Tuesday, May 22, 2012

The Canadians who helped liberate Caen


1. Canadian Memorial Garden, Memorial Museum
2.  Sign about the Canadian Memorial Garden, Caen
3. Memorial Tablet, Bombardier Everitt Ivan Hill,
4. Remembering the first Canadian to fall at Caen
 For additional information click on 'Comments' below.

1 Comments:

Blogger ritsonvaljos said...

Additional information

An important feature of the Caen Memorial Museum for Peace is the Canadian Memorial Garden. This place of peace is actually in two parts. One part of the garden represents the austere reality of war that came to this place in 1944. The second part commemorates the peace that the Canadians helped bring to 122 communities in Normandy. It is intended that the Canadians who brought this peace will be remembered foreveremore.

The top two photographs seen above were taken at the Canadian Memorial Garden, Caen. The four glass steles next to the Canadian flag record the names of the Canadian units which took part in the Battle of Normandy, while the sign explains the significance of the peace brought to this place at the cost of many lives.

The lower two photographs were taken in the city centre of Caen. They are photographs of memorials to Bombardier Everitt Ivan Hill, Royal Canadian Artillery - the first Canadian soldier to fall during the liberation of Caen. At first glance the memorials are a little misleading regarding the date of Bombardier Hill's death. According to the Commonwealth War Graves Commission website he died on 18 July 1944.

This is Bombardier Hill's CWGC citation:

Name: HILL, EVERITT IVAN
Rank: Bombardier
Service No: B/11631
Date of Death: 18/07/1944
Age: 23
Regiment/Service: Royal Canadian Artillery
2 Anti-Tank Regt.
Grave Reference: VII. D. 2.
Cemetery: BRETTEVILLE-SUR-LAIZE CANADIAN WAR CEMETERY
(Calvados, France).

Additional Information:
Son of Eli and Ethel Hill;
Husband of Joan Hill, of Little Britain, Ontario.
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Caen is a special place for the many Canadians who visit the city. Bombardier Everitt I. Hill was just one of many soldiers from Canada who gave his life to help liberate the city.

Found in the Canadian Memorial Garden at the Caen's Memorial Museum is a black granite slab set among the grove of trees. The following words of Virgil are written upon it:

"NULLA DIES UMQUAM MEMORI VOS EXIMET AEVO"
("No day will ever erase you from the memory of time.")
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Tuesday, 22 May, 2012  

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