ODE TO CANADA

From bravery during WW2 to honouring their fallen, there’s much to admire in the Canadian way

Alan Cochrane sings the praises of Canadians past and present

For a town of some 40,000-odd souls, it takes some doing to cope with an invasion, albeit a friendly one, of an extra 30,000. It’s true that invasions are not unknown in Arras, given that in the last one the Germans occupied the city for most of the Second World War. But a few weeks ago I spent a weekend in that excellent place, where not a room, nor even a park bench, was to be had for love nor money.

The reason for this incredible influx of people were the ceremonies that marked the centenary of the Battle of Arras. The vast majority, perhaps over 25,000 of the total, were Canadians whose forebears fought side by side in this epic conflict and, in a brilliant onslaught, threw the Germans off Vimy Ridge. Although seen by most British historians as part of the Battle of Arras, for our North American fellow combatants it was more properly called the Battle of Vimy Ridge.

As such, with 3,000 killed out of a casualty total of over 10,000 combatants, Vimy has become a national totem for Canadians.

There were other ceremonies which honoured the heroism and sacrifice of Scots in that great battle – 18,000 dead out of total Scottish casualties of over 50,000 – and at this point I think we might pay tribute to the Church of Scotland for choosing Dr Russell Barr as moderator of the general assembly for 2017. The services he conducted caught, perfectly, the sombre and dignified mood of that weekend.

However, it was predominately a Canadian event. There is a simple reason for that – it isn’t just that Canadians saw Arras and Vimy as marking their emergence as a nation, it was that the sacrifice in this battle of the men from this young country was so widely acknowledged that it led to them being represented at the Versailles peace talks. The death of so many young Canucks on that Flanders killing ground is a key part of their national evolution.

Scotland, on the other hand, is an ancient nation and, regrettably, we have buried our bairns on battlefields all over the world. Canada appears to regard Vimy Ridge as the main international memorial to its war dead. Where would Scotland’s be?

There is a good argument for making it at Arras, given that 44 of the battalions that fought there (one third of the UK total) were comprised of Scots. But why not Normandy, or the Somme, or Ypres, or South Africa, or Crimea or North America, or any of the other foreign fields where Scottish soldiers have fought and died? And would we, in any case, turn out in such huge numbers to honour our dead at any such place?

There’s no doubt that at Arras the healthy contingent of Scots – there were maybe 2,000 of us – were swamped. But if we are to be swamped I can think of few people I’d rather be swamped by. Canada deserves no end of tributes for the way its citizens handled themselves. I’m not sure there are many nations who’d be confident that their natives would behave so well.

What I found fascinating was being reminded, again, of the close connections between Scotland and Canada. Seven of the Canadian battalions in the battle had Scottish antecedents and I had a smashing night in a bar in the Place Des Heros with a bunch of MacLeods, Campbells and Mackenzies.

Despite our hotel having no hot water and terrible breakfasts, my Canadian counterparts put up with everything, probably because they were determined not to let anything spoil their pilgrimage and the honour they were determined to pay to their countrymen.

Additionally, the grateful thanks from the people of Arras for the sacrifices made in 1917 by those young men – Canadians, Scots, English, Welsh, Irish, Australians, New Zealanders and South Africans – meant that it would have been more than mean to moan about one rubbish hotel. N’est-ce-pas?