 352nd Infantry Division. At the end of the day, the Americans had suffered 2,400 casualties and landed 34,000 troops, while the Germans had lost 20 per cent of their fighting strength.
Members of the British 50th Infantry Division landed at Gold Beach and came up against elements of the German 716th Division and 352nd Division. The British managed to land 25,000 men, suffering 400 casualties in the process.
Sword Beach, the easternmost landing point of the Normandy invasion, involved the British 3rd Infantry Division battling elements of the German 716 Infantry Division. By end of day, the British had landed 29,000 men and taken nearly 700 casualties.
The Canadian 3rd Infantry Division landed at Juno Beach and faced treacherous offshore reefs and shoals before touching sand. They took on elements of the German 716th Infantry Division and landed 21,400 troops by end of day. They suffered around 1,200 casualties and made the most progress of the entire Allied invasion force.
In all, the Allies landed more than 160,000 troops at Normandy on D-Day, including 73,000 Americans and 83,115 British and Canadians. Allied casualties are estimated to be more than 10,000.
By the end of the month, that number would swell to nearly one million Allied soldiers.
Legion president Michael Cormican described Lethbridge as a central rallying point for the area at large. Canadians from surrounding communities and areas poured into the city, eager to contribute to the war effort in a meaningful way.
“They were all young, obviously,” he said. “They didn’t think twice about it. They volunteered and went abroad.
“Many of them didn’t come back.”
Joan said she will always be proud of her husband and what the Allies accomplished.
“As long as I’m alive, I’m going to try and tell it,” she said. “But I was so proud of my husband, and he was so proud of his own career.”
The Legion is looking for family and surviving vets in preparation of the 75th anniversary next year.
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