One of my uncles (Mom’s brother) Ora Hall from Provost, landed on Juno beach on D Day with the 1st Canadian Scottish. He was a Sgt. with a mortar crew. According to the War Diary for his unit (all are available from the National Archives), they saw action more or less continually for more than sixty days. I still have a number of letters he wrote to my Mom, none of which mentioned combat but some mentioned the appreciation shown in some French towns as they swept through as liberators. The last letter he wrote was dated just days before he was fatally wounded on the heights overlooking Calais on the “first approach”.
The War Diary and a letter from one of his friends with him at the time tells how they were riding in an open box troop carrier when an air burst artillery shell exploded in some trees above...and he took shrapnel in the top of his head. Despite a letter from the unit padre’ saying that he was in “good spirits” in hospital, his buddy said he never regained consciousness and died two days later. He was buried at the time, then relocated after the war to a CDN Cemetary near the village where he was wounded.
The war diary for the CDN Scottish gives a day-to-day account of the units actions...probably recorded by someone like MASH’s Radar O’Reilly ... One account talks about a Can Scott getting caught up a tree fetching an apple as a Panzer roared through without noticing him. Or another when in the smoke/confusion of battle, a Can Scott tried to get the attention of some tankers by pounding on the side of turret before seeing the cross insignia. Fortunately, they paid him no attention. On the morning Ora was hit, mention is made of the shelling and that a “couple of the lads ‘had it’ “. One of Ora’s mates told my mom that Ora took positions the devil would fear to direct fire. I was able to visit his grave in the late nineties.
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Old Guys Rule
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