Seventy-nine years ago today, the Canadian Army, supported by the Royal Canadian Navy and the Royal Canadian Air Force, in the company of Canada's British and American allies, stormed a Normany beach. It was D-Day, the beginning of the end for Nazi Germany..One Albertan who was there is Captain Bill Wilson RCN retd., then a seaman-gunner in the Royal Canadian Navy (RCN.) Reached at his home in High River, the 98-year-old recounted the build-up to D-Day, and Canada’s amazing contribution. He also had a front row seat to the Normandy landings..“Well I was 19, and I'd been in the navy for two years. There was 200 sailors in my ship, so I was one of 200 and pretty young,” said Wilson, who grew up in the north end of Winnipeg... a neighbourhood, he said, that featured “a little mishmash of nationalities.”.”We'd been training for about two and a half months. The Royal Canadian Navy, my ship spent the whole bloody war on convoys, and that was just up and down, up and down in the worst goddamn weather of the whole century.”.Their D-Day mission was to change from convoy escort to an attacking anti-submarine unit, with ten destroyers in two groups. His group was composed of five Canadian destroyers that stayed on constant 24/7 patrol..“One ship would go in, and refuel, and re-provision. Then it would come back, and another one would go in. So in my group of five, there was always four of us at sea,” he said. "Our one goal was to prevent the U-boats from coming attacking the landing forces. That was our picture. So the area that we were given initially was the northwest section. That's off of, say, Land's End.” (The southwest tip of England.)."The American forces destined for Utah and Omaha beach were coming out of Bristol from the Irish Sea and also from Plymouth, ninety miles east of Land's End, up the English Channel. The goal of the Canadian ships was to prevent any U-boats from coming in and attacking.”.“The Brits had broken the German code, so we knew pretty well what their battle plan was … we found out years, years later. So we just swept up and down, up and down, and we did that for about a week and a half..“Then we started to come in closer… closer to the French coast. We were pretty successful. We sank three U-boats,” he says proudly..”We were good … the best U-boat hunters or submarine hunters in the world were the Brits, but we were as good as they were. The last year (in the North Atlantic,) we were attacking. We didn't worry about convoys or merchant ships. We would just hunt U-boats..”Great sailors and great people. Great Canadians. They're just about all gone now. Matter of fact, I think of my ship, there's only about two of us left, maybe three ... that I know of.”.Wilson served on HMCS Ottawa II — a destroyer purchased from the Royal Navy and renamed. The first Ottawa was sunk off Newfoundland in 1942 by a German U-boat off Newfoundland..”A good ship. Good ship. Well-built. Good sea boat.”.When the big day came, Wilson went off watch at midnight.. HMCS OttawaThe destroyer HMCS Ottawa, from which Capt. Bill Wilson, then a seaman-gunner, observed the D-Day landings. .“At sea, when you're off watch, you get some sleep. You never got enough sleep through the whole bloody war. The way they ran the ships, you never had enough sleep. I was up about 4:30 to watch this massive landing because we had a pretty good idea of what was going to take place.".“We watched, but we were some distance from the actual landing at Omaha Beach and Utah. Of course, the Canadians were in the middle… we could see smoke and lots of aircraft. You could hear the landing … you knew that people were getting killed.”.The invasion force included 7,000 ships and landing craft manned by more than 195,000 naval personnel from eight allied countries. In retrospect, Wilson, who spent 60 years in the navy, regular and reserve, is still amazed at Canada’s brave contribution in the biggest amphibious landing in history..”The thing I remember most about it was in retrospect,” he said. “There were five landings, two American, two Brits, and one Canadian. Our population was 11 million. All of those landings, the Brits on one side, the Americans in the other side, we're right smack in the middle. And little Canada, 11 million, had one beach all to ourself.".“We suffered (but) we were the only beach that achieved all of its objectives. The Yanks didn't get all of their objectives, nor did the Brits, but we did. We had seven objectives, and we achieved them all. As a matter of fact, we even exceeded them in one area, and the Winnipeg Rifles exceeded theirs.".”For Canada, it's absolutely remarkable, absolutely remarkable, a little country like ours, but they trusted us. We achieved everything we started out to do that day. The Yanks didn't. The Brits didn't, but we did.”. Bill Wilson 1944Seaman-Gunner Bill Wilson (right) in 1944. .Wilson would lose two good friends in the war, one of whom was in the Royal Winnipeg Rifles..“Joe Shack was in my room, and he was with the Rifles, and he died on, what, June the 27th. I tried to find out whether he was one of the Rifles that was shot in the back of his head... as a prisoner by the Germans.".”He was a big guy too. He's a real nice guy. I figured afterwards he'd play for the Winnipeg Blue Bombers.”.For this writer, it's also intensely personal... I have been to Normandy twice to visit the grave of my Dad’s cousin, Mike Makichuk. Like Captain Wilson's friend, he too was with the Royal Winnipeg Rifles, but he died on Juno Beach on D-Day, June 6, 1944. And each time, I poured blessed Canadian holy water, on his gravestone. He was in the first wave, who travelled rough seas across the Channel to the beachhead and deployed off the landing craft into the unknown hell Wilson speaks of..We don’t know how he died, but we do know he never made it off the beach. He might have been shot, he may have stepped on a mine. According to Canadian government records, 335 officers and men of that division were killed in action or died of wounds..There are a total of 2,048 burials in the nearby Beny-sur-Mer Canadian War Cemetery, including Mike’s grave. And it was a tremendous honour, to travel to it, to see it and to stand by it. The graves are tended remarkably well, by the Commonwealth War Graves Commission..In a 2014 ceremony, then Prime Minister Stephen Harper marked their sacrifice to a crowd of veterans and onlookers at Juno Beach..“To our veterans who are here today, gentlemen, you have travelled a long way to be close once more to fallen comrades. What you did here will never be forgotten,” said Harper..“And I know I speak for all Canadians when I say, sincerely and heartfelt, the only thing I can say for this and for the 70 years of peace that have followed — thank you.".Harper would also pass the torch to the next generation of Canadians..“To the young people here today, I say this. D’ici peu de temps, le devoir de mémoire appartiendra à votre génération et seulement à la vôtre..“Remember that in not so many years the duty of remembrance will belong to your generation and yours alone. Do not forget.”.Amen and amen.
