1st Canadian Armoured Brigade
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1st Canadian
Armoured Brigade
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Formed: 11 February
1941 (GO 79/41) |
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The 1st Canadian
Armoured Brigade was an armoured formation formed for service
the Second World War. It was one of only two Canadian
independent armoured brigades to see combat.
Army Tank Brigade
A 1st Canadian Armoured Brigade was formed on 13 August 1940, comprising the
Fort Garry Horse, the 1st Canadian Mechanized Cavalry Regiment, The Ontario
Regiment, and The Three Rivers Regiment. The Brigade was later reconstituted as
the 1st Canadian Armoured Division was formed, then renamed to become the 5th
Canadian Armoured Brigade.
The 1st Canadian Army Tank
Brigade was created in February 1941 from active units mobilized by The Calgary
Regiment (Tank), The Ontario Regiment (Tank) and The Three Rivers Regiment
(Tank), three of the former Militia infantry regiments that had been designated
as tank battalions in the 1936 reorganizations.
General Order 79/41 organized the
brigade as as follows:
The units were renamed Canadian
Tank Regiments (CTR) and wore insignia identifying them as such.
The Ontario and Three Rivers
units had originally mobilized to serve with the 1st and 2nd Divisions, but had
not gone overseas in the wake of reorganizations. A brigade headquarters
squadron was also mobilized from The New Brunswick Regiment. The formation
trained at Camp Borden using a handful of American training tanks and some
Canadian-made Valentine tanks, before being shipped to the United Kingdom in
July 1941, where the brigade received Matilda tanks.2
The Ontario Regiment received
four Churchill tanks, and other units of the brigade began to be equipped with
Churchill tanks beginning in November 1941. The tanks proved mechanically
unreliable and required constant maintenance.3
Dieppe
One regiment, the 14th Canadian
Tank Regiment (Calgary Regiment) saw action at Dieppe, where 417 officers and
men participated in the landing at the main beach. Twelve were killed, including
their commanding officer, and 161 captured (127 of these wounded). Only two
soldiers who had landed on the beach were actually evacuated back to England -
244 soldiers had remained afloat throughout the operation. Of the 30 tanks that
did land, two were drowned before reaching dry land, one was unable to land and
returned to the U.K., and the remaining 27 were abandoned on the beach, only 15
having crossed the sea-wall. The Calgary Regiment was not brought up to strength
after Dieppe until 23 October, when sufficient replacement tanks could be
provided.4
While the British Army retained
the Churchill in independent tank brigades throughout the war, the Canadian Army
did not follow suit, and at the start of March 1943, the Churchills began to be
exchanged by units of the 1st Brigade for Ram tanks as a prelude to re-equipping
with the Sherman tank. The Three Rivers regiment turned in their entire
allotment of 43 Churchills on 29 March 1943, and the Ontario Regiment had slowly
begun to re-equip also, with "B" Squadron of the Ontario Regiment being the last
to retain theirs while on loan to the British School of Infantry in Yorkshire
until 11 May 1943.5 The brigade did not receive light tanks for the
reconnaissance troops, apparently using universal carriers instead.6
Sicily
The Three Rivers Regiment saw much action in support of the 1st Canadian
Infantry Division during the Battle of Sicily, as well as the independent 231st
Brigade of the British Army. The remainder of the brigade (including Brigadier
Wyman's headquarters, The Ontario Regiment, The Calgary Regiment and sub-units
of the Royal Canadian Army Medical Corps, Royal Canadian Ordnance Corps, and
Royal Canadian Army Service Corps) sailed on follow-up convoys, arriving in
Sicily from 13 to 17 July 1943 and found themselves attached to the British 13th
Corps.7
The brigade (less The Three Rivers Regiment) went into 8th Army reserve and
placed under command of the British 7th Armoured Division. The brigade remained
in the area of Cassible, nine miles southwest of Syracuse. On 21 July the
brigade began to move to the Scordia area, covering a gap in the line between
two corps of the 8th Army along the Dittaino River. The brigade was made ready
to fight off a German armoured counter-attack which never occurred. The Ontario
Regiment went forward at the end of July to assist the British 5th Division in
defending the western flank of XIII Corps. This left only the The Calgary Regiment
and the brigade headquarters and support elements remaining at Scordia.
