by Mark Zuehlke
Undoubtedly, operations to free up the approaches to Antwerp would have remained at the bottom of Montgomery’s list despite Eisenhower’s increasingly strident notes had not a stern directive from the Combined Chiefs of Staff—the joint American and British high command—added its weight on September 12. Meeting in Ottawa, the Combined Chiefs had reviewed and despite reservations had endorsed Market Garden. But with deliberate emphasis, they also stressed to Montgomery the “necessity for opening up the north-west ports, Antwerp and Rotterdam in particular, before the bad weather sets in.”5
Immediately upon receipt of this directive, Montgomery signalled Crerar fresh instructions. While capturing Boulogne remained the highest priority, Montgomery added that the “early opening of Antwerp is daily becoming of increasing importance and this cannot take place until Walcheren has been captured and the mouth of the river opened for navigation. Before you can do this you will obviously have to remove all the enemy from the mainland in that part where they [are] holding up north east of Bruges. Airborne army considers not possible use airborne troops in this business. Grateful for your views as to when you think you can tackle this problem.”6
The following day, as 4th Canadian Armoured Division’s Algonquin Regiment assembled at Moerkerke for its doomed attempt to win a bridgehead across the Dérivation de la Lys and the Leopold Canal, Montgomery shifted gears entirely. “Early use of Antwerp so urgent that I am prepared to give up operations against Calais and Dunkirk and be content with Boulogne. If we do this will it enable you to speed up the Antwerp business? Discuss this with me tomorrow when you come here for conference.” Immediately after the September 14 conference, Montgomery issued fresh instructions that outlined the plan for Market Garden and his expectations for First Canadian Army.
“Our real objective, therefore, is the Ruhr,” he said, but “on the way to it we want the ports of Antwerp and Rotterdam, since the capture of the Ruhr is merely the first step on the northern route into Germany.” While, upon further reflection, he had decided that Crerar should still capture Boulogne and Calais, the “whole energies of the [First Canadian] Army will be directed towards operations designed to enable full use of the port of Antwerp.” He promised airborne troops could participate in an assault on Walcheren Island once the Canadians had cleared the shore of the Scheldt estuary. Responsibility for Antwerp would devolve entirely to the Canadians on September 17. Once the approaches to Antwerp were opened, the Canadians were “to destroy all enemy to the west of [British Second Army’s left flank], and open up the port of Rotterdam.” To free 2nd Canadian Infantry Division, Dunkirk would merely be surrounded by 4th British Special Services Brigade, and the German garrison cajoled into surrender by bombarding it with both propaganda leaflets and bombs. The 3rd Canadian Infantry Division, however, would finish the capture of Boulogne and Calais, and so would not be available to participate in clearing the Scheldt for some weeks.7
SECOND CANADIAN INFANTRY DIVISION started pulling up stakes around Dunkirk on the morning of September 16. It numbered about 15,000 men, less than its authorized strength of just over 17,000 due to casualties outpacing replacements. Aboard more than 8,600 vehicles—almost 1,000 motorcycles, 600 Bren carriers, 880 15-cwt trucks, more than 1,000 three-ton trucks, and other odds and sods, the division moved out by brigades—each departing in a single convoy that included its assigned supporting artillery regiment.8 The 4th Canadian Infantry Brigade led, followed by the 5th, and finally the 6th on September 19. “Our route for this hundred mile march,” noted the Royal Regiment of Canada’s intelligence officer, “lay through many places reminiscent of the Great War, including Poperinghe, Ypres, St. Julien, Thielt, Langemarke, Roulers, and Ghent. The weather was clear and bright, ideal for ‘sightseeing.’ All along the way, we were cheered by the people who showered apples, pears, plums, tomatoes on us at every opportunity.”9
Passage through the Great War battlefields proved an evocative experience for most of the young Canadians. “The fresh green countryside around Ypres and St. Julien showed no signs of an earlier and more bitter war,” wrote the Essex Scottish war diarist. “Memory is short, it is true, but most of the troops, many of them unborn when these names were on all tongues, knew well of these places and took a keen interest in all that they saw. Of particular interest was the magnificent war memorial near St. Julien past which the column rolled at high speed to testify to our fathers that we still sought the foe.”10
It was early evening on the 16th when 4 CIB entered Antwerp. Lieutenant George Blackburn of the 4th Field Regiment was struck by the fact that even though “twelve days had passed since the four British tanks had nosed into this the biggest port in the continent making it allied territory… the people [still] thronged the beautiful wide Grand Boulevard, colourful with hundreds of their red, orange, and black flags, to cheer the passing vehicles and fill any that happened to stop with cigars, fruit and drinks.”
