HERBIE TO THE FRONT: Canadian War Cartoonists Of The Second World War, Part 2

Canadian cartoonist William “Bing” Coughlin articipated in the invasion of Sicily in 1943. Through his main character, Herbie, Coughlin illustrated many of the similar hardships and general complaints that abounded in any army: lack of food, horrible weather, and the need to constantly dig in. This 1945 cartoon is one example of what soldiers should not do: drink local alcohol.

(Volume 24-01)

By Cord A. Scott

Last month, we learned how the venerable comic panel became a much-utilized creative outlet for Canadian soldiers during the Second World War. Several Canadians — Bing Coughlin, H. Stewart Cameron, David Low and Les Callan among them — became well-known war cartoonists after their drawings were published in enlisted men’s newspapers. The second part of “Herbie to the Front” concludes with a study of Les Callan’s iconic Johnny Canuck.

D-Day and the cartoons of Festung Europa

The cartoons that portrayed the fighting of the Canadian Army were often as varied as the conditions themselves. While one doesn’t necessarily get the impression of the difficult, mountainous conditions of Italy from the Herbie cartoons, one does begin to see how the two theatres were different in their fighting styles. For many of the cartoons done in northwest Europe (Normandy, Belgium, into Holland and Germany), the mobility of units and the fluid situation of the fighting was far more prevalent. In addition, there were more cartoonists brought in to tell the “humour” of war.

One of Les Callan’s earliest cartoons was about all of the preparations for the attack on D-Day. The caption below the cartoon read:  “Supplies to Normandy! Great preparations in the south of England! Great expectations! Heaps of material. Roaring bombers. Endless convoys. Pubs all sold out. Finally — D-Day and Normandy!”

One artist who drew of the build-up and invasion of France was Lt. Les Callan, who created a strip entitled Monty and Johnny for the Maple Leaf Northwest Europe edition in the fall of 1944-1945. Callan started off in the Army Reserve in 1940, went into the Artillery in 1942, and then was assigned to the army Public Relations Branch, where he drew cartoons for the Maple Leaf. One of Callan’s earliest cartoons on the invasion was the fact that the supplies for France were so heavy it was tilting the entire island of England. As the troops awaited the invasion, spirits ran high, and ran through the men, as many local pubs sold out of spirits. Another of Callan’s jokes in the cartoons was the fact that Johnny Canuck was constantly misreading French and was trying to impress his friends and fellow soldiers. In 1945, after the end of the war, Callan published his cartoons in a book entitled Normandy and On: From D-Day to Victory. In it, he went one step further and added realistic illustrations of real soldiers as a kind of greeting card back home, such as L/Cpl. George Laverock from C Company of the Canadian Scottish Regiment, who hailed from Frae Auld Victoria.

As the Canadians progressed inland, the cartoons noted the lack of “Superman” in the German army. One cartoon noted that the Germans should be thrown back as they were under the limit. Perhaps Callan’s most humorous cartoons dealt with the dispatch riders, who seemed to go everywhere and through even the most inhospitable conditions and traffic to get where he needed to be. In one cartoon, based on an actual event, a dispatch rider even came in with a group of German prisoners of war. While he was riding he made them jog, stating “There’s nothing in the Geneva Convention which says you can’t run so git going – yuh Baskets!”

There were some issues of internal censorship. Since the cartoons were produced for as wide an audience as possible, overtly crude language and blatant sexual references were avoided for publication. However, the women drawn were often drawn in a pinup fashion, with physical attributes that made them seductive to the eye, and suggestive in their occupations. All in all however, the language and sexuality were often unstated, and the violence more for comedic effect. Of all the cartoons perused by the author, only two have ever shown dead soldiers, and the cartoons were American. The two in question were from Hubert, by Dick Wingert, which ran in the U.S. Army paper Stars and Stripes. One referenced the smell of dead bodies, and the other featured Germans who died in holding a town. Both were examples of gallows humour.

:Les Weekes was another cartoonist who drew for the Maple Leaf, with the title of This Weekes’ War. One of his notable cartoons, republished in Maple Leaf Scrapbook, was one in which a recce jeep had crashed into the water, and upon inspecting the map (underwater) the officer noted, “Hey, you know that canal bridge? Well it’s gone!”

For the artists in the northwest theatre, be it Callan, Tom Luzny, Jan Nieuwenhuys, or L. Clay’s illustrations in the 13th Field Regiment of the Royal Canadian Artillery, the cartoons reflected the conditions of the soldiers in the field. As the Canadians moved from Normandy, through Belgium and into Holland, the stories often told of how they adapted to the local conditions. All of the cartoonists noted the search for some sort of alcohol, be it Calvados from Normandy, or beer, or something stronger in Holland. Other cartoons noted the “accidental” discharge of weapons or artillery that happened to kill local animals. Since they couldn’t go to waste it was best to cook them, especially with the field kitchen nearby.

This was not to say that others didn’t contribute to the war effort or to the cartoons. Les Weekes was another cartoonist who drew for the Maple Leaf, with the title of This Weekes’ War. One of his notable cartoons, republished in Maple Leaf Scrapbook, was one in which a recce jeep had crashed into the water, and upon inspecting the map (underwater) the officer noted, “Hey, you know that canal bridge? Well it’s gone!”

Nieuwenhuys did a small book for the Canadians stationed in Holland during the winter of 1944-1945. Entitled Daag, the booklet featured sixteen comic-like colour caricatures of life in Holland. These illustrations were not of combat but of rest and recuperation in the area. Many of the cartoons dealt with the bartering of cigarettes for alcohol or even female companionship. Another discussed that “d-d Dutch Gin.” And finally several cartoons dealt with driving around the small country in oversized Allied army vehicles that often clogged the roads.

Clay’s illustrations that accompanied the history of the Royal Canadian Artillery were humorous but also told of more pressing issues. After the early comics that illustrated the training conditions, the later cartoons exemplified the conditions of the army in Normandy. Early on it was easy for the artillery to target anything that moved in Normandy. One cartoon, the appropriately named “Enemy Movement,” noted that the forward observers were calling in a strike against a German answering the call of nature. Another cartoon again went back to the “tradition” of making use of cows that were killed after being mistaken for enemy troops or being collateral damage from some sort of strike. Since the animals would rot otherwise, why not use them to augment the regimental kitchens, “Rations Supplement” suggests?

However, as the unit moved further into Holland during the fall of 1944, the fighting was more intense, leading to the jokes of bunkers (in Clay’s “Command post Fashions”), as Herbie had lived in Italy, or the sudden need to conserve rounds, as was common during the later part of the winter when supplies were hindered from reaching the front. One Clay cartoon titled “Ammo Return” even went so far as to note that a young lieutenant was about to hang himself for not reporting the proper count of artillery shells.

The key to many of the Canadian military cartoons is that they serve as a type of visual record of the fighting in Europe. While there were some artists and cartoons that were meant to be universal, such as the complaints about ineffective officers, training regimens, or food and drink, many of the cartoons did serve as a reminder of local issues encountered during combat. It might be Italian women or the incessant mud of Italy, the Calvados and Canadian troops trying out their French language skills on the locals, or the Dutch weather in the fall, but regardless it was important for soldiers to retain those memories. Callan often used many true stories as the basis for the cartoons, as did many cartoonists from all countries. Of all the cartoonists and their creations however, Coughlin’s illustrations of Herbie are the most memorable and universal.

THE MAN UNDER THE UNIFORM: Part 1: Young Art Curry: The first 25 years

The Canadian Expeditionary Force (CEF) was the designation of the field force created by Canada for service overseas in the First World War. The force fielded several combat formations on the Western Front in France and Belgium, the largest of which was the Canadian Corps, consisting of four divisions, and led by General Arthur Currie. (library of congress)

(Volume 24-01)

By Bob Gordon

General Sir Arthur Currie. The Canadian Corps’ first and only Canadian commander. The first full general in the Canadian Army (1919). Knight Grand Cross of the Order of St. Michael and St. George, and Knight Commander of the Order of the Bath (Britain); Chevalier of the Legion of Honour and Croix de guerre (France); Knight of the Order of the Crown and Croix de Guerre (Belgium); Distinguished Service Medal (United States).

A century later, the accolades still echo. Royal Military Academy Sandhurst instructor Christopher Pugsley describes Currie as “perhaps the most brilliant corps commander of the war,” who led “the most effective fighting formation among the British armies on the Western Front, superior in performance to its vaunted Australian contemporary in terms of organisation, tactical efficiency and staying power.”

This “most effective fighting formation,” the Canadian Corps, first took to the gas-soaked fields of the Ypres salient in April 1915. During the last hundred days, they spent three months at the sharp end as the shock troops of the Empire. Their route from novice to master of the arts of Ares was once seen as a simple, linear progression with the Canadian forces consistently and persistently growing in combat effectiveness. More recently, the variability, inconsistency and irregularity of change have been emphasized. Evolutionary dead ends, explored and abandoned, have been identified. Periods of sudden and revolutionary change (January to April 1917) are also evident. Today, historians concur the march to the final Hundred Days Offensive was anything but straight for the Canadian Corps.

Its leader, General Sir Arthur Currie, the man under the uniform, has never been granted a similar, measured reappraisal. In the immediate wake of the Great War, former Minister of Militia Sam Hughes slagged Currie, all but branding him a vainglorious butcher. Initially, much attention was directed at dismissing these accusations as baseless. More recent analyses have focused on his achievements as he progressed from brigadier to corps commander. The narrow focus has been on his military career, and one such assessment is even subtitled “A Military Biography.” Moreover, as was once the case with the corps itself, they suggest an unvarying and inexorable rate of ascent: A career simply destined to greatness.

From whence this apparent military genius arose has remained unexplored or, like an elephant in the room, been politely ignored. Was he a failed land developer and embezzler? A frustrated lawyer? A dedicated militia officer and daring entrepreneur? A chance confluence of man and circumstance? Was he all of the above or none of the above?

Young Art Curry, aged approximately 12, at the time of his admission to Strategy Collegiate Institute. (museum strathroy-caradoc)

This series will tack this way, exploring Currie’s civilian life from his youth in Ontario through his financial coming of age in Victoria. This portrait of Currie to age 40 in 1914, when his military, as opposed to militia, career commenced will provide a lens through which his military biography will be reinterpreted. Currie was hardly wet behind the ears when he went to war. He was approaching 40. He was on the verge of retiring from the militia. He was a self-made man of considerable influence socially, politically and financially, precarious as the latter may have been by 1914. These life experiences were foundational to Currie’s success with the Canadian Corps.

According to the Dictionary of Canadian Biography: “Arthur Currie’s paternal grandparents, John Corrigan and Jane Garner, a Roman Catholic and an Anglican, fled religious intolerance in Ireland to farm in Adelaide Township, Upper Canada. Upon their arrival in 1838, the Corrigans changed their name to Curry and became Methodists ... The elder son, William Garner Curry, married Jane Patterson in 1868.” William Curry was relatively affluent and held numerous local government positions. Born from this union on December 5, 1875, on the family farm near Napperton, six kilometres west of Strathroy, in Adelaide Township, was William Arthur Curry. He would not change his name to Currie until he was a militiaman and, reportedly, tired of the jokes about spicy food that were told at his expense in the mess and orderly room.

Curry began his education in a one-room schoolhouse in Napperton, Ontario. Apparently a promising student, he moved on to Strathroy Collegiate at the age of 14. On October 23, 1891, 15-year-old Arthur’s father, William, unexpectedly died from an “inflammation of the bowels” at the age of 46. The [Strathroy] Age, describing William Curry as “well known” with “numerous friends,” noted that “the funeral on Sunday last was one of the largest ever seen in the township, 165 rigs being in the procession.” Not surprising, considering that William had served as a township councillor, school board trustee, was deputy reeve at the time and owned a 300-acre farm.

In the wake of this tragic event Curry left Strathroy Collegiate and entered the Model School, earning a 3rd Class Teaching Certificate. His biographers imply that this abandonment of his dream of becoming a lawyer was necessitated by strained financial conditions following his father’s death.

However, circumstantial evidence tends to undermine this assertion. The Currys were a reasonably affluent family and they seem to have remained financially stable and secure following William’s death. Crystal Loyst, Museum Collections and Research Coordinator at the Museum Strathroy-Caradoc, has stated that, “As for the farm, the original plot was divided into two – William Currie [an older brother of Arthur’s] lived on the west half of the west half of lot 15 con 5 SER and his brother T.O. Currie lived on the east half of the west half of lot 15 Con 5 (by the map, however other records state Lot 14) … Arthur’s cousin Harold owned the property next door.” Under these conditions, it is difficult to see penury driving Arthur out of school.

Officers of the 5th Regiment (BC), Canadian Garrison Artillery, at Macaulay Point in 1909. Currie is seated in the middle row, at left of centre.

Regardless, leave he did, only to discover positions for a novice pedagog with a 3rd Class Teaching Certificate were few and far between. By November 1892, he had returned to the Collegiate hoping to achieve his honours and qualify for admission to a university.

As treasurer of the Strathroy Collegiate Institute Literary Society he took an active role in debates as both a disputant and a judge. In November 1892 he failed to demonstrate that “The Indian in North America has suffered more injustice than the Negro.” Four months later, Curry decided against the resolution, “War has caused more destruction and misery to the human race than intemperance.” A story published in his hometown newspaper, The Age Dispatch, on February 27, 1930, headlined “Sir Arthur Retreated Like a Good Soldier,” affirmed his debating prowess. It details his youthful determination to finish his arguments leading him to depart the podium, but circumambulate the room at a slow march, spitting out arguments, before resuming his seat.

Other schoolmates’ reminiscences, published in the Age Dispatch on April 17, 1919, affirm young Curry’s energetic and independent disposition. The article describes him as “the recognized star of the large class of which he was a member,” taking note of both his wit and pugilistic prowess. Proof of the former is provided by the pleasure he took, in later life, as Principal of McGill University, sharing a dram with an economics professor on the faculty by the name of Stephen Leacock. Coincidentally, as a young student teacher Leacock had done a brief placement at Strathroy Collegiate and taught Curry in the early 1890s.

Between Curry’s grades and his extracurricular activities, biographer, and former subordinate on the staff of the Canadian Corps, Hugh Urquhart asserts that the principal regarded his attaining “honours” as a given. Regardless, in May of 1894, weeks shy of graduation, Arthur Curry dropped out and headed west to Vancouver Island. Purportedly, the rather rash decision was precipitated by a dispute with a teacher. Contradicting himself, Urquhart then asserts that it was a premeditated excursion with a total of six young men participating. What is clear is that enough planning was required for Curry to have secured the $25 train fare.

While the timing of Curry’s exodus may have been impetuous, it was hardly Quixotic: he left with a well-defined destination. In Victoria he had arrangements to stay with a maternal great-aunt, Mrs. Orlando Warner, and her husband, a master shipwright from Pugwash, Nova Scotia. He promptly settled into their large house on Alston Street, overlooking the harbour.  The welcome was warm enough that Curry remained for 16 months while he qualified for a BC teaching certificate at which point he took a position teaching in Sydney that paid $60/month. The local trustees were impressed with his abilities, noting particularly his classroom management along with his students’ deportment and discipline.

As soon as possible, upon securing a job at Victoria Boys’ Central School, he returned to the city. One year later he moved to Victoria High School. This apparently lateral move was actually a step up for Curry as the high school had a more prestigious reputation and drew its students from the most affluent and influential families in Victoria. Curry would remain there into a fourth school year. It was during this period that he began spelling his name Currie.

In the winter of 1899–1900, Currie’s teaching career was interrupted by a prolonged illness. Apparently, Currie used the down time to contemplate his future. Probably with an eye to marrying, he left teaching, concluding it offered prestige but not pounds sterling. In the spring of 1900, presumably capitalizing on connections made with students’ parents, Currie reinvented himself as an insurance salesman joining Matson and Coles, a prominent Victoria firm.

Liberal Prime Minister Wilfred Laurier claimed the new century for Canada: “As the 19th century was that of the United States, so I think the 20th century shall be filled by Canada.” Currie, a life-long Liberal, set out to personify this dictum in the century’s first dozen years.

Next month: Currie’s affluence, influence and profile all grow exponentially. Ascending to the top of Victoria society, Currie is staring into a financial abyss when European rivalries and violence erupt into global war in the summer of 1914.

HERBIE TO THE FRONT: Canadian war cartoonists of the Second World War, Part 1

(Volume 23-12)

By Cord A. Scott

“If the troops like the cartoons I can thank my army experience more than any other one thing. Because no matter how well you can draw, you can’t get that feeling of live humor into an army cartoon unless you’ve experienced the things you’re trying to put into black and white. You’ve got to live it first.” — Bing Coughlin, This Army

“It will serve as a reminder that during the most trying periods the Canadian Army always retained a sense of humour.” — General H.D.G. Crerar, Maple Leaf Scrapbook

When the Second World War began in Europe, Canadians from all walks of life and a multitude of different jobs answered the call to defend the British Empire.

Given the country’s strong familiarity with American media, in addition to the older British tradition of enlisted men’s papers, it was not surprising that the venerable comic panel became a much-utilized creative outlet for Canadian soldiers. These cartoons allowed men in the field to enjoy a laugh while dealing with the harshness of war.

As with the American military, one cartoon character has come to dominate the Canadian soldier’s service: William “Bing” Coughlin’s Herbie, who was featured in This Army. A variety of other comics were also in circulation, depicting soldiers in different regions and conditions, and confronting different struggles.

Most cartoons came from two principal sources: armed forces papers and weekly magazines. These were akin to the editorial cartoons or Sunday funnies from the newspapers many soldiers would recognize from their civilian life. There were also personal sketches that were compiled into some form of booklet and were sold as a souvenir to the troops.

There were plenty of publications for Canadian Armed Forces personnel to choose from: Khaki, The Maple Leaf, and Wings Abroad, as well as front-line papers like the Big 2 Bugle and The Column Courier.

