LOOKING BACK FROM LATER ON:
THE 50TH ANNIVERSARY OF DIEPPE
By Doug Harrison, RCNVR and Combined Operations, 1941 - 1945
[Originally published in the Norwich Gazette, 1992, then in St. Nazaire to Singapore: The Canadian Amphibious War, 1941 - 1945 (Volume 2)]
The truth as to why the mostly Canadian Forces raid on Dieppe took place on that tragic day of August 19, 1942 will probably never be known. For writers - for years after the war - anything pertaining to the Dieppe raid was dealing with censored or restricted material. Those in authority were possibly hoping a fateful error would be forgotten or become vague or hazy in the minds of the participants and non-participants alike.
Approximately seventy-one Canadian navy officers and ratings took part in the eventful raid, many manning landing craft carrying Canadian soldiers. Though the passage was calm they were hardly able to leave the craft to land on the beach of stones, backed by insurmountable cliffs in many places, facing tremendous German fire power. It reminds me of the Charge of the Light Brigade, only much worse......
For the Canadian Navy’s part there were ill omens from the start. Some Canadian sailors were separated from their group and put aboard plywood landing craft with English officers and sailors they hadn’t met before, let alone trained with. Aboard a landing-craft carrying ship, The Duke Of Wellington, loaded with Canadian soldiers, some members of the Black Watch preparing hand grenades had an unfortunate accident. One grenade exploded prematurely. A futile effort was made to throw it out of a porthole but it missed, bounced back and left one dead and eighteen wounded. They were taken ashore just before the ship sailed for the English Channel. The Non-Comm. officer who took them ashore was on the other hand fortunate. He missed the boat.
A small flotilla of landing craft had incredibly bad luck when in mid- channel, at 0347. They unexpectedly met with a small German convoy composed of one reasonably large ship and five small trawlers and E-boats. In the ensuing fire fight one of our Canadian naval officers, Sub/Lt. C.D. Wallace, was killed and lies buried at Dunkerque.
If any ship in the German convoy realized what they saw and got a message ashore then the cat was out of the bag hours before the landing. It has never been clear in my mind how the Allied masterminds had more knowledge of the beaches at North Africa, Sicily and Italy than they did of the beaches of France, less than 75 miles away. In the North African landing November 8, 1942, when dawn broke I was astonished that my landing craft was on the beach only a good stone’s throw away from a sidewalk cafe. Good reconnaissance.
At the actual landing amidst the hellfire that August morning 54 years ago (1942), one Canadian landing craft was struck by cannon fire and heavy machine gun fire. One seaman was killed and the coxswain severely wounded. The stoker, Robert Brown DSM*, although wounded himself, and our commanding officer tried to free the craft and worked feverishly to help the wounded, to no avail. Mercifully, after the day which seemed like eternity, they and the wounded coxswain were captured. The coxswain, Lloyd Campbell of London, died October 21 despite very good German medical attention and is buried in Berlin. Richard Cavanagh, the seaman, lies at his rest at Dieppe.
Stoker Brown, DSM and commanding Officer Robert McRae returned to Canada after POW Camp. I have visited both men. Mr. McRae lives in Toronto and taught as a Professor of Philosophy at the University of Toronto. Brown’s life is a story in itself. He was accepted, at an early age, into the band of Six Nation Indians at Ohsweken, Ontario. I attended his funeral in March, 1989 and he is at rest among his native friends in the Anglican cemetery. One other Canadian sailor killed was Joe McKenna of PEI. His body was transported back to England and is buried in a small church cemetery amidst floral surroundings at Newhaven, the port from which he left that needless day.
So much has been written and captured films televised, with many reasons given for the raid. Possibly much was learned but I am convinced much more was lost.
*Robert Brown (seated), with Doug Harrison (left), and Billie Rose
Photo is dated 'May 21, 1988'
* * * * *
The editor of St. Nazaire to Singapore (Vol. 2) added the following footnote in a later version of the book:
For a long time I wondered if Doug Harrison was too suspicious in his comments about the screening of information related to Dieppe. However, recently, after reading the accounts of the dumping of Vice Admiral Baillie-Grohman as Naval officer in charge at Dieppe, I got some insight. He had been a very successful man in developing and directing Combined Operations in the Middle east before returning to the UK for Dieppe. He was wanting in his job, it seemed, too good a job. It might have endangered Churchill's use of ULTRA system.
It seems that in order to keep the secret, a zone of apparent ignorance was necessary to guard against the Germans wising up to the fact that the Allies were reading and decoding all their audio telegraphy messages. This even included the daily reports of Hitler's generals to him which he required every morning. A strict censorship enabled the British to carry this intelligence block through to the end of the war and beyond. Even Stalin got camouflaged and restricted information which did not leak ULTRA. So there was something there after all which Doug was sensitive to and it cost the Vice Admiral his position because he wanted to make sense of his job and had to be blocked from doing it. Was it something Cliff Wallace sensed too in our last evening together?
"I don't know how, but I have such a feeling I won't get through it," he said.
And another thing - the awareness of politics and war are never far apart.
Please link to another Story re Combined Operations - DIEPPE
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