Resistance fighters also swarmed the Canadians, peppering them with questions and offering information about the enemy across the Albert Canal. The Germans, some of the fighters told Blackburn, had orders “to destroy the harbour.” Looking at the largely unscathed port facilities, he found it “inexplicable” that “the Germans who had been defending the port had pulled out… without taking time to destroy the port although tons of dynamite were available for that purpose. But now they seemed to appreciate their error and all indications were that they intended to rectify it if possible.”11
The infantry regiments stopped inside the city, and, “after ridding themselves of enthusiastic admirers… cooked a meal on the street, while waiting for their reconnaissance units to return from the port area to guide them into the lines they were taking over from 53rd British Infantry Division.”12 Meanwhile, the 4th Field Regiment carefully manoeuvred guns and munition trailers through the crowds and was soon, Bombardier Ken Hossack of ‘A’ Troop noted, setting up inside “excellent German-build dugouts at Noordkasteel, just north of Antwerp’s dock area. The fine defences here were constructed and ready for occupation if an Allied landing had been attempted near the city. The cooks situate in a nice clubhouse by the side of a large swimming pool, where the Supermen and collaborators once made merry with their wives and sweethearts.”13
It was well after dark when the infantry regiments began taking over the front lines from their British counterparts. The Essex Scottish made the switch with the Highland Light Infantry under harassing shellfire from Germans dug into positions in and around the northern suburb of Merksem. Three men from the reconnaissance party were wounded.14
Scuttlebutt held that the division was going to be here for some time, its role to guard the docks and port facilities. Divisional headquarters soon confirmed the rumour with instructions that the infantry were to aggressively patrol beyond the front line to keep the Germans off balance and collect intelligence. No immediate plans were afoot to gain control of more of the port facilities or Albert Canal crossings, which frustrated the Belgian resistance fighters still trying to wrest the northern docks and villages from German hands. But in the absence of tank support, 2 CID was too weak to mount a strong attack against the well-entrenched German forces.
Canadians and Belgians established a mutually supportive relationship that differed sharply from the standoffish approach adopted by the British during their short occupation of Antwerp. The British had little trusted the resistance units commanded by Eugene Colson because they were mostly comprised of Flemish Belgians who were members of the Nationale Kongsgezinde Beweging (National Movement for the King). That meant their loyalty was pledged to King Leopold III rather than the British-backed government-in-exile. King Leopold, who had been both head of the government and army commander-in-chief, had surrendered his forces on May 28, 1940, just ten days after the Germans invaded. Although the decision was immediately repudiated by the Belgian government, it was unable to prevent the soldiers laying down arms. While the government had fled to exile in London, Leopold had surrendered
alongside his troops and was imprisoned by the Germans until 1944 at his royal château near Brussels. As the Allies moved north from Normandy, he was unwillingly evacuated to Austria. Despite the fact that Leopold’s personal intervention in 1942 was credited with saving about 500,000 Belgian women and children from deportation to work in munitions factories in Germany, the British government and Belgian government-in-exile—comprised primarily of French Belgians—were determined to force his abdication in favour of his brother Charles. Consequently, neither the British nor the government-in-exile endorsed cooperation between Twenty-First Army Group and the NKB resistance fighters.15
None of these political machinations much concerned Major General Charles Foulkes or his staff at 2 CID headquarters. By September 19, they reported being awash in intelligence reports from the “Belgian secret army who are working in close liaison with us.”16 Nobody bothered sorting out whether the resistance fighters they dealt with from one moment to another were members of the NKB, the Belgian National Movement, Group G, Independence Front, Liberation Army of Belgium, Secret Army, or the formal Witte Brigade (White Brigade) that became the informal designation Canadians used to identify any resistance unit. That each of these movements had its own political and military agenda ranging from Flemish independence to creating a communist state, to re-establishing the monarchy of King Leopold III meant nothing to the Canadians.