The cartoons served several valuable purposes. First and foremost, they were used to entertain. They were a way for personnel to vent their frustrations in an innocent manner.

They were also used to educate. For example, illustrations by Len Norris were adopted as part of the Canadian Army’s training regimen. His cartoon posters were created to show how to properly maintain equipment.

The importance of wartime cartoonists was recognized at the time. There was even a book on the major artists and their work: War Cartoons and Caricatures of the British Commonwealth, by Alan Reeve, published in 1941. Among the artists acknowledged in the book were British artist Bruce Bairnsfather (famous for the Second World War cartoon “If you can find a better ‘ole”) and Canadian artists such as David Low and Les Callan.

For most of the artists profiled in the book, fame would come after war’s end. Only Callan was a known artist at the time of the book’s publication.

One of the universal experiences of any military service is the transition from civilian to military life. Several Canadian artists attempted to capture the essence of basic training in their cartoons.

One of the earliest attempts at this was made by H. Stewart Cameron, who drew a series of cartoons that were bound into a leaflet called Basic Training Daze: Candid Cartoons of You and Me in the Army. Cameron illustrated the chaos of basic training: marching in formation during the first week, gas chamber training and mess hall. He was also quick to note how difficult it was to handle weapons like a Bren gun, which bounced all over during discharge. The cartoons were meant to make light of training that was often trying.

Vancouver cartoonist Len Norris was another artist whose illustrations made light of training. Norris’s initial job for the Canadian Army was to illustrate training and education posters for the department of military maintenance. Interestingly, this mirrored American comic book illustrator Will Eisner, who was working for the Aberdeen Proving Ground, creating posters for Army Motors, a U.S. Army training manual.

Norris produced a book about his experiences in cartoon form, entitled “Private” Reflections, with text and poems by Paul Zemke. The book contains reflections on everything from gas masks and parade drills to comments on the fairer sex (“Hey look! Real legs!”). There were even comments on how the Yanks were different in their approach to war. One private says to another as shells whip by, “If you were a Yank you’d get the Purple Heart for this, chum,” as the second man’s head came off — sarcasm and understatement at their finest.

The comparison between Norris and Eisner is no coincidence. Given the sharing of equipment and supplies between Canadian and American troops, and the need to maintain them effectively, articles appearing in American and Canadian publications would frequently be shared. It was natural, therefore, that the two would develop similar forms of entertainment and illustrations to augment military training or doctrine.

One book that captured the essence of air training in Canada was Dat H’ampire H’air Train Plan, by Carroll MacLeod and illustrated by H. Rickard. This book, which was first written in 1943, described the training regime of the RCAF. The book, which was told through verse as well as cartoons, ended with the crew of a Halifax bomber being shot down, escaping, and making their way back to England.

Several cartoons tried to embrace the concepts of training in Canada or overseas before they saw combat. Another example of training as a subject is found in the book The Canadian Field Artillery. Several cartoons noted the increased training schedules that were instituted while in England. What made these cartoons unique, however, is that they were drawn not by an enlisted man, as is often the case for many war cartoons, but by Lieutenant P.P.F. Clay. His drawings depicted life in England, where the training was undertaken before the inevitable landings in France. Another thing that made these illustrations unique was the fact they depicted a unit from training in England, through to actual combat in Europe.

Regardless of where an individual soldier trained, the topics of complaint were universal. Shared experience allowed soldiers the ability to vent to one another and bond over shared struggles. For example, a cartoon might depict the bitterness of soldiers who are forced through harsh and rigorous training, while their officers sipped spirits and discussed tactics.

This sort of humour was critical to the morale of the Allied fighting men, and served as a way to inform and amuse. It offered a release for those who were either unsure of how they might react to combat, or had seen the horrors of war and wished to vent in a way that those who understood would appreciate. These comics were an essential part of military life and continue to this day.

Italian Campaign and the fame of Herbie

Of all the cartoons drawn by military artists, one inevitably stands out for the troops. For the American GI, it was the characters Willie and Joe, as they appeared in Stars and Stripes. For the Canadians, the most recognized figure was the “everyman” that slogged through the mud and suffered: Herbie. The creation of “Bing” Coughlin, a sergeant with the Princess Louise Dragoon Guards, Herbie was similar in form to Kilroy. He had a big nose, was often involved in a variety of mishaps, and was definitely a citizen soldier, not a professional career type. He was also a man who enlisted with the goal of getting the job done. The cartoon character came from the Mediterranean theatre, where the fighting and harsh conditions of Italy created the need to laugh.

Coughlin illustrated many of the similar hardships and general complaints that abounded in any army: lack of food, horrible weather, and the need to constantly dig in. More importantly, Herbie was the illustrated member of the Canadian ground forces who, at that time, were seeing their first significant, sustained fighting. While the military ventures of Hong Kong in December 1941 and Dieppe in July 1942 were significant for the Army as a learning exercise, the landing at Pachino in July 1943 was the first real experience that the Canadian Army would have in both joint operations with Allied forces, as well as a way to validate training of their own troops. Coughlin, like his American counterpart Bill Mauldin, participated in the invasion of Sicily, and then went to work drawing the famous characters while initially in Naples. While many of the cartoons became icons of their particular fighting men, it is Herbie more than any other that was the “face” of the Canadian fighting man.

Herbie was well meaning but often the epitome of what NOT to do in combat, whether trying to drive between a bulldozer and a tank with his jeep, or drinking the local vino while in Italy, or simply complaining of the things that all soldiers did: a lack of women, decent food, and mostly the desire to go home. However, he was not a shirker and he did his job well. The sense of humour shown by Herbie was typical of combat jokes. He was an expert on different types of soil after digging so many trenches or foxholes. At times he had visions of personal glory, but more often was quick to head for shelter and safety. Mostly, he simply wanted to get the job done and get back home to his regular life. Coughlin drew his cartoons with an eye on the average grunt. As with so many military historians, the life of the enlisted man is frequently overlooked, in favour of the battle or the commander. However, by looking at the cartoons, which were meant for the common soldier, one can tell of morale, of equipment comparisons, or even the condition of fighting.

Coughlin was quick to pick up on emotional themes from the Italian campaign. The gripes about constant digging of trenches were similar to the cartoons from American artist Bill Mauldin as were the cartoons of stolen or stripped jeeps. Other cartoons were uniquely Canadian: one was a cartoon of a sniper engaged in his deadly craft, with his spotter noting, “Whatever you do, don’t hit his binoculars!” No doubt this was in reference to the Zeiss binoculars prized by the Allies for their superior optics.

Several other cartoons made light of Herbie’s run-ins with the military police while on a temporary pass, or even of the MPs grabbing German prisoners of war. One cartoon noted that the MPs were in such a rush to put up the out-of-bounds signs that they advanced too far and were in fact now prisoners of the Germans. Many of the German POWs were quick to point out to Herbie and his comrades that they would be in Canada before the Canadian troops would.

Beanie was a character that Coughlin later introduced to work and pal around with Herbie. Like Willie and Joe of American fame, they would run afoul of military police, drink lots of alcohol, enjoy the sights, and think about home. Herbie later would be depicted by Coughlin in the process of slowly making his way back to Canada and the various troubles or escapades he encountered on the way back. Regardless of how, the key was that they were home. W

Next month: D-Day and the cartoons of Festung Europa will be profiled

Photographic Advances in War: Bringing the reality of the battlefield to the home front

(Volume 23-12)

By Garla Jean Strokes 

In previous articles, I explored war photography’s emergence in the Crimean War, the American Civil War, and the First World War. This article examines the formation of the Canadian Army Film and Photo Unit in the Second World War, and how that system of information operated.

Photographic technology developed drastically between the First and Second World Wars. During the 1920s, lightweight, rapid-firing cameras like the Leica (1925) and Rolleiflex (1928) became available for purchase. As a result, the 1930s saw the birth of pictorial magazines — such as LIFE, in 1936 — and photographers like Robert Capa and Henri Cartier Bresson became household names.

The precedent set during the First World War for photographs in the news, combined with the relative saturation of images in weekly illustrated magazines meant citizens at home expected to see pictures of war. Photographers’ technical ability to deliver had improved dramatically.

Photographers of the Canadian Army Film and Photo Unit attached to the 1st Canadian Parachute Battalion. From left to right: Sergeant C.M.G. “Mike” Lattion, Sergeant A. H. Calder, Lieutenant Charles H. Richer. Photograph by Lieut. Barney J. Gloster. (dnd, library and archives canada, mikan 3524544)

As their predecessors had in 1914, soldiers of the Second World War had experience using basic cameras. Government and military leadership feared what information could be leaked, but the official war photography unit that was established during the First World War had long since been disbanded. An equivalent was found in the Canadian Military Public Relations Organization and its civilian counterpart, the Canadian Bureau of Public Information (later the Wartime Information Board).

