We Follow Faint Footsteps that War Veterans Left Behind
The Norwich Gazette is Shuttered But Stories Live On
Canadians in Combined Operations, including my father, man landing crafts
at Arzeu for US troops; Operation Torch, beginning November 8, 1942.
Photo - RN photographer Lt. F. Hudson, Imperial War Museum (IWM)
Introduction:
My father Doug Harrison (RCNVR, Combined Operations) appears in the above photograph found at IWM. He is either the sailor (far left) stabilizing the landing craft (Landing Craft Assault, LCA) with an anti-broaching line or the fellow (2nd left on the LCA) taking a break - sitting atop an object so he can get a good view.
"How can I be sure?" is a very fair question.
My father's Navy memoirs share the same information as read in the caption re who, why, when and where, and besides, it just looks like him even from where I'm sitting, almost 80 years after the event.
By using my father's memoirs and newsy articles for his hometown newspaper I assembled a few columns of my own with the goal of producing 24 in all - to tell some of the story re his WWII adventures. I produced 13 before the Norwich Gazette was closed down in 2018. And I may produce more in the future about my father and other Canadians in Combined Ops who participated in the Dieppe raid and invasion of North Africa in 1942, the invasions of Sicily and Italy in 1943, and trained others at a Combined Operations School (C.O.S.) on Vancouver Island from 1944 - 45.
at a C.O.S. on Vancouver Island. Photo - Collection of D. Harrison (far right)
Links to the collection of Gazette columns:
Column 2 - Canadian Sailors Volunteer for the Unknown, 1941
950 - 1,000 members of RCNVR also volunteered for Combined
Ops beginning in Dec. 1941 while at HMCS Stadacona, Halifax
Column 11 - Dieppe Raid Pt. 3: Buried With Full Military Honours
Column 13 - North Africa PT 2: The Landings and 11 Days Hard Labour
A navy hammock that made its way around Africa in 1943, pre-Operation Husky
Photo sent to me from CFB Esquimalt, Vancouver Island
Unattributed Photos GH
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