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On this date: October 2016

OnThisDateLead

october-1
LAC
1 OCTOBER 1916
The Battle of Ancre Heights begins.

october-2
The ship’s company of HMCS Iroquois holds a remembrance service for shipmates killed in action.
W.J. RUSSELL, LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA—PA114887
2 OCTOBER 1952
Three are killed, 10 wounded when the HMCS Iroquois is hit by a shore battery in North Korea.

3 OCTOBER 1927
Prime Minister W.L. Mackenzie King chats with the British PM, inaugurating Canadian transatlantic telephone service.

october-4
Passenger Liner SS Florizel arriving St. John’s Harbour.
Public Domain
4 OCTOBER 1914
The SS Florizel, carrying the Newfoundland Regiment’s First 500, joins the armada carrying the first Canadian contingent to the First World War.

october-5
Marc Garneau
Canadian Space Agency, Public Domain
5 OCTOBER 1984
Marc Garneau becomes the first Canadian in space, aboard the space shuttle Challenger.

6-7 OCTOBER 1944
RCAF No. 6 Group commits 293 aircraft to a bombing raid in Germany’s industrial Ruhr Valley.

stanley_cup_series_is_off
1919 Stanley Cup Series is cancelled between Montreal Canadiens and Seattle Metropolitans because of Spanish Flu. Announcement of Cancellation in The Globe
Globe & Mail, Alex Laney, Public Domain
7 OCTOBER 1918
The first of Canada’s 50,000 Spanish flu victims dies in Montreal.

october-8
Canadian troops in the vicinity of Arras, along Arras-Cambrai road in September, 1918.
LAC-PA-003153, Public Domain
 8-10 OCTOBER 1918
Hurricane bombardment from 324 tanks is unleashed in the 2nd Battle of Cambrai.

9-10 OCTOBER 1970
Debate starts over making concessions to the FLQ for release of kidnapped diplomat James Cross.

samuel_hughes_1905
Photograph of Sam Hughes
LAC- PA-028098
10 OCTOBER 1911
Sam Hughes is sworn in as minister of militia and defence.

wallace_lloyd_algie_vc
Lieut. Wallace Algie
Public Domain, WikiCommons
11 OCTOBER 1918
Lieut. Wallace Algie leads the capture of two machine guns, an officer and 10 men at Cambrai, earning the Victoria Cross.

nurse_edith_cavell_1865-1915_q32930
Cavell in a garden in Brussels with her two dogs before the outbreak of war
IWM-Q 32930, Public Domain
12 OCTOBER 1915
British nurse Edith Cavell is executed for helping Allied prisoners escape occupied Brussels.

legion-wins-sir-arthur-currie
Sir Arthur Currie

13 OCTOBER 1917
Gen. Arthur Currie is asked to deploy Canadian troops on the Passchendaele front.

14 OCTOBER 1942
A U-boat torpedoes the passenger ferry Caribou in the Cabot Strait, killing 136 of 237 aboard.

15 OCTOBER 1942
An RCAF unit forms to oversee the Northwest Staging Route, airstrips built through Alberta, B.C. and the North to ensure a wartime supply route to Russia.

quebecbatteries
The Batteries of Quebec bombard the New England fleet
Public Domain National Archives of Canada (C6022)
16 OCTOBER 1690
Quebec City cannons repel an attack by an English fleet of 30 ships and 2,300 men.

General Sir Arthur Currie and a few children watch Canadian soldiers march to a rest camp following action at Hill 70. [PHOTO: LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA—PA1826]

General Sir Arthur Currie and a few children watch Canadian soldiers march to a rest camp following action at Hill 70.
PHOTO: LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA—PA1826

17 OCTOBER 1916
The 1st, 2nd and 3rd Canadian Infantry Divisions begin to move toward Vimy Ridge.

hmcs_skeena_ikmd-04292

18 OCTOBER 1940
The destroyer HMCS Skeena rescues six from the torpedoed SS Bruse.

alexander_fleming
Sir Alexander Fleming, Inventor of Penicillin.
Public Domain
19 OCTOBER 1945
The first all-Canadian mercy flight is en route to Poland with a cargo of 2,500 kilograms of penicillin.

hillary_clinton_official_secretary_of_state_portrait_crop
Did you know? Democratic Presidential candidate Hillary Clinton is a descendant of filles du roi Madeleine Niel and Jeanne Ducorps dite Leduc.
Official Photo Department of State
20 OCTOBER 1671
Bachelors are ordered to marry the Filles du Roi, brides from France, or lose their hunting, fishing and fur-trading rights.

Private Ernest Smokey Smith, VC. [PHOTO: LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA]

Private Ernest Smokey Smith, VC.
PHOTO: LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA

21-22 OCTOBER 1944
In Savio, Italy, Ernest “Smoky” Smith holds his position against a firing tank, then shoots and disables it, earning the Victoria Cross.

bernard_law_montgomery

23 OCTOBER 1942
British Lt.-Gen. Bernard Montgomery launches the second Battle of El Alamein against Axis forces in North Africa.

the_famous_bluenose_restored

24 OCTOBER 1921
The Nova Scotian schooner Bluenose wins her first International Schooner Championship.

Alex R. Dunn FinalClip
PORTRAIT BY SHARIF TARABAY
25 OCTOBER 1854
The first Canadian to earn a Victoria Cross, Lt. Alexander Dunn saves two colleagues during the Charge of the Light Brigade in Balaclava, Crimea.

lieutenant_colonel_charles-michel_dirumberry_de_salaberry

26 OCTOBER 1813
Charles de Salaberry and 1,600 Voltigeurs turn back 3,000 invading Americans at the Chateauguay River in Quebec.

october-27

27 OCTOBER 1915
King George V visits the Canadian Corps on the Western Front.

soviet-r-12-nuclear-ballistic_missile
CIA reference photograph of Soviet medium-range ballistic missile (SS-4 in U.S. documents, R-12 in Soviet documents) in Red Square, Moscow.
Public Domain
28 OCTOBER 1962
The Cuban Missile Crisis ends; Russian missiles will be removed from the island.

29 OCTOBER 1958
Rescue workers find 12 survivors of a Springhill, N.S., mine disaster; seven more will be rescued, but 74 die.

30 OCTOBER 1899
A 1,000-man contingent leaves Quebec City, bound for the Boer War.

31 OCTOBER 1944
The Canadian Army attacks the causeway to Walcheren Island on the Scheldt estuary in the Netherlands.

 

 


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