The Military Public Relations Group went on to appoint photographers, while the Canadian Army Film Unit recorded events with motion-picture cameras. The two organizations merged in 1943 to form the Canadian Army Film and Photo Unit (CAFPU). Each branch of the military — Army, Air Force and Navy — appointed its own photographers and cameramen. Usually two cameramen were paired with a photographer, and each unit had a driver and the support of film-developing technicians. No military photography or film unit existed prior to the outbreak of war, but by 1945 more than 200 individuals contributed to the effort.

Photographers were given specific assignments, based on the twin desires of promoting the Canadian military effort and historically documenting its activities. Numerous letters and memos from CAFPU Major Gordon Sparling tell us that photographers were asked to get images of Red Cross personnel, Canadian Women’s Army Corps, sporting events and specific officers, particularly Montgomery and Eisenhower. Some of the photographers were stationed in Canada to record the British Commonwealth Air Training Program, the nation’s major war contribution, while others tested new types of film, or were given the prosaic task of making ID photographs.

In Europe, one of the CAFPU’s first assignments was to record the Dieppe Raid. Cameraman Alan Grayston and photographer Frank Royal trained with the troops in advance of the attack, but as historian Dan Conlin states:

“When high command cancelled plans to send Grayston and other Canadian cameramen on the Dieppe Raid, he got so angry at the film unit headquarters that while waving his hand gun around it went off and he fired three bullets through the glass door of his commander. However, he was so respected in the unit that he was just demoted from Sergeant to Private for a few weeks and then sent back into the field with his camera.”

Royal was unable to even land on the beach on August 19, so he captured scenes of the battle in the distance from his ship. All extant images of the failed raid were taken by the German defenders.

The invasion of Sicily in 1943, codenamed Operation HUSKY, gave Canadian photographers another chance to record the overseas action. Royal and Grayston were both on hand to photograph the Canadian Forces. Despite transportation issues that made it difficult to capture as much footage as they would have liked, their work brought international attention to the CAFPU, and nine cameramen and photographers remained on hand to record the Battle of Ortona in December 1943.

Sergeant Alan Grayston of the Canadian Army Film and Photo Unit filming a Canadian demonstration of German infantry tactics, Polegate, England, March 28, 1943. Photograph by Lieut. Jack H. Smith. (dnd, library and archives Canada, mikan 3210377)

Other members of the CAFPU returned to Britain in anticipation of the June 6, 1944, invasion of Normandy. On the morning of June 6, three main teams landed on Juno Beach: photographer Don Grant and cameraman Bud Roos landed first with the Royal Winnipeg Rifles, while cameraman Bill Grant and photographer Frank Dubervill were sent in with the Queen’s Own Rifles. Grayston and Ken Bell landed with follow-up troops. Other photographers and cameramen associated with the Navy, including Gilbert Milne, were also on hand. Each team landed at different parts of the beach to gather comprehensive coverage and to reduce the risk of mass casualty. 

As the first Canadian cameraman to land on the beaches of Normandy, Bud Roos remembered, “You can hear funny little bees running by your ear, and my only thought was, ‘Why are people dropping here and here and why am I still walking?’ but I kept walking anyway.” Of the 30 men in his assault craft, only he and two others made it ashore alive. His camera would not work, and he abandoned it to help the injured.

Roos’ partner, Don Grant, landed with two cameras. His Speed Graphic was ruined when his landing craft toppled into a sandbar — he was thrown into the water while many of the men behind him in the landing craft fell pray to enemy machine-gun fire. Grant had a Leica tucked inside his battle dress blouse, and began shooting.

The Canadians scooped D-Day — correspondent Ross Munro’s written account and Bill Grant’s film footage made it to North America before any others. This speedy transmission was primarily because the chaotic nature of the American beaches meant that none of their footage made it out as quickly. When the offices of LIFE magazine received press photographer Robert Capa’s four rolls of film depicting the Americans landing on Omaha Beach, they were rushed through the dryer and destroyed. Eleven were salvageable, of which only nine exist today.

Despite speedy transmission, the CAFPU had to deal with wartime censorship. Images of the war were considered to have the power to make or break morale and the ability to reveal military intelligence. Upon passing the censor, however, images were made available to soldiers as well as the press. For the rank and file, albums of contact sheets were sent to field offices and orders were sent through commanding officers. Prints were then processed in the field.

In all, official photographers made more than 200,000 negatives during the war, which are now housed at Library and Archives Canada. The film unit’s footage was given to the National Film Board after the war, but it was destroyed during a fire in 1967. Its wide wartime distribution of the film means that some of the work has survived. This output was not without great sacrifice. Photographer Terry Rowe was killed in February 1944, and Jack Mahoney was killed that April. Cameraman Jimmy Campbell was killed that July. Bud Roos left Europe after suffering a nervous breakdown, and Bill Grant and Bill Cox were each taken out of the war with injuries.

THE DAY THAT CHANGED THE WORLD: The Archduke, his lim and his date with history

(Volume 23-3)

By Larry D. Rose

Visitors to Vienna usually want to see the magnificent palaces, listen to Strauss waltzes or perhaps savour chocolatey desserts at one of the many superb coffee houses. However, hidden away in one corner of the Austrian capital, is something rather more unusual.

 On display at the Austrian Military Museum are several items relating to the 1914 assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand, including the uniform he was wearing when it happened. The assassination, of course, was the spark that touched off the First World War, which left 15 million people dead, Russia swept by revolution and the map of Old Europe in tatters.

The archduke’s sky-blue cavalry general’s tunic, with high collar and gold braid cuffs, still shows ample evidence of the attack in Sarajevo on June 28, 1914. His helmet, festooned with now-faded green ostrich feathers, sits nearby.

Only a few feet away is the 1911 Gräf und Stift phaeton convertible car which carried Franz Ferdinand and his wife, Sophie, to their fateful encounter with assassins. The car comes complete with a bullet hole on the right-hand side, near where the archduke was seated. The Graf und Stift was the luxury limo of its day, and although splendid, somehow doesn’t seem as big as one might expect considering its role in such a momentous event.

The museum also has the actual Browning Model 1910 semi-automatic pistol the assassin, Gavrilo Princip, used in the attack along with other weapons seized from the group of conspirators.

The archduke, the heir to the Austro-Hungarian throne, was 51 years old at the time and, given the grim outcome of events, it would be nice to think he was an admirable prince. Alas, it turns out that he was a passionate believer in the absolute right of kings who thought his Hungarian subjects were “infamous liars” and who wasn’t much loved by his uncle, Emperor Franz Joseph or just about anyone else except his wife.

For her part, Sophie was intelligent and assertive but not a “royal” and, as a result, was shunned by the extremely rigid etiquette of the Austrian court. At least the couple could say they had a loving and happy marriage.

The assassination was the result of ghastly security blunders, blind dumb luck by the mostly amateurish assassins, and, above all, terrible judgement by the archduke himself. Tiny details, such as the fact that the Graf und Stift limo did not have a reverse gear, also played into the ultimate outcome.

It is clear the archduke should never have gone to Sarajevo in the first place since it was among the most notorious trouble spots in the entire Austro-Hungarian Empire. Several earlier plots had been foiled. Meantime, in terms of security lapses, the route the archduke was to take was well advertised in advance while the royal couple rode in the wide open car with almost no guards around them. One officer who was part of the security force joined the motorcade, leaving most of his troops behind.

The assassins were part of a Bosnian group committed to throwing the Austrians out of the Balkans. There were seven of them, armed with six bombs and four Browning semi-automatic pistols. They also carried a handful of cyanide suicide capsules which, in the event, proved ineffective in hastening their own dispatch.

Three of the group had been in Sarajevo for some time, scoping out the parade route and planning to cover three bridges since the archduke’s motorcade would have to use at least one of them.

The archduke and Sophie had arrived in Sarajevo by train on the morning of the fateful day — which happened to be their 14th wedding anniversary — and, under bright sunshine, set off down a broad boulevard toward city hall amid splendid uniforms, fluttering ostrich feathers, fezzes worn by locals and Sophie’s fashionably big-as-all-outdoors bonnet.

At the first stop one of the plotters threw his bomb. It hit the archduke’s car but bounced off and exploded under the following vehicle, injuring several officers, some bystanders and slightly wounding Sophie on one cheek. The bomb thrower was arrested. This apparently unnerved most of the other conspirators who, although the motorcade passed directly in front of them, found various excuses for melting into the crowd and calling it a day.

It was blindingly obvious to the Austrians that if there was one assassin about, there could be others and this might be the right moment to depart for safer havens. However, unaccountably, the archduke commented, “That fellow is clearly insane” and ordered the visit to continue.

Amid dust and smoke, the injured members were taken to hospital and then the cavalcade proceeded to city hall. There, the archduke was greeted with a previously written speech — macabre in the circumstances — noting that all the people of Sarajevo were “filled with happiness” over the royal visit.

Then came the archduke’s next—and ultimately fatal — decision as he demanded plans be changed to visit the wounded men in hospital. All piled into their vehicles and the convoy headed off. However, no one told the archduke’s driver of the new plan and after setting out he turned onto the wrong street. Without a reverse gear, the car remained stationary while assistants assembled to push it back far enough to take the correct route.

