Ortona (69 page)

This stands powerfully at odds with the way Canada remembers Ortona. An unnamed CBC commentator broadcasting from London on December 28, 1943, said that Ortona would figure in the battle lore of Canada. Yet today few Canadians recall ever hearing the name. Even those who recognize the battles of Dieppe, Hong Kong, and the Canadian landing at Juno Beach during the Normandy invasion seldom know anything about Ortona. For some reason, the battle slipped quietly and decisively from the nation's consciousness. True, Canadians are not much given to remembrance of the battles in which fathers, grandfathers, and great-grandfathers fought. But the blind spot of memory with regard to Ortona seems inexplicable.

Two factors may be at work here. First, there is a tendency in Canada to wallow in military failure or perceived controversy rather than to explore and celebrate battles won. Book after book refights Dieppe and retackles the defeat at Hong Kong. In the Normandy invasion, Canadians were part of one of the climactic battles of the
war. This has rendered it a good topic for anniversary tributes. But the Battle of Ortona was neither obviously timely nor possessed of any momentous controversy. So historians have turned their backs on it. Added to this is the reticence of the veterans themselves to describe their experience at Ortona. The psychic scar is still prevalent. In Edmonton, during the annual reunion of the Loyal Edmonton Regiment, one old soldier said to me, “I don't see what your interest in Ortona is. There were other battles. It was just one of them.” Later the same man sat down and said, “I lost my best friends in Ortona. I never made friends like those again. Never.” There were tears in his eyes. He brushed them away hard with an angry hand. Then he went to the bar, and ordered another double rye and water.

One veteran of the PPCLI, radio signaller Jack Haley, said he never felt free to discuss the reality of war with his family. Humorous events, sure — but not the horror of a battlefield. He said, “This is the first time I've ever talked about most of this. I'm glad to do so.” In the slaughterhouse that was Ortona, there was little laughter. What humour the soldiers did see in unfolding events was usually macabre, the kind of thing only men in war could find funny. One veteran told how a man, returning to a house where his squad rested, played a joke by bursting through the doorway and yelling in German for them to surrender. One of his friends, startled awake, let him have a full burst in the stomach with a Thompson submachine gun. The man lived. At the time, the rest of his regiment thought the story of how he got wounded was hilarious. Try explaining the humour of this event to a sixteen-year-old granddaughter.

At Ortona, Canadians endured a terrible test of arms. Every battle can be ultimately viewed as tragedy. So there is a particularly Canadian tendency to reshape such events into tragicomedy, or an intellectual debate about a battle's causes or the reasons for its failures. This is impossible with Ortona.

As I walk the cobblestone streets and talk to some of those who were young civilians caught in the battle, I am struck by a difference in their perspective on the conflict. The people of Ortona pay it tribute, both by remembering the survivors and by absorbing it into the collective memory of the community. They have taken the battle into their hearts and emerged the stronger for doing so. The store-keeper
in San Leonardo spoke openly and without great emotion about being orphaned by an artillery bombardment, I think, because hers was part of an experience that had been shared and spoken of through the generations. They did not skirt around the edges of what people endured. Rather, they confronted it directly and then were able to go on, to rebuild their homes and lives.

We could do worse than to follow their example.

1st Canadian Infantry Division

Canadian Armoured Corps:

4th Reconnaissance Regiment

(4th Princess Louise Dragoon Guards)

The Royal Canadian Artillery:

1st Field Regiment

(Royal Canadian Horse Artillery)

2nd Field Regiment

3rd Field Regiment

1st Anti-tank Regiment1

2nd Light Anti-Aircraft Regiment

Canadian Infantry Corps:

The Saskatoon Light Infantry

(brigade support group)

1st Canadian Infantry Brigade:

The Royal Canadian Regiment (permanent force)

The Hastings and Prince Edward Regiment

48th Highlanders of Canada Regiment

2nd Canadian Infantry Brigade:

Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry Regiment (permanent force)

The Seaforth Highlanders of Canada Regiment

The Loyal Edmonton Regiment

3rd Canadian Infantry Brigade:

Royal 22e Regiment (permanent force)

The Carleton and York Regiment

The West Nova Scotia Regiment

1st Canadian Armoured Brigade

11th Canadian Armoured Regiment

(Ontario Tanks)

12th Canadian Armoured Regiment

(Three Rivers Tanks)

14th Canadian Armoured Regiment

(Calgary Tanks)

Corps of Royal Canadian Engineers

2nd Field Park Company

1st Field Company

3rd Field Company

4th Field Company

Royal Canadian Army Medical Corps

1st Infantry Division:

No. 4 Field Ambulance

No. 5 Field Ambulance

No. 9 Field Ambulance

1st Armoured Brigade:

No. 2 Light Field Ambulance

^*
Not all supporting units included.

