North-West Europe - www.canadiansoldiers.com

The North-West Europe campaign involved formations of the First Canadian Army during the Second World War. The campaign included Canadian participation in several major periods of action;

Dieppe 19 August 1942
Battle of Normandy 6 June 1944 - 25 August 1944
Channel Ports September 1944
Battle of the Scheldt October 1944
Nijmegen Salient November 1944 - February 1945
Battle of the Rhineland February 1945 - March 1945
Final Phase March 1945 - April 1945

The Battle Honour North-West Europe was granted to regiments who served in any of these major periods of action. The Battle Honour's title is suffixed with the addition of the years of service, i.e. North-West Europe, 1944-45 for a unit engaged in combat in phases of the campaign during both 1944 and 1945.

The First Special Service Force was also awarded this battle honour as the only Canadian ground unit to serve in Southern France.

North-West Europe Campaign

Dieppe - Normandy - Channel Ports - Scheldt -
Nijmegen Salient - Rhineland - Final Phase

Normandy

The allied invasion of the Continent was one of the most inevitable military operations of the Second World War; it was also one of the most widely debated. The Americans campaigned vigorously with their British allies for an immediate return to the Continent as early as 1942; the British had commitments in North Africa and felt that once that continent had been cleared of Axis forces, the best approach to attacking the Axis would be through the Mediterranean. The latter view won out. The raid on Dieppe in August 1942 was an extension of the successful (and costly) commando raiding program instituted by the British. As forces headed to the Mediterranean in 1943 to participate in what became the Italian Campaign, large numbers of men remained in the UK, including the bulk of the First Canadian Army.

On 6 June 1944, the Allies returned to the continent with the largest amphibious invasion in history; Canada provided the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division, the 2nd Canadian Armoured Brigade and the 1st Canadian Parachute Battalion to the assault force, and took responsibility for one of the five landing beaches. D-Day, as the date of the invasion has become famously known, was a success. The following 90 days that comprised the Battle of Normandy has been a controversial subject ever since, due to the slow progress of the Allied armies in defeating the Germans. In the end, Operation OVERLORD pushed the Germans out of Normandy ahead of the arbitrary schedule set before the invasion - but at great cost in lives.

Battle of Normandy

Normandy Landing – Authie – Putot-en-Bessin – Bretteville-l'Orgueilleuse – Le Mesnil-Patry – Caen – Carpiquet – The Orne – Bourguebus Ridge – Faubourg de Vaucelles – St. André-sur-Orne – Maltot – Verrières Ridge - Tilly-la-Campagne – Falaise – Falaise Road – Quesnay Wood – Clair Tizon – The Laison – Chambois – St. Lambert-sur-Dives – Dives Crossing – Forêt de la Londe – The Seine, 1944

Channel Ports

The collapse of the German Army in Normandy took the Allies by surprise; it was anticipated that on D+90 (i.e. 90 days after the initial landing) the Germans would be fighting on the line of the River Seine. The Germans withdrew past the Seine in advance of that date, and in fact retreated as far as Belgium. Paris fell in late August, and Antwerp in Belgium was taken in early Sep.

After Falaise the Germans were in such disarray that the Allies might have driven straight to Berlin if they had been able to focus even a third of their combined strength on a relatively narrow front and then put all their logistics effort into keeping it moving. But military alliances have their own agendas and their own political prices. Who would quarterback such a thrust? Who would carry the ball? Montgomery and Patton were the obvious choices but they could never have worked together.¹

General Eisenhower, the Supreme Commander of SHAEF, opted for a "broad front" strategy in which all the armies under his command advanced abreast. Priorities were given where needed. In August 1944, the invasion of Southern France drove Axis forces out of the south and eventually enabled the front line in North-West Europe to extend from the North Sea to the Swiss border. From north to south, Eisenhower had three army groups operating: the 21st Army Group under Montgomery, with the First Canadian Army and the British 2nd Army under command; the 12th Army Group under Omar Bradley, with the US 1st Army (Courtney Hodges) and US 3d Army (George S. Patton, Jr.) under command, and the 6th Army Group with the US 7th Army (Alexander Patch) and French 1st Army under command.