By chance one of the assassins, described by historian Max Hastings as “a weedy teenage terrorist,” was standing on the exact spot where the car stopped. Gavrilo Princip seized this unexpected opportunity and fired two shots at the archduke from a few feet away. One bullet hit Franz Ferdinand in the neck while the other entered the side of the vehicle (hence the hole) hitting Sophie in the abdomen and severing an artery. She died very quickly.

Franz Ferdinand’s last words, muttered in the car, were, “Sophie, Sophie, don’t die — stay alive for our children.” The archduke was rushed to hospital and examined for what appeared to be chest wounds. His uniform was ripped twice as doctors tried to locate his wounds, with the rips still obvious on the tunic today. He died lying on a couch, which is also part of the exhibit at the Vienna museum.

The assassin, Princip, tried to commit suicide but was grabbed, arrested and later sentenced to a long prison term since he was too young to be executed. He died of tuberculosis while still in jail.

The rest, as they say, is history.

The archduke’s uniform, the car, gun and other artifacts are only a small part of the museum that is spread over two floors and includes hundreds of photos, weapons, uniforms and memorabilia covering more than 200 years of Austro-Hungarian military history. The Austrian Military Museum, known in German as the (take a deep breath) Heeresgeschichtliches
Museum, is a $25 cab ride from the city centre. Entry fee is about $10.

"YANK" NELSON: An early Canadian ace in the Battle of Britain

(Volume 23-11)

By Jon Guttman

Born to a Jewish family in Montreal on April 2, 1917, William Henry Nelson took an interest in airplanes when he was six. At age 16 he won the junior championship of the Montreal Model Aircraft League. He attended King Edward VII Public School, Baron Byng High School in Montreal and, after his family moved to the suburb of Westmount, Academy High School in Outremont. In 1936, however, Nelson crossed the Atlantic aboard a cattle boat and tried to enlist in the Royal Air Force. He was initially rejected due to poor eyesight, but he persisted and on May 9, 1937 he managed to enlist as an “Acting Pilot Officer on Probation.”

After completing his training Nelson was assigned to No. 10 Squadron, a bomber unit equipped with Armstrong Whitworth Whitleys. During that time his “colonial” accent earned him the nickname “Yank.” By the time war broke out in September 1939 he had attained the rank of flying officer.

Nelson’s was one of eight Whitleys involved in No. 10 Squadron’s first mission, attacking the German seaplane base at Hornum on the island of Sylt on the night of March 19–20, 1940. In spite of some heavy anti-aircraft artillery fire all aircraft returned unscathed, but most of their bombs fell short of the target, straddling the railway line leading to Hornum.

On April 20, with the German invasion of Norway underway, No. 10 Squadron raided Oslo, but impenetrable weather compelled the Whitleys to attack the secondary target, the airfield at Stavanger, resulting in hits on the runways. Afterward the commander of RAF Station Dishforth recommended Nelson for the Distinguished Flying Cross on April 25. On the 30th his appraisal was reprised by the commander of No. 4 Group, Air Commodore Arthur Coningham: “This Canadian officer has carried out many flights over enemy territory, during which he has always shown the greatest determination in his reports and results generally have been successful above the average.” In consequence, on May 31 Nelson became the first Jewish Canadian to be gazetted for the DFC, with the following citation:

“This officer carried out many flights over enemy territory, during which he has always shown the greatest determination and courage. On the 20th April 1940, after an attack on Stavanger, a balloon barrage was encountered west of the target, a report of which was transmitted to the base in sufficient time to enable following aircraft be warned.”

Nelson subsequently went before King George VI, who personally congratulated him for his performance. At that point, however, Nelson’s ambitions turned elsewhere, as he requested a transfer to Fighter Command. With France surrendering to the Germans and Britain clearly their next target, the RAF needed all the fighter pilots it could muster and, on June 24, the man it once rejected for faulty eyesight reported to No. 6 Operational Training Unit at Sutton Bridge, to transition from bombers to the RAF’s hottest operational fighter, the Supermarine Spitfire Mark I. He completed the course on July 20 and on the 27th was assigned to No. 74 Squadron at Manston.

Known officially as “Trinidad Squadron” but more popularly as “Tiger Squadron,” No. 74 Sqn had a tradition harkening back to the Great War and formidable members such as Edward “Mick” Mannock, Ira “Taffy” Jones and Keith “Grid” Caldwell. If “Yank” Nelson had an entirely new game to learn — and fast — he was fortunate to do so under the seasoned tutelage of South African Squadron Leader Adolph Gisbert Malan. Then credited with five confirmed victories and shares in three more — to which he added a Messerschmitt Me 109E on July 28 — “Sailor” Malan was also a first-rate leader and trainer of men.

Nelson seems to have been a quick study, for just three weeks after joining No. 74 he opened his account on August 11. That morning the Luftwaffe launched a high-speed morning raid on Portland Harbour using Jagdbomber (fighter bomber) variants of the Messerschmitt Me 110 from Erprobungsgruppe 210, while other units conducted a feint operation over Dover. This was followed up at 1000 hours by the largest bombing raid yet seen over England, by 150 aircraft spread out over five miles, consisting of Junkers Ju 88As of I and II Gruppen, Kampfgeschwader 54 and Heinkel He 111s of KG 27, escorted by Me 110s of I and II Gruppen, Zerstörergeschwader 2, and provided top cover by Me 109Es of Jagdgeschwader 2 and 27. The Zerstörer, some 60 strong, had hoped to divert British attention from the bombers, and they succeeded, drawing an attack by No. 609 Squadron’s Spitfires and Hurricanes of Nos. 238 and 601 Squadrons. Forming circles for mutual defence, the Me 110 crews claimed 17 victories, but six crews failed to return and five other planes were damaged. The British in fact suffered the loss of 15 planes shot down and 14 pilots killed, as well as nine damaged.

The Me 109s were conspicuously absent from the main action, and JG 2, at least, was busily engaged with No. 74 Squadron, which claimed eight Me 109s, including two by Malan, for the loss of Spitfire P6969, from which Pilot Officer Peter C.F. Stevenson bailed out and was rescued by a motor torpedo boat. Nelson described his own first success in his combat report:

“I was yellow 3 in No. 74 Squadron, on patrol at about 24,000 feet and sighted 8 ME.109’s to port. My leader suddenly dived on one ME.109, so I circled looking for any E/A [enemy aircraft] coming down on our section. While climbing and turning I saw 6 ME.109’s at 28,000 feet who obviously did not see me, they were circling widely so I climbed onto the last E/A. I was sighted and they started turning steeply, I easily out-turned them. They all broke up and the last E/A flick-rolled away from me. I closed rapidly and at the short range of 150 yards I opened fire with a 3 seconds burst dead astern, and he burst into flames. I immediately turned away and saw the remainder E/A speeding for home, well away. Not seeing any further E/A I pancaked Manston.”

JG 2 claimed an exaggerated 22 victories that day, while losing seven fighters and five pilots killed or missing, including Oberleutnant Heinz-Ewart Fricke, adjutant of III Gruppe, and Hauptmann Edgar Rempel, commander of the 6th Staffel (6./JG 2). An eighth plane made it across the Channel to crash land near Cherbourg. The 7th Staffel of JG 26 also had a brush with No. 74 Squadron at 1130 hours, in which Leutnant Josef Bürschgens’s Me 109E-1 was hit in the engine over Manston. Although he too made it across to belly land at Calais-Caffiers, his plane broke its back and was written off.

Large though they were, the first two waves of German attacks were mere feints to distract attention from the main strike of the day, an attack on a convoy code-named “Booty” off the Essex coast by Me 110C-6 and Me 110D-0 “Jabos” of ErprGr 210, with I./ZG 26 providing top cover. Attacking from cloud cover off the Thames Estuary, ErprGr 210 claimed an 8,000-ton vessel sunk before six Hurricanes of No. 17 Squadron turned up, soon joined by 11 Spitfires of No. 74. Hit from two sides, 1./ErprGr 210 lost two planes and crews before their escorts could intervene. When it did descend on the British fighters, 1./ZG 26 claimed nine of them — two credited to Leutnant Martin Meisel — but lost two Me 110Cs and their crews, while two damaged Zerstörer of 2./ZG 26 barely made it back, one crash landing at St. Omer. 

Of 11 Me 110s destroyed and five damaged claimed by No. 74, Nelson was credited with one destroyed east of Harwich and another damaged, but at the cost of Pilot Officers Denis N.E. Smith and Donald G. Cobden, whose bodies later washed ashore in Belgium, to be buried at Ostende by the Germans. Claiming some shared victories, No. 17 Squadron lost Pilot Officer Kenneth Manger, DFC (five victories), whose body was never found.

August 13 was Adler Tag, slated for a supreme effort in which the Luftwaffe would wrest control of the air over Britain, but it did not go as planned. Malan and No. 74 Squadron’s contribution was to surprise a formation of Dornier Do 17Zs coming in over the Thames Estuary, resulting in 11 claims, though several were later downgraded to “probables,” including one of the two by Malan and the single Do 17 claimed by Nelson.