The Ontario Regiment supported units of the British 13th Brigade in operations
across the Dittaino River, and in further offensive operations. All three
regiments were reunited at Scordia by 11 August, and for the first time since
leaving Scotland the three units were concentrated together.
The casualty lists for the
three tank regiments reflect the different operational roles which each had
been called upon to undertake. The Calgaries had only eight wounded in
Sicily; the Ontarios one killed and 13 wounded; while the Three Rivers
Regiment, which was in almost continual action throughout the campaign, lost
21 killed and 62 wounded.8
Armoured Brigade
Southern Italy
In late August 1943, the brigade was redesignated 1st Canadian Armoured Brigade,
and the Tank Regiments were redesignated Armoured Regiments. According to the
Official History of the Canadian Army:
On 26 August 1943 H.Q. 1st
Canadian Army Tank Brigade was redesignated H.Q. 1st Armoured Brigade, and
its three regiments became the 11th Armoured Regiment (The Ontario
Regiment), 12th Armoured Regiment (Three Rivers
Regiment) and 14th Armoured Regiment (The Calgary Regiment) Canadian
Armoured Corps. It was November before the new designations were adopted in
the field.9
The formation landed in southern
Italy in September 1943 and its tanks supported Canadian infantry at Potenza,
Termoli and Ortona. The first major tank-vs.-tank encounters came at Termoli in
early October where the Three Rivers, in support of the British 78th Infantry
Division, exchanged six of its Shermans for an equal number of Panzerkampfwagen
IVs of 16. Panzer Division. The Three Rivers were also prominent at Ortona, in
particular "C" Squadron, which deployed its vehicles directly in the ruined
city. "Losses were heavy, and throughout the period the three units each
averaged 35 tanks, in effect operating at half strength."10
Brigadier Murphy of the 1st Canadian
Armoured Brigade holds an "O" Group near Aquino, Italy on 23 May 1944. LAC
photo.
In early 1944, light tanks
arrived to replace the carriers in the reconnaissance troops.
This period also marked
the end of the permanent association between the 1st Canadian Armoured
Brigade and the 1st Canadian Infantry Brigade. Apparently Major General
Vokes, commander of the (1st Canadian Infantry Division) became very
critical of Brigadier Wyman...As a result it was decided to assign the
Canadian armoured brigade to support British divisions. This decision stood
even after Wyman left to command the 2nd Armoured Brigade in the United
Kingdom (in February 1944), since the Canadians had by this time brought the
tricky role of infantry support to perfection. No doubt the lack of cavalry
heritage in its regiments helped. As a result, the next battle saw the
brigade supporting the 8th Indian Division in its assault across the Gari
River in May 1944 in the opening stages of the last battle for Cassino. The
Calgary Regiment added to the reputation of the brigade by manning several
improvised bridging tanks.11
Kept in the front line until July
1944 in support of various formations, including the British 78th Division, 1st
Canadian Infantry Division and British 4th Division, the formation was by the
summer of 1944 considered "the most experienced armoured brigade in Italy" in
the words of the 8th Army's commander, and thus "in great demand."12
From June 1943 to July 1944 the brigade had lost 168 Sherman tanks (41
completely destroyed) and 18 Stuart reconnaissance tanks. Many of the latter had
by the summer of 1944 also been modified into "recce" variants by the removal of
the turrets and addition of a .50 calibre machine gun. After a short time out of
the line, the brigade was once again in support of the infantry of the 13th
Corps, with each armoured regiment assigned to a different division for the
fighting for the Gothic Line. Each regiment also now received 105mm howitzer
armed Shermans to supplement their role as artillery.13
Assault Troop
The 1st Canadian Assault Troop
was created in Italy on 1 June 1944 to provide the brigade with its own
engineers. Its strength was 2 officers and 84 other ranks, all from the Canadian
Armoured Corps. They were given special training in methods of keeping tank
routes open, which included using demolitions and removing enemy mines and
booby-traps. One section from the Troop joined each of the three armoured
regiments on 18 July 1944. Concurrently, a 5th Canadian Assault Troop was
organized for the 5th Canadian Armoured Brigade of the 5th Armoured Division.14
Winter 1944
In October 1944 a long, hard
winter began for the brigade:
Since the end of October
(1944) Brigadier Murphy's three armoured regiments had found their support
of the 13th Corps reduced almost to a static role. Worsening ground
conditions had brought a further deterioration in communications, and supply
routes could only be maintained with the utmost difficulty. On 7 November
the diarist of the Three Rivers Regiment noted that a horse was being sought
for the use of ... the Commanding Officer...The extreme case occurred in the
1st British Infantry Division's sector, where The Ontario Regiment's "A"
Squadron, sent to relieve an American unit on Mount Grande had to take over
the U.S. tanks in situ, since movement by armour over the snow-blocked
mountain trails was impossible. Under such conditions the Ontarios could at
best provide artillery support for the limited attacks made by the infantry.
