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Most of the Canadian soldiers who served in the Battle of Normandy were not involved in the D-Day landings or the bridgehead battles. The 2nd Canadian Division did not arrive in France until after the capture of Caen on July 9 and 4th Armoured Div. reached... -
The 70th anniversary of D-Day and the Battle of Normandy will introduce a new generation of Canadians to events that have long stirred the imaginations and collective memories of veterans and their children. There will no doubt be extensive television coverage on June 6, centered on... -
As the battle of Normandy ended in the last days of August 1944, the soldiers focused their energies on the pursuit of the German army and the liberation of northern France. It was left to the war correspondents to make sense of the confused, bloody campaign... -
The reverberations of war continue long after the last shell or bullet is fired. They roll outward—like waves from a blast— through one generation to the next. This is not what he would want me to do. My grandfather would not want me lying on this damp... -
On the afternoon of Aug. 18, 1944, the 4th Canadian Armoured Division redeployed its forces in response to a directive from the corps commander to prevent the enemy from escaping the Falaise Pocket. The division was to establish blocking positions along the River Dives between the... -
American General Omar Bradley’s decision to stop Gen. George S. Patton’s 3rd Army at Argentan, France, on Aug. 12, 1944, gave the German armies in the Falaise Pocket a chance to escape encirclement. Montgomery accepted Bradley’s decision and ordered the Canadians to capture Falaise before turning...
Voices from war’s end
The most familiar images from the end of the war are the joyful and sometimes raucous VE-Day celebrations on May 8, 1945. But the war did not end all at once for everybody. Freedom came in stages as the Allied front crept forward across Europe. Canadian liberators fought town to town, beginning in Sicily...