Though now a full-fledged “Tiger,” Nelson would add no more to No. 74’s tally until October, during the Battle of Britain’s fourth and final phase. Having failed to dominate the Channel, eliminate the RAF or cow the British people into submission with the bombing of London, the Luftwaffe made increasing use of Me 110s and Me 109s to make high-speed bombing raids on selected targets. During that time No. 74 had replaced its Spitfire Mark Is, powered by 1,030-hp Rolls-Royce Merlin III engines, for Mark IIs using the 1,175-hp Merlin XII in September and, after a rest period, moved from Coltishall to Biggin Hill on October 15, to deal with the Jabo threat.

Its first opportunity came on October 17, as Me 109s of III./JG 53 headed up the Thames Estuary toward London. At 1510 hours Malan led 11 Spitfires up to intercept, making contact at 1530. Nelson reported of the action:

We climbed rapidly, and at 26,000 feet saw some bursts from our antiaircraft [guns] below, and turned towards them. Two Me 109s suddenly appeared across our bows. The squadron leader, ‘Sailor’ Malan DFC, immediately got on the tail of the leading 109, and I closed with the outside one.

They took no evasive action as we came out of the sun, and I fired a burst with slight deflection at 150 yards, down to point blank range. He immediately started a half-roll turn down, white smoke streaming out, obviously glycol.

I followed him easily at first, firing short bursts, then more eruptions came from his engine, almost blinding me. Diving down to 2,000 feet he entered some low cloud vertically. Having got up tremendous speed I had to pull up in order to avoid hitting the ground. I found him difficult to hold in the latter part of the dive, as he went well past vertical, and I had my actuating gear wound fully forward. He was seen to crash near Gravesend. The enemy aircraft was coloured dark on top, with a tremendous yellow spinner, and was sky blue beneath.

Besides Nelson, Malan and Flight Lieutenant Peter C.B. St. John were credited with Me 109s, but Flying Officer Alan L. Nicalton was killed, shot down over Tunbridge by Feldwebel Eduard Kosolowski of 8./JG 53; his Spitfire crashed at Hollingbourne at 1540. German casualties were Oberleutnant Ernst-Günther Heinze, commander of 8./JG 53, whose Me 109E-7 crashed in the Channel, but who was rescued, and Oblt. Robert Magath of 7./JG 53, who returned to Le Touquet with 10 holes in his plane. In another action that day Pilot Officer Brian V. Draper forced Me 109E-4/B W Nr 1106 “Yellow 1” to crash land at Manston, Leutnant Walter Rupp of 3./JG 3 being taken prisoner. 

On October 27, No. 74 Squadron again clashed with JG 53. Nelson reported:

“I was No.2 to S/L [Squadron Leader] Malan detailed to patrol Biggin Hill at 7.50 hours. We intercepted 30 Me.109s over Ashford. Two of them came across my bows, heading into the sun. I followed and closed to 150 yards on the port side of the enemy and opened fire with a three-second burst which caused to the 109 to smoke badly and half-roll down. I followed easily and the enemy, after a sharp dive, pulled steeply into the sun. I could only follow him with the smoke trail. After two minutes I closed once more in the climb and gave a continuous burst of ten seconds at point-blank range. The 109 shed bits of machine which hit my aircraft and damaged the spinner and propeller. The enemy then wallowed in a shallow dive, and I formated on it down through the clouds. I saw the whole central portion of fuselage was shot away and no pilot to be seen. He did not jump, so I assume he was slumped in his cockpit. The machine crashed a couple of miles to the south of Rochford Aerodrome.”

The Jabo unit, II./JG 53, had taken off at 0918 and lost Uffz. Hermann Schlitt of 4./JG 53 whose Me 109E-4 went missing near Tunbridge Wells around 0950. The unit providing top cover was III./JG 27 and its commander, Hauptmann Max Dobislav, claimed a Spitfire south of Maidstone at 0800 for his 18th victory, while Oblt. Erbo Graf von Kaganeck of 9./JG 27 claimed a Spitfire over Ashford at 0948. Sergeant John Alan Scott of No. 74 Squadron was shot down over Maidstone and his Spitfire crashed and exploded at Dundas Farm, Elmstead, at 0900.

On October 29 Flight Lieutenant John Colin Mungo-Park was leading No. 74 Squadron on patrol when he got a call from Sector Operations Control to join No. 92 Squadron at 25,000 feet over Biggin Hill. Climbing to 30,000 feet, he spotted a ragged Me 109 formation at about 27,000 feet and called out “Tally-ho” to his men. In the ensuing scramble Mungo-Park got two, Pilot Officer Robert L. Spurdle and Sergeant Neil Morrison each claimed a Messerschmitt that could not be confirmed, and Pilot Officer Edward W.G. Churches attacked an He 111 that he last saw in a shallow descent south of Dungeness, also counted as a “probable.” Meanwhile, Nelson got on an Me 109’s tail at 25,000 feet and as it dove followed it down, giving it a three-second burst at 150 yards followed by a second at 50 yards before it crashed in a field near East Grinstead Hospital. On the debit side, Sergeant Harold J. Soars was shot-up for the third consecutive day, though he force-landed at Biggin Hill and his Spitfire was eventually repaired.

October 30, 1940 marked the official end of the Battle of Britain, but that did not mean the fighting was over. On November 1, No. 74 clashed with JG 26, en route home from covering a midday Jabo raid on London. The ensuing dogfight did not go well for the Tigers this time, for JG 26’s commander, Major Adolf Galland, destroyed a Spitfire west of Ashford for his 51st victory, Leutnant Hans Heinemann of 1./JG 26 downed another over Ashford — his only success before being himself shot down and killed on December 5 — and Hauptmann Walter Adolf, CO of II./JG 26, claimed one over Maidstone for his 14th.

Adolf’s victim, Sergeant Frederick P. Burnard, brought his Spit home badly damaged. Hit southeast of Ashford, Sergeant Soars bailed out off Dover; fished out of the Channel, he was rushed to Victoria Hospital at Folkestone. Bob Spurdle noted afterward: “Soars got shot down again and this time wounded; he should be taken off fighters.”

The third Spitfire, Nelson’s P7312, is also believed to have gone into the Channel off Dover. His body was never recovered, but the contribution and sacrifice of Bill Nelson — bombing DFC, Tiger Squadron ace, Canadian — to the Battle of Britain and ultimate Allied victory, is commemorated on Panel 4 of the Runnymede Memorial in Surrey.

Christmas In The Trenches: The meaning of the season during the Great War

By Kyle Falcon

(Volume 23-11)

The story of the Christmas Truce has been told many times. On Christmas Day 1914, men who had been sending each other bullets and bombs left their trenches to exchange pleasantries, food, souvenirs and, depending on who you ask, even played a game or two of football. As incredible as the story is, it was not to be repeated, since efforts were made by officials to prevent what they saw as lack of discipline on subsequent holiday seasons.

So what was Christmas like the following years? How was Christmas experienced and what did it mean, if anything, to those fighting a bitter war? Soldiers’ letters, memoirs and diaries are certainly a good place to start for such a discussion, but this article looks to another medium. Canadian trench periodicals, written by soldiers on the front lines, offer a lively discussion of the topic given their duel purpose as a humorous escape from war’s realities and a forum for news and serious reflection. To be sure, they do not speak for every soldier and the plurality of experiences, but they do offer an alternative to the popular Christmas Truce narrative.

The trenches of the Western Front were hardly an ideal place to celebrate Christmas. Putting aside the absence of amenities, décor and family, there was also a glaring contradiction with celebrating the birth of Christ in the environment of war, especially against fellow Christians. As The Iodine Chronicle put it in December 1915, “The season of Peace and Goodwill is again upon us, and still ‘man’s inhumanity to man’ is what most strikes us.” A shared Christian culture was what allowed the Christmas Truce to occur, but every December that the fighting continued, it was a question that begged an answer.

“While we are waging a relentless war, how can we consistently celebrate the Birthday of the Prince of Peace?,” the trench journal Another Garland from the Front asked in 1916. The answer they provided was that evil was a necessary product of free will and that Christians had a duty to combat evil crimes. “We must not,” they stated, “shut our eyes to possibility of crime, even such a crime as the ambition to subjugate the world.” The Iodine Chronicle reached a similar conclusion in that “the sacredness of the cause makes up for this seeming inconsistency.”

Another Garland from the Front was a follow-up to the 1915 A Christmas Garland from the Front. The two journals, issued by the 5th Canadian Battalion, were conceived as seasonal gifts from the soldiers at the front to the Canadians at home. They had elements of a typical trench journal, containing short stories, poems, sketches, and overviews of the battalion’s actions during the war. Content could be satirical or serious but a subtle message was conveyed that the trials endured on the front was the ultimate Christmas gift. One poem, For Home Consumption, reminded readers of their hardships by joking that “I love to hear the screeching of the shells a-tearing round about.”

