Saturday, December 30, 2017

Editor's Column: As Published in the Norwich Gazette

Faint Footsteps, WW2

[Photo: Doug Harrison, Buryl McIntyre; Norwich boys in Halifax, 1941]

Introduction:

I recently made an agreement to write 24 columns for the Norwich Gazette, my father's hometown newspaper. In the 1990s he wrote for his favourite weekly upon a variety of subjects, but the most significant columns, in my opinion, were about his time with RCNVR and Combined Operations during World War 2.

I will attempt to share many details related to his training in Canada and the U.K. and subsequent involvement in significant raids and invasions under the able direction of the Combined Operations organization. I will try to tell as complete a story as possible related to the adventures he experienced between embarking on them (June 1941) and disembarking ( September 5, 1945).

Column 1: Following My Father’s Trail from 1941-45

My father enlisted for military service in the Royal Canadian Navy Volunteer Reserve at H.M.C.S. Star, Hamilton’s Navy base, in June 1941. After initial training there he was moved on to more rigorous activities in Halifax (H.M.C.S. Stadacona).

In his navy memoirs he says the following about the move to the East Coast in October ’41. “Hamilton was tough, (but) it couldn’t hold a candle to Halifax.”

If I’d been asked a few years ago what my father did after completing his training at Stadacona, I would have said he joined or was assigned to the Merchant Marine and during the course of the war patrolled the Atlantic in merchant ships that carried valuable cargoes of troops, food supplies and materials of war to the United Kingdom.

My impressions would have been based on slim details found in one of his columns that appeared in the Norwich Gazette in the early 1990s, entitled ‘Merchant Mariner True Norwich Hero.’

The first two sentences read as follows:

Norwich has its pioneers and its heroes. One of the heroes, according to this observer, is Lorne ‘Skimp’ Smith, a wireless operator once attached to the United States merchant marine during the Second World War.

The column goes on to say that after a meaningful conversation with Skimp, Dad was asked what he planned to do, where he planned to serve. He said he was going to join the navy. Though J.C. St. John (a former principal of Norwich High School) wanted Dad to join the army in the Elgin Regiment, the last two sentences of the column read: “I would curse him (Skimp) later, many times, but on that day... the die was cast. It was to be navy blue for me.”

He began training in Hamilton - on probationary strength - shortly thereafter.

Twenty years after the above column was published I buried my father at sea according to his expressed wish, but I was none the wiser about his WW2 actions. When I tossed a small wooden ship containing his ashes into the Atlantic Ocean near Halifax, the only words engraved on an attached plaque related to his service read, “Leading Seaman, Canadian Merchant Marine.”

Hopefully I built the "small wooden ship" with more skill than the plaque.

On that day in June 2010, I was mere feet from the ocean upon which I believed he’d served as a Merchant Mariner. But I was way off base. I was in fact about 4,000 kilometres from the first Combined Operations training camps he attended (with Buryl McIntyre, another Norwich boy) in southern England and north-west Scotland beginning in January 1942. I was even farther from Dieppe and the shores of North Africa, Sicily and Italy, the places where Canadians in Combined Operations manned landing crafts during dangerous raids and life-altering invasions in 1942 and ’43.

Doug Harrison (centre foreground) assists U.S. troops from
British landing craft LCA 428, in N. Africa, Nov. 8, 1942
Photo as found at Imperial War Museum (IWM)

Way, way off base. When I tossed the wooden ship from a slippery rock on the East Coast, I was unaware that Dad finished his ‘Navy days’ on the West Coast, at a Combined Ops training camp on Vancouver Island.

That being said, after discovering my father's hand-written Navy memoirs in a tired-looking folder in November 2011, and carefully reading several of his columns from the Gazette, and more, I’ve made gains in understanding the path he followed during World War II.

I have dozens of pertinent photos and hundreds of verifiable details at my fingertips. I know his love of ships goes back to his childhood, and his Rolex Oyster watch (a gift from his mother Alice and girlfriend Edith Catton in 1941) was stolen five minutes after he took it off to shave at Navy barracks in Halifax. I know he was discharged in September 1945, one day before his 25th birthday - after declining the call to participate in the Pacific theatre of war - and I know shadows cast during WW2 followed him, and some of his mates, for a long time.