HQ Company
No. 1: Signals Platoon
No. 2: Administrative Platoon

Support Company
No. 3: Mortar Platoon (3 inch)
No. 4: Bren Carrier Platoon
No. 5: Assault Pioneer Platoon
No. 6: Antitank Platoon (6 pounder)

A Company
No. 7 Platoon
No. 8 Platoon
No. 9 Platoon

B Company
No. 10 Platoon
No. 11 Platoon
No. 12 Platoon

C Company
No. 13 Platoon
No. 14 Platoon
No. 15 Platoon

D Company
No. 16 Platoon
No. 17 Platoon
No. 18 Platoon

Private (Pte.)
Gunner (artillery equivalent of private)
Trooper (armoured equivalent of private)
Lance Corporal (L/Cpl.)
Corporal (Cpl.)
Lance Sergeant (L/Sgt.)
Sergeant (Sgt.)
Company Sergeant Major (CSM)
Regimental Sergeant Major (RSM)
Lieutenant (Lt. or Lieut.)
Captain (Capt.)
Major (Maj.)
Lieutenant Colonel (Lt. Col.)
Colonel (Col.)
Brigadier (Brig.)
Major General (Maj. Gen.)
Lieutenant General (Lt. Gen.)
General (Gen.)

Because the German army and the Luftwaffe ground forces had a ranking system where rank also usually indicated the specific type of unit in which one served, only basic ranks are given here. The translations are roughly based on the Canadian ranking system, although there is no Canadian equivalent for many German ranks.

Many military decorations were won by soldiers at Ortona. The decoration system that Canada used in World War II, like most other aspects of its military organization and tradition, derived from Britain. A class-based system, most military decorations can be awarded either to officers or to “other ranks,” but not both. The exception is the highest award, the Victoria Cross, which can be won by a soldier of any rank.

The decorations and qualifying ranks are:

V
ICTORIA
C
ROSS
(VC)

Awarded for gallantry in the presence of the enemy. Instituted in 1856 and open to all ranks. The only award that can be granted for action in which the recipient was killed, other than Mentioned in Despatches — a less formal honour whereby an act of bravery was given specific credit in an official report.

D
ISTINGUISHED
S
ERVICE
O
RDER
(DSO)

Officers of all ranks, but more commonly awarded to officers with ranks of major or higher.

M
ILITARY
C
ROSS
(MC)

Officers with a rank below major and, rarely, warrant officers.

D
ISTINGUISHED
C
ONDUCT
M
EDAL

Warrant officers and all lower ranks.

M
ILITARY
M
EDAL

Warrant officers and all lower ranks.

A
NTITANK
G
UNS
Canadian forces used two antitank guns at Ortona. The six-pounder was the main antitank gun attached directly to infantry battalions. Each battalion had its own antitank platoon. This gun had a range of one thousand yards and fired a six-pound shell. It proved invaluable as a close support weapon during the house-to-house fighting inside Ortona. Also available to 1st Canadian Infantry Division were the seventeen-pounder antitank guns of 1st Anti-tank Regiment. This was basically an up-gunned version of the six-pounder. It had greater range and greater hitting power because of the seventeen-pound shell.

B
REN
C
ARRIER
Also known as the universal carrier. A lightly armoured tracked vehicle capable of carrying four to six soldiers and their weapons. Provided no overhead protection, but was walled on all sides by armour. It had a top speed of thirty-five miles an hour. This was the Commonwealth forces battlefield workhorse. Its open design enabled it to be used for carrying just about any kind of military gear used by infantry. Some were converted into weapons carriers and played a combat role by being fitted with Vickers .303 medium machine guns, Bren light machine guns, or two-inch mortars, or were used as the towing vehicle for six-pounder antitank guns.

B
REN
G
UN
Standard light machine gun of Commonwealth forces. Fired .303 rifle ammunition held in thirty-round magazines. An excellent, although slow-firing, weapon. It had a range of about 500 hundred yards and weighed twenty-two pounds.

B
ROWNING
9-M
ILLIMETRE
A
UTOMATIC
The standard pistol used by Canadian forces. Officers in the line rifle companies generally kept their pistols hidden or even threw them away to avoid being easily identified as officers by German snipers.