Others made the point more explicitly. In the introduction to the 1916 issue of Another Garland, Arthur Currie asked those who read the journal to remember “the men who are daily laying down their lives in order that ‘Peace on Earth and Good Will among Men’ may once more prevail.” For one padre of the 7th Battalion, the Canadian soldiers had likewise set an example worthy of emulation and optimism. After a “year’s discipline and trial ... of great sacrifices,” he proclaimed, “our great Empire moved by this great Christmas wish will be mighty in bringing Christ’s peace on earth.”

The holiday address to the No. 1 Canadian Field Ambulance in The Iodine Chronicle similarly invoked the sacrifice of the men as proof of Christmas spirit: “in this season of cheer ... [w]e should also remember … our gallant comrades fallen on the field of honour, those who have made the ‘supreme sacrifice’ ... have given the greatest proof of their love for their fellow men.” According to these commentators, the soldiers were not abandoning Christian values but protecting and demonstrating them.

Not all discourse was so serious. Trench newspapers were after all designed to be humorous, so as to distract from war’s brutality and sustain morale. Consider a column in the December 1915 edition of The Listening Post. “If Santa Claus had included any portion of the British Front on his programme,” it began, “we could see no earthly reason why he shouldn’t call at the business address of the 7th Battalion.” What was the author referring to exactly? According to the column, they had spent the two days before Christmas decorating the trenches: “Pte. Allwood … had been persuaded to take his old socks off the barbed wire, and replace them with the new pair he had just been issued.” They had also doubled the amount of sandbags covering their trench so that German snipers would not kill Santa Claus.

Such was the nature of the trench newspaper, where the low quality of life, the constant risk of death, and even the inappropriateness of Christmas decorations in the trenches were highlighted through satire. While some projected Christian notions of sacrifice on soldiers to keep the Christmas spirit alive in wartime, others used irony to expose the farce. The not-so-subtle message was that, despite the hardships that made a conventional Christmas impossible, the men had not lost their spirit. Perhaps this is a sentiment that can only be given justice through the trench newspaper’s typical dark humour: “Whizz-bangs, Krumps, Krumps, and such delicate attention have taught us most effectively that it is better to give than to receive.”

If the spirit of the season could find expression in the face of conflict, so too could it be celebrated in the environment of war. All joking aside, some semblance of an ordinary Christmas could be had behind the lines. As The Listening Post noted, “Adaptability is a Canadian characteristic,” and so the men of the 7th Battalion were “prepared to celebrate Christmas to the best of their necessarily limited material resources.” With the use of a hut and a small stove, officers were treated to a Christmas dinner. After announcements by the commanding officer and a toast to Canada and the Allies there was a moment of silence to honour those killed, wounded, captured or back home. Non-commissioned officers and other men of the battalion were likewise treated to a Christmas celebration thanks to the Y.M.C.A.  The No. 12th Canadian Field Ambulance described their 1917 Christmas festivities as “the jolliest time ever had in France.” Approximately 200 men gathered for a concert and feast. They were treated to theatre, music, sardines, toast and turkey, and the walls and ceilings were “camouflaged with cheery decorations” that mirrored the attitude of the men. “We were plentifully supplied with false faces, paper hats, whistles, tin-horns,” one writer recalled, “there was an unlimited amount of good humour and sparkling wit.” Some were able to escape to pleasant memories of home: “It sure reminds me of the kind [of turkey] mother used to make” was one such remark by a soldier. The effort was enough to boost the morale of the men. As their journal In & Out concluded, “We rolled into our blankets … mightily pleased with the day’s activities, and wishing that Christmas came more than once a year.”

Not all men were lucky enough to enjoy such a setting on Christmas. Nor did every soldier possess the wit and literary gifts as some of the trench newspapers contributors. Nevertheless, these snippets show some of the ways in which a domestic holiday devoted to “goodwill towards men” could be reconciled in the environment of the Western Front, and in ways very different from the example set in 1914.

HMS Tribune: Halifax's first maritime disaster is almost forgotten

(Volume 23-10)

By Bob Gordon

Founded by the Royal Navy in 1749 on the shores of a remarkable natural harbour, Bedford Basin, Halifax has been a navy town since. A challenge to the French at Fortress Louisbourg and in violation of a treaty with the Mi’kmaq, Halifax was born on the front line. It grew to become the most important Royal Navy base in the western Atlantic.

Since 1910, when the Naval Service of Canada was established (and renamed the Royal Canadian Navy one year later), the naval presence has brought a host of benefits to Halifax including infrastructure, investment and employment. Also, Halifax has often paid a price for this military significance. The massive explosion in 1917 killed over 1,900 and left 6,000 homeless. During VE-Day celebrations on May 7, 1945, rioting broke out that carried into the next day, ravaged the central business district and left three dead. Only two weeks before VE-Day, HMCS Esquimalt was torpedoed within sight of the lights of Halifax. Six months earlier, HMCS Clayoquot met the same fate on Christmas Eve 1944. In this roll call of naval tragedy, HMS Tribune is conspicuous in its absence. Despite the loss of approximately 250 lives within hailing distance of the shore, the men are unmourned. With a legitimate claim to being the largest shipboard naval disaster in Canadian history, the fate of HMS Tribune is all but forgotten.

Originally christened La Charente Inférieure of the Marine royale française when it was launched at Rochefort in 1793 during the French Revolutionary Wars, HMS Tribune was a fifth-rate frigate mounting 34 guns and eight 32-pounder carronades (some sources suggest a total of 44 barrels). At 900 tons, she was long — over 40 metres — and lean, with a draft of less than four metres and a beam of 11.5 metres. The Halifax Royal Gazette, in the immediate aftermath of the tragedy, described her as “one of the finest frigates in her majesty’s service.”

A year after the frigate was launched, in 1794, the newly minted French revolutionary government determined that a vessel named after a minor river flowing into the Bay of Biscay lacked revolutionary vigour. She was more appropriately renamed La Tribune, evoking ancient Roman democracy. In mid-1796, La Tribune was under the command of Citoyen John Moulson (or Moulston), an American who had served in the French Navy for 16 years.

She was captured off the south coast of Ireland near Scilly by HMS Unicorn, commanded by Captain Thomas Williams, in June 1796. The capture was announced with glowing praise in The London Gazette on June 18, 1796: “Intrepidity and judicious Management were never more strongly manifested than in this Instance, which reflects the highest Honor on Captains Williams and Martin, and on every Individual under their Command.” Williams’s conquest earned him a knighthood. Two days later a prize crew brought La Tribune into Portsmouth Harbour and shipwrights began repairs and refitting. Additionally, all the ordinance was replaced with canon and carronade cast by the Royal Artillery at Woolwich.

The following spring, on April 29, 1797, she was rechristened HMS Tribune and brought into Royal Navy service. Captain Scory Barker was assigned to command a fortnight later. Within weeks she was briefly thrust into the limelight. In July, inclement weather prevented the courts martial of the Spithead mutineers from convening on HMS Royal William and the venue was moved to HMS Tribune. Captain Barker welcomed aboard Sir John Orde, Rear Admiral of the White, presiding, his entourage, the accused, witnesses, et al. Two days later the crew of HMS Tribune contributed to the military justice system in a less pleasant manner. They provided the witnesses to the execution of the death sentences delivered by Rear Admiral Orde.

Two months later HMS Tribune was operational. Flying the Union Jack, she set sail from Torbay on September 22, 1797 under Captain Barker. She was detailed to escort a resupply convoy to the Quebec and Newfoundland fleets. En route HMS Tribune lost track of its convoy and headed for Halifax alone, arriving in the early morning of Thursday, November 23.

Two months out and hours from port, a debate broke out between the captain and the master. Captain Barker favoured waiting for a local pilot. Reportedly, the master, John Clegg, objected vehemently arguing that “he had beat a 44-gun ship into the harbour, that he had frequently been there, nor was there any occasion for a pilot since the wind was favourable.” The fateful decision was taken to proceed immediately under the master and the Captain returned to his cabin.

The book Remarkable Shipwrecks, Or a Collection of Interesting Accounts of Naval Disasters: With Many Particulars of the Extraordinary Adventures and Sufferings of the Crews of Vessels Wrecked at Sea, and of Their Treatment on Distant Shores, which was published in Connecticut in 1813, only 16 years after the mishap, describes the moments before disaster struck: “By twelve o’clock the ship had approached so near the Thrum Cap shoals that the master became alarmed, and sent for Mr. Galvin, master’s mate, who was sick below. On his coming upon deck, he heard the man in the chains sing out, ‘By the mark five!’ ... the master ran, in great agitation, to the wheel, and took it from the man who was steering, with the intention of wearing the ship; but before this could be effected, or Galvin was able to give an opinion, she struck.” The sickening thud of the ship hitting the shoal brought the captain back on deck.

Initially, distress signals were run up and acknowledged by the nearby shore installations. Boats were dispatched to aid the stricken ship. However, the winds prevented the military boats, save one, from reaching it. Then, efforts were made to lighten the ship by dumping cannon and other heavy objects. Accompanied by a rising tide, these efforts were successful: “about half past eight o’clock in the evening the ship began to heave, and at nine got off the shoals.” Ultimately, however, freeing her from the shoal sealed the fate of the Tribune and her crew.