I also know what he said in his memoirs, penned in 1975, is true: “It would cost a small fortune today to retrace the places I had been to and seen under the White Ensign.”

The cost of trips I’ve taken to Halifax, Scotland, London (U.K.) and Vancouver Island would surely make my father roll his eyes, but ‘small fortune’ or not, they were worth every penny.

Future travels, more so I’m sure.

GH


Unattributed Photo GH

Wednesday, December 27, 2017

Video: Fox Movietone Newsreels - North Africa, 1942.

The Invasion of N. Africa, November 8, 1942.

["This way, boys." A Canadian in Combined Ops leads the way for U.S. Troops]

Introduction:

As time goes by, more and more valuable material about World War 2 is being presented by war museums, university archives, etc., in very good quality. Occasionally, the material provides a glimpse of the role of Canadians in Combined Operations.

While looking at a digitized version of The Winnipeg Tribune (e.g., a collection of 1943 issues) I noticed that Winnipeg movie theatres were presenting news reels about many significant events (and not so significant, if viewers were not interested in Harvard or Yale football scores).

First-hand details about the invasion of North Africa, Sicily, Italy (and much more) were provided in short newsreels before the latest feature film hit the screen:



The Canadian Paramount News agency, mentioned above, was but one of several producers and distributors of newsreels, and more research needs to be done by this Editor to find that agency's cache of WW2 reels.

That being said, a cache of newsreels produced by Fox Movietone News has been located and I will provide links to several on this site (a few at a time) that reveal more about the role played by Canadians in Combined Operations during significant D-Days between 1942 - 1944.

One link provided with this entry is connected to the invasion of North Africa and reveals the scene depicted in the top photo - a Canadian member of RCNVR and Combined Ops leading US troops to the shores of North Africa on Nov. 8, 1942 at Arzeu. (The sailor very closely resembles my father, and he was serving at Arzeu on that day.)

About Arzeu, Clayton Marks of London, Ontario writes:

At Arzew, Z beach had been selected for the biggest of the three landings - here the S.N.O.L. was Captain Q.D. Graham. The assault craft lost cohesion, and instead of touching down simultaneously they arrived piecemeal over a period of more than twenty minutes. The American Commander insisted on sending so much gear ashore with his men that the landings from the LCM Flotilla were delayed by nearly two hours and the whole program fell more and more behind the clock. The troops went ashore greatly overloaded, and here again, any opposition would have been disastrous. (Page 68, Combined Operations)

And I found the following statements about those days in my father's Navy memoirs;

Once the bulldozer was unloaded the shuttle service began. For ‘ship to shore’ service we were loaded with five gallon jerry cans of gasoline. I worked 92 hours straight and I ate nothing except for some grapefruit juice I stole.

Our Coxswain was L/S Jack Dean of Toronto and our officer was Lt. McDonald RNR. After the 92 hours my officer said, “Well done. An excellent job, Harrison. Go to Reina Del Pacifico and rest.” 

But first the Americans brought in a half track (they found out snipers were in a train station) and shelled the building to the ground level. No more snipers. ("DAD, WELL DONE")

It sounds like, according to two Canadians, that the Americans slowed down the transportation process by bringing in lots of supplies but speeded up the establishment of a beachhead by having lots of ammo.

So, I call it a draw. (Canadians are known for their ability to compromise : )

US troops disembark from British landing crafts manned by Canadian sailors.
November 8, 1942. ALC 426, left. Photo - Imperial War Museum (IWM).

Please link to the following newsreels, as found at the University of South Carolina:

1. The U.S. Invasion of (North) Africa - Volume 25, Number 22, from Nov. 21, 1942.

Includes scenes of the world's largest armada up to that date; busy landing crafts; landings.

Film and audio quality is very good at full screen.

2. A Year of War Since Pearl Harbour - Volume 25, Number 24, from Nov. 28, 1942.

Includes video from which the top still photo was taken.

3. Rickenbacker Alive After 24 Days on Raft - Volume 25, Number 21, Nov. 18, 1942.

Includes the launch of three Landing Craft, Tanks (LCTs).

Landing craft off the coast of Arzeu, North Africa. November, 1942
Photo as found at IMW.

Please link to Video: Canadian Army Newsreel - Sicily

Unattributed Photos GH

Tuesday, December 26, 2017

Articles: 1943 Issues of Gangway, Navy News .