The resistance organizations operating in the Antwerp area were largely of similar mind. The immediate task was to defeat the Germans and, as Colson’s resistance fighters had swelled to almost 3,000 as more men stepped up to volunteer, they could play a key role in stemming German attempts to regain control of the dock areas in Allied hands.17 Brigadier Fred Cabeldu, commanding 4th Canadian Infantry Brigade, had been met upon arrival in Antwerp on September 16 by NKB and White Brigade fighters and was impressed that they “had already organized themselves and offered their whole-hearted cooperation.” Soon his brigade and Colson’s fighters were carrying out joint patrols and beginning to plan more aggressive operations intended to gain control of some of the villages north of the Albert Canal.18
The Canadians became immersed in the surreal Antwerp-area battlefront. Never had they fought inside a thriving, fully inhabited city. Antwerp bore no resemblance to the ruins of Caen in Normandy. “Ordinary urban life went on in Antwerp much as in peacetime. The trams continued to run; night clubs remained open; and the shops sold a reasonable assortment of goods. Two bands played each night at the Century Hotel… and the Belgian girls in their elegant evening dresses were certainly (or did it, after all, only seem so?) the most beautiful in the world,” the Royal Regiment of Canada’s regimental historian later wrote.19
Because of the battlefront’s static nature, each regimental commander was permitted to give 7.5 per cent of his men leave for five hours at a time, with everyone required to be back with his unit by 2230 hours each night. Initially, the men’s pockets bulged with Belgian francs.20 Although a private’s pay was only $1.30 a day with an augmentation of $35.00 per month for men who were married that went directly to their wives, the soldiers in Antwerp had not had many pay parades since landing in Normandy, and deployment in Antwerp provided opportunity for each regiment to distribute a hefty amount of back wages.21
BOMBARDIER HOSSACK DECLARED Antwerp “a veritable utopia, with wine, women and song in abundance, and [it] is visited often and well with and without the official passes.”22 Blackburn, who was promoted to captain while in Antwerp, thought the city “had a fantastic unreality about it… normal civilian activity was being carried on as though the war was miles away instead of a few short blocks. The sidewalks were packed with well-dressed shoppers going to and from shops offering an amazing array of luxuries. Civilian cars moved unconcernedly about the streets and cafés and hotels, each with some form of orchestra, according to their size, gave forth music and laughter and all the other sounds of a people in a festive mood. To those occupying an [Observation Post] this period seemed even more amazing. To them it meant leaving a building from where the Germans could be seen and ‘shot up’ and where because of hostile shells and snipers they had to ‘keep their heads down,’ catching a street car and riding up town to have tea in one of the most famous hotels in Europe among fashionably dressed people listening quietly to the hotel orchestra. After the life of filth and slit trenches of the [Normandy] bridgehead, Antwerp seemed a paradise.”23
“The cost of high living is telling on the boys,” Hossack gloomily reported a few days into the deployment. “Our extra cigarettes, soap and chocolate disappear for francs but still we’re poor. In the end everything from jeeps to dirty underwear claims its price.”24 Officers fretted about the fact that the men were going to seed, hard drinking was prevalent throughout the ranks, and it was not uncommon for soldiers to return from the city too drunk to stand watch. Yet the officers also knew that these men had been facing constant danger for months, and few were put on charge. Even those absent without leave for days went mostly undisciplined. The war was still there, right on the Albert Canal within a short streetcar ride of the city. And each day the patrols went out, skirmishes were fought, shells exploded in the positions, and men who had been enjoying drink and fine food only hours earlier died or were maimed. They called it the “Streetcar War” and declared it craziness, and knew that when the inevitable orders came to move out from Antwerp they would do so with a measure of relief at getting back to a war that was more real and easily understood.