On at least one occasion "B" Squadron, in the divisional "Gun Line" west of
Gesso, fired at ranges of from 8000 to 11,000 yards, obtaining sufficient
elevation for these distances by running the noses of their tanks up a steep
bank.
...Apart from The Ontario
Regiment's move there was little change in the dispositions of the Canadian
armour during the last two months of 1944. The Three Rivers Regiment,
supporting the 78th Division and the 6th Armoured Division in the Santerno
valley, spent Christmas at Castel del Rio, with two troops of tanks frozen
in at Gesso and the balance of its forward squadrons at Fontanelice on the
Imola road. On the 13th Corps' extreme right flank "B" Squadron of The
Calgary Regiment assisted Gurkhas of the 8th Indian Division in cleaning up
around Modigliana in mid-November, and on the 25th it crawled forward
another two miles toward Faenza. By this time, however, the Polish Corps'
westward drive on the Eighth Army's left was carrying it across the Indian
front, which by 17 December was held by only one brigade. "To reach the
enemy we would have had to cut North-West into the mountains and bare
escarpments," wrote the Calgary diarist on the 8th. "This we could not do .
. . Our usefulness to 8th Indian Division was ended."
For the rest of December
Lt.-Col. Richardson concentrated his regiment in the Marradi area, to await
the next move. This was not long in coming. At Christmas the threat against
the Fifth Army's left flank sent the bulk of the 8th Indian
Division...hurrying westward to Lucca, and on 30 December the Calgaries
began moving into a rest area... The perilous journey over the eighteen
miles of treacherous mountain roads...took seventeen hours...
After spending most of
January at San Donato the Calgaries embarked upon what was to prove their
final operational role in Italy. A long rail trip by way of Arezzo and lesi
brought them to the Forli area, where they came under command of the 5th
Corps and were assigned to support the 56th Division in its Senio positions
opposite Cotignola.80 Here the squadrons spent the first three weeks of
February in a more or less static role, occasionally carrying out individual
tank shoots which were usually followed by reports of "Jerry stretcher
bearers carrying away casualties." Late in January the remainder of the
armoured brigade had received orders to concentrate on the Adriatic coast
for a period of rest and training at Porto San Giorgio... This would make
the Canadian armour available for the Eighth Army's spring offensive acid
preclude the necessity of the hazardous journey across the mountains when
the winter snows were melting. As it was, the Three Rivers Regiment was
forced to leave to the 78th Division the six immobile tanks in the Gesso
area. The transfer to the coast began on 31 January, with the Ontarios being
the first to ship their tanks. Four days later, however, as Brigadier
Murphy's headquarters was preparing to leave Borgo San Lorenzo, further
movement of the brigade was suddenly cancelled.15
Operation
GOLDFLAKE
In concert with the 1st Canadian Infantry Division and 5th Canadian Armoured
Division as part of I Canadian Corps, the 1st Canadian Armoured Brigade moved
from Italy early in 1945 to rejoin First Canadian Army in North-West Europe. The
tank regiments left behind their vehicles, however they retained their 105mm-gun
armed Shermans, as they were not standard issue in 1st Canadian Army. The three
armoured regiments received new Shermans, including two 17-pounder ("Firefly")
Shermans per troop.
Technical Quartermaster Sergeant O.T.
Hanson of the Calgary Regiment checks vehicle kit as the regiment
re-equips with Sherman Vc tanks, at Dottignies, Belgium on 22 March 1945
as part of the move to North-West Europe. LAC photo.
The brigade supported both the
1st Canadian Infantry Division and the 49th British Division in the closing
battles of the war in western Netherlands.
Composition July 1943 - February 1945