Royal Canadian Navy Gangway

[Photo: West Coast News, by Canadian Navy Personnel]

Introduction:

In the September 2, 1943 issue of The Winnipeg Tribune (Digitized) mention was made of Ordinary Seaman (OD) Bruce Mooney, ex-newspaperman for the Tribune. We are told OD Mooney went to work on the Gangway, an RCN newspaper situated at the Navy base (Naden I) in Esquimalt, B.C.

This Editor believes that for those interested in Navy history and stories, finding old copies of The Gangway would be an interesting research project.

[Four issues of Gangway can be read by linking to "For Posterity's Sake."]

Canadian Navy history and memoirs reveals that during WW2 there was a Combined Operations training base (Givenchy III) established in late 1943 at Comox Spit on Vancouver Island, and several veterans of the raid at Dieppe and the invasions of North Africa, Sicily and Italy went there to serve in January 1944, after they had returned home from Europe in December 1943.

Though Gangway does not focus on Combined Operations to any great extend, references are made to personnel and events that veterans of Combined Ops (and those searching on behalf of veterans) would likely find interesting. Some details and articles are provided below.

From the May 1943 issue:


[Photo: Iconic picture taken at HMS Quebec, Inveraray Scotland.
Canadians who had volunteered for Combined Operations trained
on landing craft there, beginning in Spring 1942.

The above photo and attached article appeared in Gangway to provide information about a practice assault using landing craft at a Canadian location. The assault was being filmed as part of a Hollywood Movie, likely "Commandos Strike At Dawn."

During WW2, most of Canada's landing craft were on Vancouver Island, many at Givenchy III.



More photos related to the movie, starring HMCS Prince David, can be found at For Posterity's Sake.

Givenchy Barracks were at Esquimalt Navy base, and pre-dated
Givenchy III Barracks at Comox Spit.

Navy boys played a lot of baseball at Esquimalt and the tradition continued at Comox. Editor is not sure if Naden III refers to Esquimalt base or Comox base.


Zooy suiters had a hard time from Navy boys in London, Ontario. Similar news about Navy VS Zoots came out of Montreal as well. What was the problem?


Lloyd Evans, RCNVR and Combined Operations, writes about being in Malta in August 1943, and among many details he recalls is a short reference to a Canadian pilot, Buzz Beurling:

 Malta - Aug 1943

On arrival at Valetta harbour we tied up our LCMs. We were billeted for a week or two at old Fort Manuel before moving to a tented camp....

This was the Island where the Canadian pilot Buzz (screwball) Beurling, at that time with the RAF and later with the R.C.A.F., became known as the "Knight of Malta." The story goes that he was shot down near the water's edge and, although injured, made his way back to the airfield. He immediately took off in another plane and shot down the plane responsible for shooting him down earlier! After the war he was killed taking off from Rome on his way to fight for Israel; the plane had been sabotaged.
(Page 31, My Naval Chronicle)

Coincidentally, a lengthier reference concerning Buzz is found in the July 1943 issue of Gangway:



The Firedrake was well-known to the first two drafts of Canadians who volunteered for Combined Operations in late 1941. When they were shipped overseas in early 1942 in the Volendam, a Dutch liner (just one of several ships in a convoy), they were escorted by the faithful Firedrake and it earned their praise.

My father writes the following in his memoirs, concerning the convoy and his safe arrival in Scotland in January 1942:

The convoy consisted of a destroyer H.M.S. Firedrake, armed merchant ship Jervis Bay (sister ship of the famed Burgess Bay who held off a large German man o’ war until the remainder of its convoy could escape, costing her her life and all aboard) and an American four-stacker loaned by the USA to England.

The Dutch captain lined us all up and assured us we would arrive safely because the Volendam had already taken three torpedoes and lived to sail. This was very heartening news for those of us who had never been to sea except for a few hours in Halifax upon a mine-sweeper. Our first meal was sausage with lots of grease. Naturally, many were sick as it was very rough.

Late at night I was on watch at our stern and saw a red plume of an explosion on our starboard quarter. In the morning the four-stacker was not to be seen. The next evening I heard cries for help, presumably from a life-raft or life-boat. Although I informed the officer of the watch, we were unable to stop and place ourselves in jeopardy as we only had the Firedrake with ASDIC (sonar) to get us through safely.