Despite its festive air, Antwerp was a city where danger lurked for unwary soldiers. While many known fascists had been rounded up by the resistance, some eluded the sweeps. Germans wearing civilian clothing regularly infiltrated the city to gather intelligence and kidnap soldiers for interrogation. Snipers operated frequently behind the Canadian lines. Most of the roads leading from the rear areas to the front lines were under German observation from heights of ground, tall buildings, and port structures located north of the Albert Canal, so any movement generally drew mortar or artillery fire. Men occasionally went missing while on leave only to turn up later dead in a ditch. Such a fate befell Gunner James Carson of the 4th Field, whose corpse was found in one of the canal locks. “Accident or foul play?” Hossack wondered. “We’ll never know.”25
According to the Royal Regiment’s historian, officers and men alike went into Antwerp “fully armed, the pistols in their pockets and the knives strapped to their persons providing a strange contrast to the plush and gilt décor, the sweet music, and the soft lights of the cabarets.”26
Even no man’s land presented, in the words of the division’s war diarist, “a very curious situation. Merksem, a suburb of Antwerp, lies north of the Albert Canal and is in enemy hands. Yet civilians pass to and from Merksem via the tram line to the canal, where they alight, cross the canal on foot and resume their journey in a tram operating on the other side of the canal.” Despite the “field security problem” this created, the Canadians proved “unable to put a stop to this traffic.”27
While civilians came and went from Merksem at will, the same was not true for the Canadians. Repeated attempts to penetrate the town were blocked by “what seemed to be a… screen of well-placed MG posts supported by mortars and light guns.”28 Slowly, however, the aggressive fighting patrols sent out by the Canadians and Belgians gained control over the port facilities to the north of the Albert Canal. But Merksem and the other communities of Ekeren, Oorderen, and Wilmarsdonk which arced around the outer edges of the port to its immediate north and east were sufficiently in dispute that the Canadian hold remained tenuous.
Between September 18 and 21, control of Oorderen and Wilmarsdonk, hamlets surrounded by fields that had been partially flooded when the Germans opened nearby locks, seesawed back and forth. During the fight, a pattern developed whereby Oorderen changed hands daily. Daylight hours saw the Royal Hamilton Light Infantry in control of its streets, but with sunset they were forced out by the Germans. In keeping with the biza
rre nature of the Streetcar War, both sides frequented the same small tavern—the Germans taking over the seats around the inkeeper’s tables after darkness. “The innkeeper thought it was a great joke,” Sergeant Gordon Booker later recalled.29
Patrols on both sides were lost; their fate known only to the opposing side. On September 18, a two-man patrol guided by a resistance fighter “never returned and it is suspected that they were taken prisoner.” Early the next morning, a patrol from ‘A’ Company led by Lieutenant Donald Trumpour Knight walked into an ambush while groping its way through heavy fog. An MG 42 hidden in a house ripped off a burst that cut down the thirty-two-year-old officer from Toronto. Six hours later, Captain C.D. MacKay rolled his carrier platoon into the north end of Oorderen and shot up several German patrols trying to infiltrate the town partially as an act of vengeance.30 In the absence of tanks, 4 CIB’S infantry regiments had taken to using their carrier platoons as quasi-armoured units that could quickly deliver concentrated machine-gun fire. On September 20, an Essex Scottish reconnaissance patrol crept across ground being rapidly flooded by an unusual rising tide caused by the autumnal equinox and caught a six-man German patrol literally napping. Four were taken prisoner and another shot and killed.