Attack on Verrieres ridge, July 18 1944

Attack on Verrieres, July 18 1944

After the tragedy at Dieppe, the RHLI returned to England to replace their casualties and destroyed equipment. After two years of constant training, the RHLI of the 2nd Canadian Division were sent back to the coast of France. Due to the RHLI being part of Dieppe, they were not chosen to part of the initial invasion of Normandy June 6, 1944. Instead the battalion met on the shores of Juno beach July 7, 1944 to began their campaign through Europe. The RHLI went back into on July 17, 1944 two years after Dieppe. They attacked Verrieres Ridge, and below are personal excerpts and images from the battle.

Hugh Arrell- Describing a British Major

We were scared to death at this time of course, and here was this British officer up to help us and we didn’t know whether we should out of our slits to greet him or not. He asked where there was a good position to observe and we told him there was only place in the village and that the Germans knew it, too. They were shelling it continually. ‘wee, lets have a peek,’ he said, and he set off with us following. The building was virtually shaking by this time and the shelling seemed to get heavier while we were there. But the little major only said, ‘it’s a bit sticky, isn’t it?’ and left to bring up his tanks.

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Hugh Harrison- Discussing being captured

I threw up my legs to get away from the grenade, and the damned thing went off right in the seat of my pants. It didn’t hurt much and I didn’t think I was wounded so I got up and tossed a couple of grenades. Then the tracers came. One hit me in the knee-cap and made a mess but didn’t break it. The Brens were in action but by this time the patrol was on my left and I wasn’t in very good shape to exercise control. I caught up with them two hundred yards away and found that we had one dead and another by the name of Broderick with a broken knee. At this point things looked pretty bad. We seemed surrounded by patrols of Jerries. I decided then to save what I coud. The scouts thought we were pretty close to the unit so I told them to see if they could get back. Everybody was dead tired and I thought they would have a better chance if they left the Brens. We (Harrison and Broderick) could use them for support. Nothing occurred in the morning and I hid one of the Brens but I was not strong enough to hide the other. Broderick couldn’t move at all because he hada busted knee. I figured the only thing we could do was give ourselves up so I gave a shout and a couple of Jerries came from about 25 yards away. I made them promise that they would back for Broderick but they didn’t for four or five days, I was taken to their intelligence officer, who spoke perfect english and he asked what unit I was from. I said I didn’t know why, but I couldn’t tell him. He then asked the sergeant where I was caught and he looked up a book and map and said: “RHLI I guess.” Those were his exact words. And then he looked at the book again and said, “4th Brigade 2nd division. Good outfit. I thought perhaps you were 3rd division."