After some days we spotted a light on our port stern quarter one night. It was the light of the conning tower of a German submarine. How she failed to detect us, or the Firedrake detect it, I will never know. I was gun layer and nearly fell off the gun (4.7 gauge). I informed the Bridge and the Captain said, “Don’t shoot. Don’t shoot. It could be one of ours.” But as it quickly submerged we did fire one round to buck up our courage.

Some days later we spotted a friendly flying Sunderland and shortly after sailed up the Firth of Clyde to disembark at the Canadian barracks called Niobe. Before we disembarked, however, we took up a good - sized collection for the crew of the Firedrake for bringing us through. It was soon confirmed that the American four-stacker had taken a fish (torpedo).
(Pages 8-9, "DAD, WELL DONE")

[Editor: The book can be purchased via AbeBooks]

Recently, news articles related to the invasion of Italy (D-Day Sept. 3, 1943) have been posted on this website. And more will follow. In the July 1943 issue of Gangway the following appeared:


Before I discovered (in memoirs) that my father had been a member of Combined Operations, I assumed he was a member of the merchant marine. Though the poem below relates to the Merchant Navy it could be used to raise appreciation for all those who volunteered to serve their country during WW2:

[Last line: "They give; must not we repay?"]

Please link to Articles: Italy, September 4 and 6, 1943 - Pt 21.

Unattributed Photos GH

Monday, December 18, 2017

Articles: Italy, September 4 and 6, 1943 - Pt 3.

Canadians on Landing Crafts Get Top Billing!!

Canadians run troops and tanks, etc. from Messina to Reggio Calabria

Introduction:

Stop the presses!

Seldom do I give that order, but today I share an news article (from the Sept. 6 1943 issue of The Winnipeg Tribune, digitized) that mentions the names of several Canadian members of Combined Operations, part of the 80th Flotilla of Landing Crafts, stationed in Messina, Sicily for the invasion of Italy and the supply of troops thereafter. 

The writer, Dick Sanburn, a Tribune War Correspondent, likely travelled to Italy aboard the landing crafts at some point during the early days of the invasion and got to know several of the Canadians who were in charge of the transporting of troops and supplies. He made note of the names of several men and many were familiar to my father, mentioned in his Navy memoirs, and familiar to this editor as well. 

For example, Lloyd Evans is mentioned, and I have referred to Lloyd's memoirs in the last two entries related to these WW2 articles, and again today. 

A terrific find, I say. And though the Canadian Navy boys in Combined Ops will soon receive little notice from the press as troops move inland, they receive top billing from me today.

The complete article follows:


Lieut. Jack Koyl (aka Uncle Jake according to my father) is the first officer mentioned and he has been mentioned and highlighted in previous posts.

LS Jim Searle, J. Malone of Edmonton, Norm Boren of Ottawa (sic. I'm certain Sanford is referring to N. Bowen) and Donald Westbrook of Hamilton (aka "Westy") were familiar mates to my father.

 Doug Harrison, back row, centre. Jim Malone, next right. At Givenchy III, Comox, BC

Back row, L-R: Don Westbrook, Chuck Rose, Joe Spencer.
Front Row, L-R: Joe Watson, Doug Harrison, Art Warrick.
Givenchy III.

Lloyd Evans, formerly of Ottawa, now in Markham, Ontario and mentioned above, recalls the following about the early days after the invasion of Italy:

Three of us decided to do a little sightseeing when the other crew were on duty on our craft. We visited Reggia di Calabria and called in on a police station with a letter requisitioning any guns we wanted. Under the occupation rules and regulations locals had to turn in any weapons they held. To make the letter look authentic we stamped it with an official looking mark...the stamp having been made out of a potato. As we suspected the local police couldn’t read English and they fell for it. Most of the weapons looked like antiques from the Boer war but I managed to get a lovely little Baretta ladies gun that I later sold to an American sailor in Gibraltar.

Charlie Sellick, Jim Ivison, with weapons "like antiques" in Italy, 1943.
Photo from the collection of Joe Spencer, RCNVR, Combined Ops.

