1000 Men, 1000 Stories : Editor's Research: Canadians in Combined Ops Return Home (2)

The Allies' Long, Slow Slog Continues on Both Sides of Italy

News From The Winnipeg Tribune, January 5 - 7, 1944

Photo Credit - As found online at The War Illustrated Magazine

The above caption reads as follows:

CANADIANS IN CALABRIA. Led by Pipe-Major A. Anderson of Toronto, Canadians of General Montgomery's 8th Army march through Straorina, near Reggio di Calabria. It was on the beaches around Reggio, at 4:40 a.m. on September 3, 1943, the fourth anniversary of our declaration of war on Germany, that our men landed to establish their major bridgehead for the invasion of Italy. Hands on hips, a young Italian girl watches and wonders whilst the Canadians pass. Photo Associated Press

Introduction:

The chances are quite good that the Canadian troops above, who would be serving alongside Monty's Eighth for several months in Italy (though Monty would bid adieu in early January - see previous post - to return to the U.K. to prepare for D-Day Normandy), were transported to beaches near Reggio by Canadian sailors (members of RCNVR and Combined Operations) in the Canadian 80th Flotilla of Landing Crafts (a 'first').

Most of the members of the 80th Flotilla toiled for 4 - 5 weeks, beginning Sept. 3, transporting men and materials of war across the Messina Strait as part of Operation Baytown, before returning to the United Kingdom (and shortly thereafter to Canada).

During January 5 - 7 1943, while Canadian troops battled in Ortona Italy and area, some of the Canadian sailors who had kept supply lines running from Messina to Reggio - by use of their LCMs (landing craft, mechanized; and part of the 80th Flotilla) - were on a train from Toronto bound for HMCS Givenchy III on The Spit near Comox, British Columbia. (The sailors, including my father, had returned to Canada in December, 1943).

And as has been mentioned in the first post in this series, I am searching The Winnipeg Tribune for any stories related to their return and continued service in Combined Operations. Though pickings may be slim, many articles provide excellent details re the battles overseas as well as context for the next stage of my father's WWII experiences.

Items from The Winnipeg Tribune follow:

The RAF and RCAF are very active over Germany:

Canadian war correspondent Douglas Amaron reports progress of the Canadian 1st Division troops. And in a second piece following Amaron's account we read that Cassino is being fortified):

Dick Sanburn, another reliable Canadian writer, responds to criticism that the "long, slow slog" in Italy is too slug-like:

"Red Patch Devils" return to Halifax, Canada about one month after some members of RCNVR - Combined Operations, but circumstances differed. The sailors returned to Halifax aboard the Aquitania and were ready to serve in a new location once their home leave ended, and the "Devils" arrived aboard hospital ship Lady Nelson and needed time to recuperate from injuries. Some of their 'war stories' appear in the next day's edition, soon to follow.

Just as sailors Lloyd Evans, Thomas Fawdry and Jean Kroon were interviewed by local papers after they returned to Canada (see previous post), so were members of the "Red Patch Devils":

Readers, what are the odds that Pte. Stan Fleet, mentioned above, has surviving family members in Kitchener or Killarney? Same goes for others mentioned?

Note to self: Check White pages, check for obits, etc.

Many readers will know that it took quite some time for Allied troops to enter Rome. The Cassino roadblock was a significant slowdown;

Tough times in Italy continued for months for Canadian troops. Meanwhile, some members of RCNVR-Combined Operations were on their way to Comox, B.C., as mentioned earlier. The photo below was very likely taken while a few Canadians in Combined Ops were travelling by ferry from the City of Vancouver to Vancouver Island:

Back L - R: Art Warrick (Hamilton), Ed Chambers, Don Westbrook (Hamilton)

Front L - R: Joe Watson (Simcoe), Don Linder (Kitchener), Doug Harrison (Norwich),

Mystery Man (far right). Circa January 1944

Please note: "Inching" is the correct word:

Canadians Take Ortona!

Photo quality in many newspapers was not the best, as we can see above.

When original photographs appear (sometimes years later), we benefit greatly.

Photo Credit - Ortona, 75 Years Later (link provided below)

I call the news clipping below a "two-fer", i.e., I get two for the price of one. We first read that there is a unique fighting unit at work in the Apennines, Italy, and also get some news about landing craft production in Canada.

The two clips don't seem to be particularly related, but those with an interest in Canadians in Combined Ops will know that landing crafts are at the heart of the matter.

I don't have a timeline re when construction began on landing crafts in Canada, but I do know that most of the landing crafts (in Canada) used for training purposes during WWII were on the west coast, i.e., likely on Vancouver Island, at such places as The Spit (HMCS Naden III, later to be called Givenchy III). Please note - that's where the sailors on the ferry (see their photo a few clips above) are heading!

As well, there are numerous photos re landing craft production, some from a book in my father's collection entitled Canada's War At Sea by Stephen Leacock and Leslie Roberts:

Photo Credit : In 'Publisher's Postscript' Canada's War At Sea, pg 93

Photo Credit: In 'Publisher's Postscript' Canada's War At Sea, pg 28

Photographs of look-alike Canadian-made landing crafts appear in a self-published book of memoirs produced by veterans of RCNVR and Combined Operations, also from my father's collection:

Did my father go from the Toronto train to the Vancouver ferry to The Spit's

LCM flotilla in quick succession? The scenario is very possible.

Photo - St. Nazaire to Singapore: Canadian Amphibious War 1941 - 1945

Top photo - HMCS Givenchy III. Bottom photo - The Slough, Courtenay B.C.

I believe the following two photographs depict Canadian soldiers practicing 'landings on foreign shores,' in this case somewhere on Vancouver Island, British Columbia:

More information concerning a few well-read Canadian columnists:

I believe that I was just handed the easiest segue one could get...

Canadian war correspondent Dick Sanburn (see last line above) does really good work (see next article below):

More information - with excellent diagrams - about "house-to-house" and "room-to-room" infiltration (aka "mouse-holing") can be found at Ortona, 75 years later: The tragedy of Canada’s ‘Little Stalingrad’.

At the above online site readers will also find a lengthy, inspirational piece of prose entitled "At Ortona" (an oratorio, by George Elliot Clarke, Canada's former poet laureate), written "for the 75th anniversary of the battle."

It begins as follows:

At Ortona

I

September’s Calabrese sun —

Plus passing of each assassin —

Those black-hearted, black-shirted few

Who told peasants to suck up dew

And chew dust. Well, basta! They’re done!

Before our troops, they stoop — or run!

Scarcely dare they point a gun.

But still we tramp and them pursue —

To Ortona.

On we progress! Press each bastion

(Fascists backed by Nazi faction),

Who top each peak and from these spew

Bullets, so ruddy blood plays dew,

Sprays grass…. But we Canucks forge on —

To Ortona.

II

Off Sicily, northward pressing

Through Calabria, undressing

To suit sirocco, cool the head,

We free the poor to store their bread.

Liberation’s our progressing!

But our foe’s dour and distressing!

Shelling, sniping, keep us guessing

Where land-mines lurk to quirk our tread —

To Ortona...

The Winnipeg Tribune printed the next map in the January 7 issue, and though it addresses action re Yugoslavia in the caption, one can see the bold line (next to Rome) that depicts the Allied front line, stretching south from Ortona on the Adriatic Sea to (near) Cancello on the opposite coast.