Priority in September was given to Operation MARKET-GARDEN, an airborne operation even larger than the massed parachute and glider landings in Normandy had been. The objective - to put a force across the Rhine River and into Germany, threatening the Ruhr industrial region, outflanking the Siegfried Line defences, and ending the war in 1944 - was not met. In the meantime, First Canadian Army spent September fighting along the North Sea coast on the left flank of the Allied armies. Their goals were to eliminate V-2 Rocket sites and open up the Channel Ports so that Allied supplies would not have to be drawn from the Normandy beaches. With Allied armies as far from Normandy as Antwerp in Belgium and Aachen in Germany, millions of gallons of gasoline were being expended in transporting supplies to the front line. The Germans resisted stubbornly in the port cities, and some even held out until May 1945, left "masked" in the Allied rear. The need to liberate a large port facility became acute by the end of September 1944.

Channel Ports

Dunkirk, 1944 – Le Havre – Boulogne, 1944 – Calais, 1944 – Moerbrugge – Moerkerke – Wyneghem – Antwerp-Turnhout

Canal

Battle of the Scheldt

While Antwerp had fallen with port facilities intact to the Allies, the British forces that captured the city had not taken the step of advancing a few miles beyond the city and cutting off the neck of the South Beveland Peninsula. With the Scheldt Estuary - the waterway connecting Antwerp to the sea - in German hands, the port facilities were useless to the Allies. Priority shifted from the MARKET-GARDEN fighting (the British 1st Airborne Division had been reduced from 10,000 men to 2,000 in the space of 10 days when efforts by ground forces to link up with them stalled) to the clearing of the Scheldt. Canadian forces spent the month of October clearing the approach to the South Beveland Peninsula to the north of the estuary, and the Breskens Pocket to the south. The task was completed by 1 November, and British commandos landed on Walcheren Island itself to clear the large coastal guns there.

Battle of the Scheldt

Leopold Canal – Woensdrecht – Savojaards Plaat – Breskens Pocket – South Beveland – Walcheren Causeway – The Lower Maas

Nijmegen Salient

Nijmegen had been one of the cities liberated in MARKET-GARDEN, and the salient opened in the German line remained garrisoned by US paratroopers until the Canadians relieved them in place. The winter passed by relatively uneventfully for the Canadians. To the south, the Germans launched a major offensive in The Ardennes (known popularly since as the Battle of the Bulge). Had the offensive been successful in its object - driving through the Allies to the Meuse River and dividing the US and British forces - additional offensive action was contemplated against the Canadian Army around Nijmegen. In the event, the only major action was a minor clash at Kapelsche Veer in early 1945.

Nijmegen Salient

The Ardennes – Kapelsche Veer – The Roer

Battle of the Rhineland

That a major Allied offensive action would take place in 1945 was not a surprise to anyone. The Germans had one major terrain feature left in the west - the River Rhine. Operation VERITABLE was launched in Feb 1945 to clear the Germans off of what land remained in their hands to the west of the river. Executed in conjunction with Operation GRENADE, a US offensive to link up with them and similarly clear the west bank of the Rhine, the operation was notable for its extensive artillery preparation and the terrible conditions of mud and flooded terrain. While Field Marshal Montgomery prepared for a set piece crossing of the Rhine once the west bank was cleared, US armies to the south were effecting their own crossings. General Patton's US 3d Army managed an assault crossing of the river, while General Hodges' US 1st Army seized an intact bridge at Remagen, near Bonn. The main crossing by 21st Army Group was done in dramatic fashion, with a large amphibious assault backed by a full scale airborne assault across the river (Operation VARSITY). Once again, the 1st Canadian Parachute Battalion took part in the airdrop and 3rd Canadian Infantry Division provided forces for the amphibious phase.

Battle of the Rhineland

The Rhineland – The Reichswald – Waal Flats – Cleve – Moyland Wood – Goch-Calcar Road – The Hochwald – Veen – Xanten

The Final Phase

The final phase of the war was fought across the Rhine following the massive crossing, called Operation PLUNDER. During this period, I Canadian Corps was repatriated to First Canadian Army from Italy. As II Canadian Corps drove into the northern Netherlands, I Canadian Corps went into the line and drove west, liberating or assisting in the liberation of Arnhem, Deventer and Apeldoorn and crossing the Ijssel. To the north, Canadian units cleared the Netherlands to the north coast, with major fighting at Groningen and the Delfzijl Pocket at the end of Apr, before crossing the border again into Germany for the final battles at Leer, Bad Zwischenhahn, Oldenburg and Wagenborgen.

Final Phase

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The Rhine – Emmerich-Hoch Elten – Twente Canal – Zutphen – Deventer – Apeldoorn – Arnhem – Groningen – Ijsselmeer – Kusten Canal – Delfzijl Pocket – Bad Zwischenahn – Oldenburg – Leer – Wagenborgen