I didn’t think my leg was too bad other than very sore but it got worse a few days later. After a visit to the first aid post I was sent down the coast by ambulance with a few others. We spent one night in a church and next day arrived at a British hospital in Catania near Mt Etna. When they noticed my Canada badge I was offered a move to a Canadian base a short distance away - the 5th Canadian Casualty Clearing Station that was situated in a modern Sicilian hospital. The next day they operated on my leg to remove a blood clot.

One of the soldiers in the ward had been caught in machine gun crossfire. About 70 bullets had hit him but amazingly only one drew blood, the others just left burn marks as they grazed him. I only accepted the truth of his story when I saw his shirt cut to ribbons. The one that did the damage went right through his rear end. I was deeply impressed with the skill and dedication of all the medical staff and the hours they put in. This was especially the case when a large numbers of casualties arrived from the front lines.
(Page 33 - 34, My Naval Chronicles) 

Clayton Marks of London, Ontario writes the following about the days after the invasion in COMBINED OPERATIONS:

For a month after the lightly-opposed Italian landing the 80th Flotilla carried out its familiar routine of ferry work. The end came with the Italian armistice and a great celebration in which the population of the countryside joined, and after that the word "England" was on every man's lip. The men of the 55th and 61st assault Flotillas had long been in the United Kingdom. The 81st was also there. Last of the Combined Operations units to return to Britain, the men of the 80th Flotilla, arrived on October 27th. (Page 86)

My father, a member of Combined Operations and the aforementioned 80th Flotilla, and who celebrated his 23rd birthday on September 6, 1943 - the same date as the opening newspaper story above) mentions the following about some of the adopted routines the men experienced after the invasion:

How long we worked across the straits I cannot really recall, but perhaps into October. One of our stokers set up a medical tent for the civilians at Messina and treated them for sores and rashes. We fed them too but when pregnant women came we had to close up shop. 

After a time we were sleeping in casas or houses and I had a helper, a little Sicilian boy named Pietro. First of all I scrubbed him, gave him toothpaste, soap and food. He was cute, about 13 or 14 years of age, but very small because of malnutrition.  His mother did  my washing and  mending for a can of peas or whatever I could scrounge. I was all set up. When Italy caved in there was a big celebration on the beach, but I had changed my abode and was sleeping with my hammock, covered with mosquito netting, slung between two orange trees. I didn’t join in the celebration because I’d had enough vino, and you not only fought Germans and Italians under its influence, you fought your best friend.

We weren’t too busy and the officers (who ate separately but had the same food as us) were growing tired of the diet, the same as we were, even though they had a Sicilian cook and we didn’t. An officer by the name of (Andrew) Wedd asked me if I knew where there were some chickens or something. I said, “Chickens, yes.” 

When he said, “How be we put on some sneakers and gaffle them,” I said right then, “Okay by me. Tonight at dark we’ll go, but I get a portion for my part of the deal.” He agreed and later we got every chicken in the coop, rung their necks, and then took them to the house and had the Sicilian cook prepare them. I got a couple of drum sticks out the window. Next morning, the Sicilian cook came in as mad as hell. Someone had stolen his chickens. Little did he know at the time he cooked them that they were his own because his wife looked after them.

We had some days off and we travelled, did some sight seeing, e.g., visiting German graves. We met Sicilian prisoners walking home disconsolately, stopped them, and took sidearms from any officer. We saw oxen still being used as draft animals when we were there.

Sometimes we went to Italy and to Allied Military Government of Occupied Territory depot (AMGOT). (They later changed that name because in Italian it meant shi-!) While a couple of ratings kept the man in charge of all the revolvers busy, we picked out a lot of dandies. If he caught us we were ready. We had chits made out, i.e., “Please supply this rating with sidearms,” signed Captain P.T. Gear or Captain B.M. Lever, after the Breech Mechanism Lever on a large gun.

I learned quite a bit of the Sicilian language under Pietro’s tutelage. He did all my errands and I would have sure liked to have brought him home. It broke my heart to leave him. (Page 35-36, "DAD, WELL DONE")

* * * * * *

Below are more news articles, cartoons, maps and photographs from The Winnipeg Tribune (issues dated Sept. 4 and 6, 1943). Hopefully they provide more content and context related to the activites of Canadians in Combined Operations while in Italy:


















Please link to Articles: Italy, September 3, 1943 - Pt 2.

Unattributed Photos GH