Afloat it was discovered the frigate had two metres of water in its hold and that the chain pumps could not keep up with the inflow. The ship was sinking. Additionally, the battering on the shoal had damaged the gudgeon and pindle, ripping the rudder from the hull. It hung lifeless and useless from the stern of the ship. Adrift and rudderless with a gale rising, the ship floated across the harbour entrance and finally ground ashore off Herring Cove on the west side of the channel.

Remarkable Shipwrecks describes the terrifying events that followed: “The scene, before sufficiently distressing, now became peculiarly awful. More than 240 men, besides several women and children, were floating on the waves, making the last effort to preserve life.” Their cruel fate was rendered bitterer still by the small, but insurmountable gap that separated them from the safety of dry land. “The place where the ship went down was barely three times her length to the southward of the entrance into Herring Cove. The inhabitants came down in the night to the point opposite to which the ship sunk, kept up large fires, and were so near as to converse with the people on the wreck.”

Earlier, a handful of officers had reached land in the jolly boat. However, Captain Barker, fearing for his career prospects, refused to proclaim the order to abandon ship. A captain in the Royal Navy knew that it was career suicide to issue such a fateful order, that he would never again receive an operational command. Consequently, the crew and passengers, hundreds of stranded souls, found themselves trapped on the floundering vessel in the dead of night with a gale rising. Throughout the night in the wind, water and chill they slowly expired.

There are conflicting reports on fatalities, calculations complicated by an inaccurate crew manifest and the presumed presence of ‘unofficial’ passengers (notably, wives and children of officers). Some sources say 14, others say only 12, aboard made it to safety. Accounts of how many were aboard range from 250 to 289. Therefore, somewhere between 235 and 275 persons died of exposure or drowned.

Late in the morning of November 24, a young Herring Cove lad rowed a dory out to the wreck and was able to draw off eight more survivors. Known to history as Joe Cracker, his real name is unknown. Cracker was Royal Navy slang for a keener or a go-getter. Nonetheless, the very existence of a lad known to history as Joe Cracker is rendered probable by the inclusion of the tale in the 1813 source, Remarkable Shipwrecks: “The first exertion that was made for their relief was by a boy thirteen years old, from Herring Cove, who ventured off in a small skiff by himself about eleven o’clock the next day. This youth, with great labor and extreme risk to himself, boldly approached the wreck, and backed in his little boat so near to the fore-top as to take off two of the men, for the boat could not with safety hold any more.”

At the time, Prince Edward Augustus, Duke of Kent and Strathearn and the fourth son of George III, was resident in Halifax, serving as a major-general and commander-in-chief of the Royal Nova Scotia Regiment. The young hero was presented to the prince and Sir John Wentworth, lieutenant-governor of Nova Scotia. In consequence of his heroism, the 13-year-old was offered a position as a volunteer on HMS Resolution. However, the adventure was short-lived as he proved unsuitable for naval service and was soon discharged to resume his life in Herring Cove.

Nova Scotia publisher and politician Joseph Howe fancied himself a poet and once set to preserve the memory of HMS Tribune:

Acadia’s child — thy humble name

The Muse will long revere.

The wreath you nobly won from Fame

Shall bloom for many a year.

Long as the thoughts which swell’d thy breast.

The flame that lit thy eye,

Shall in our Country’s bosom rest,

Thy name shall never die!

Howe’s fervent wish that honest and innocent heroism amidst tragedy be remembered through the ages was forlorn. Today, even the young Cracker’s real name remains unknown. The small plaque on Tribune Head that recognizes his heroism states simply: “Joe Cracker, the fisher lad of 13 years who was the first to rescue survivors from the wreck of HMS Tribune in a heavy sea off the headland.” Beyond this silent invocation, the loss of some 250 souls stranded aboard HMS Tribune passes silently, forgotten.

The Tides of Memory Come In

By Alexander Fitzgerald-Black 

Words from a Second World War correspondent still resonate to this day on the true meaning of Remembrance

On November 8, 1944 the First Canadian Army completed operations to clear and secure the banks of the Scheldt estuary, opening the logistically vital port of Antwerp to Allied shipping. The port itself had been liberated over two months earlier, but it had taken tenacious fighting by Canadian, British, Polish and other Allied forces to secure its approaches. Canada’s toll for these operations amounted to 1,418 killed and 4,949 wounded, approximately fifty per cent of the casualties suffered by Allied forces in the Battle of the Scheldt.

Although the cost was high, this was arguably the Canadian Army’s most significant contribution to victory in the Second World War. Antwerp had been captured with its port facilities intact thanks to the brave efforts of the Dutch Resistance. Once its approaches were clear, the inland port became an essential node in the Allied logistical chain in Northwest Europe. The First Canadian Army — some 170,000 men organized in two corps (five divisions and two armoured brigades) — had seen hard fighting without much respite since its activation in July 1944 during the height of the Normandy battle. For its part, 3rd Canadian Infantry Division had landed at Juno Beach on D-Day.

After this draining victory, which also saw the surrender of 40,000 German troops, First Canadian Army was taken out of the line for a period of regeneration. The CBC’s senior war correspondent, Matthew Halton, decided to take the opportunity to reflect on his pilgrimage to what is now the Canadian National Vimy Memorial Park. He had visited the Vimy Memorial in September 1944, after he witnessed the destruction of German forces at Falaise and the great advance following the Normandy breakout.

Halton shared his experiences with homes across Canada over the crackle of the wireless. Families of servicemen and women abroad must have been stirred by his reflections. Remembrance Day in 1944 took place as that “hard and cruel war [drew] slowly towards its bitter end.”

The Grand Alliance seemed to have Germany beaten. It wasn’t a question of whether Germany would fall, but a question of when, and at what further cost. Few probably guessed that Adolf Hitler’s armies had one last great offensive in them — Unternehmen Wacht am Rhein (“Operation Watch on the Rhine”), which would become known in popular circles as the Battle of the Bulge. Once the counterattack was dealt with, the First Canadian Army would once again play a significant and costly role in the final assault on Nazi Germany and in the liberation of the Netherlands.

As Halton addressed the nation he lamented the mass destruction and death of two generations. He accurately predicted additions to cenotaphs around the country, with places like Arras, Bapaume, Ypres, and Vimy Ridge to be joined by places like Bretteville-sur-Laize, Caen, Tilly-la-Campagne, and Falaise. For Halton, these were the anthems of the doomed youth of two generations.

In this country and in others, movements have sprung up protesting Remembrance Day as perpetuating jingoistic attempts by governments and their militaries to justify conflict. The white poppy movement and its supporters make news every November 11th, some arguing that the red poppy worn by the majority of citizens glorifies war. Others counter that the red poppy is a symbol of remembrance; some find those who wear white poppies are giving offence to the nation’s veterans and others impacted by conflict.

I believe that Matthew Halton’s reflections are instructive in this debate. He asks his listeners a question that we should ask ourselves every Remembrance Day: “There’ll be mad dogs again in the future, what are you going to do?” In Halton’s day, those mad dogs were Nazi Germany, Fascist Italy, and Imperial Japan. Arguably, the Western Allies fought alongside another mad dog: Joseph Stalin. Today’s mad dogs are the Taliban, the Islamic State, Bashar al-Assad, and, in some circles, Vladimir Putin. Canada has opposed each of these mad dogs on varying levels. 

The question Halton urges us to consider is whether our resistance to these threats — real or perceived — to world security is worth the cost. Canada’s combat death toll from Afghanistan sits at 158, while suicides of PTSD-laden veterans will continue to drive that death toll upwards.

Some argue that Canada needs to maintain its commitments to allies; if we want a seat at the table, we had better be willing to shed some blood. Halton has an answer for this too. He notes the terrible duality of war, that “splendid things come out of war, but war is a thing to be ashamed of.” Canada emerged from the Second World War as one of the world’s great, un-devastated, economies. Some scholars argue that the post-war period was a golden era in Canadian foreign relations, when this country’s middle power status carried significant weight among the major powers. But the cost of these gains was immense: over 45,000 Canadians were killed and 54,000 were wounded. Beyond these figures, it is not hard to imagine the lingering effects that PTSD had on families when loved ones were finally reunited.

Matthew Halton leaves us with a plea to “not break the faith.” He urges his listeners to move forward after the present World War in efforts to avoid a third. We haven’t broken the faith so far, at least not on the massive scale that Halton experienced twice in his lifetime. I’d like to believe that Remembrance Day has something to do with that. Its power is in forcing us to consider both sides of the paradox of war. We must thank and remember our veterans for their efforts in building the society we cherish today while, at the same time, reflecting on those who were lost in that terrible effort to build this better world.

I encourage you to listen to Matthew Halton’s words with an open mind and an open heart. I listen to the clip every November 11th. In it I find a profound understanding for the meaning of Remembrance Day, when the “tides of memory come in.” Enjoy, and Lest We Forget.