FFWD REW

Book puts names to soldiers

Breakout from June shows the appalling human costs during the Normandy Campaign

The calm and tranquility of Juno Beach today belies the devastation and death that marked the D-Day Normandy landings of Allied troops on June 6 1944. In the weeks and months that followed many thousands more members of the military and civilians died in the quest to rid France — and ultimately Europe — of Nazi German occupiers.

France was indeed liberated but Normandy became the sacrificial lamb in that quest. Mark Zuehlke’s newest book Breakout from Juno: First Canadian Army and the Normandy Campaign July 4 – August 21 the ninth in his “Canadian battle series” shows the appalling human costs of those intense weeks of fighting.

Drawing on official reports and the personal recollections and diaries of Canadian soldiers Zuehlke tells the story chronologically beginning with the Canadian and British assault on the beautiful medieval city of Caen. Its high strategic importance guaranteed the Germans would defend it fiercely and the Allies in turn would spare no effort to take it. As a result many of Caen’s ancient buildings became “a massive pile of rubble” and hundreds of civilians died.

As the Calgary Highlanders South Saskatchewan Regiment Canadian Grenadier Guards and many other formations pushed south encounters with German panzer divisions inspired heroism amid tragedy and victory.

In one battle on the edge of a wood a round from an enemy tank caused an explosion of ammunition and fuel in a Canadian tank and “…only Captain (Johnny) Hope survived the destruction of his Sherman emerging from the turret with an arm sheered off. (Lieut. John) Stock found (Sgt. George) Wallbank next to his burning Sherman moaning with one foot completely blown off.”

Wallbank till then an accomplished athlete asked to be shot and put out of his misery. Stock himself badly burned chose instead to inject morphine into Wallbank who crawled to safety and lived.

Breakout from Juno ’s devotion to naming as many soldiers as possible is one of its strengths. Too often in books and TV documentaries wars are summarized as the movement of armies not the actions and fate of individuals.

The author chronicles numerous examples of pure selflessness and courage but doesn’t hesitate to note instances of lesser performances such as some ruthless treatment of German SS combatants following reports their comrades had executed Allied prisoners.

The chief Allied goal during that grim summer was to close the Falaise Gap a corridor through which the Germans planned to escape and it proved to be the decisive battle for Normandy. At its end Canadian casualties numbered 18444 of whom 5021 were fatalities.

Appropriately Zuehlke closes the book with his visit to Juno Beach one recent May where gentle waves roll across the gleaming sand and tourists mingle in and around the Juno Beach Centre an architecturally stylish edifice to Canada’s Normandy achievements and sacrifices distinguished by the statue Remembrance and Renewal by Canadian sculptor Colin Gibson.

Many visitors are school kids. The author rightly observes “It is children who are the hope of remembrance…. It falls on our shoulders to keep the stories and the history alive.”

In that Zuehlke does a superb job.

Breakout from Juno

by Mark Zuehlke

513 pp. Douglas & McIntyre

Tags: