Terrible Victory

by Mark Zuehlke

  While the Germans facing No. 15 Platoon seemed content to pin them in place, once the sun rose, No. 14 Platoon fended off one counterattack after another. Gallagher organized a carrying party to “bring up grenades as fast as they could and after we used approximately twenty-five boxes we managed to drive them off.” About ten men were wounded, and MacDonnel’s platoon was forced to give up about a hundred yards–crowding in close to the road.39

  Normally, ‘C’ Company would have dealt with the Germans by driving over the canal to gain control of the other side, “but to put one’s head over the level of the dyke was to cause the top of the dyke to be swept by enemy machinegun fire. Artillery fire could not be laid on owing to the close proximity of our troops to the enemy which was about five yards.”40

  At about 1400 hours, Major David Pugh brought a platoon from ‘D’ Company up to reinforce No. 14 Platoon. This enabled the Can Scots to regain some lost ground, and soon the rapid grenade exchange slowed to a desultory trickle. In the late afternoon, a German first-aid man slipped into No. 15 Platoon’s position and asked for a twenty-minute truce to allow him to evacuate twenty-five men immobilized by wounds. Marshall realized that the Type 36 grenade, which was more explosive and produced a greater spread of shrapnel than the German potato-mashers, was inflicting “a harvest of shrapnel wounds and burns.” Gallagher agreed to the truce, using the time to evacuate his own wounded and resupply with grenades.41

  According to plan, the rest of the battalion was supposed to have attacked towards Eede from the front line held by ‘C’ and ‘D’ Companies at midnight. But it was obvious that before this could happen the Germans immediately across the dyke had to be driven off. Pugh and Gallagher conferred with the Regina Rifles and agreed on a joint attack along the length of their line. Once the Germans were driven off, Can Scots’ Major Earl English’s ‘B’ Company would move up the road before veering left to seize the southern outskirts of Eede, while ‘A’ Company struck out on a northwesterly angle alongside two parallelling hedgerows to enter the village from the east.42

  At 2200 hours, just as a brief artillery and mortar bombardment lifted, ‘C’ and ‘D’ Companies went over the top of the dyke “after making a barrage of our own with… grenades.” The attack seemed to stun the defending Germans, many of whom immediately surrendered. Despite numbering only fourteen men, Sergeant T. Byron’s No. 13 Platoon rounded up thirty prisoners. When Byron was wounded, Corporal A.H. Palmer took over without the platoon suffering any loss of momentum. Private P. Colman, leading Palmer’s section, skillfully ferreted the Germans out of their positions on the side of the dyke. Although wounded in both arms, Private E.G. Shannon “carried on until the fight was over… These are men who were mentioned to me,” Gallagher later wrote, “but there were many more, and every man did an excellent job.”43 In all, the two companies took more than 150 prisoners–a remarkable feat considering ‘C’ Company had just thirty-five men left and ‘D’ Company was little better off.44 By 2230 hours, they reported the “last resistance had been cleaned out and we had established ourselves firmly on both sides of the dyke and as far out as a group of buildings 100 yards to our front.”45

  This set the stage for ‘A’ and ‘B’ Companies’ push for Eede, which they began at 0030 hours on October 13. Eede stood west of the main road astride a secondary road, while the highway was itself bordered by closely packed farmhouses. The village was a long straggle of interspersed houses rather than a tightly knit community. ‘B’ Company made good progress into the village, coming to a halt about two hundred yards from the canal in order to avoid being separated from the rest of the Can Scot front. ‘A’ Company, under Major J.D.M. Gillan, also met no resistance as it slipped alongside the hedgerows to where they intersected the main road. Moving out ahead of the rest of the company, No. 7 Platoon returned a report that the houses west of the road were clear. Captain Gillan then moved the company up and spread the platoons among the houses to consolidate its hold.

  Unwittingly, Gillan established company headquarters inside a house where a group of Germans under command of a sergeant was hiding in the basement. Plopping down on some sandbags in the kitchen, the captain propped his feet against the cellar door just as someone tried pushing it open. Thinking one of his men was searching the place, Gillan gently eased the door closed when the person trying to open it abruptly stopped. A moment later, someone shoved hard, compressing Gillan’s knees up around his neck. Then an arm clutching a stick grenade appeared. The thrown grenade collided with Gillan’s helmeted head and spun across the room, while the arm, wearing a grey uniform marked with sergeant’s stripes, disappeared amid much crashing of a body tumbling down stairs. The grenade exploded, wounding both Gillan and his second-in-command, Captain S.L. Chambers. No. 7 Platoon, responding to the explosion, quickly rounded up the German sergeant–a bit battered from his tumble–and his men.46

  While the Can Scots had not cleared all of Eede for simple want of manpower, they had pushed the bridgehead far enough from the canal to give the engineers breathing space to launch a Bailey bridge. 7 cib’s trial by fire on the Leopold Canal was not yet over, but things were markedly improved. “For an entire week,” the Can Scot regimental historian later wrote, “the brigade had had to claw its way forward in a battle reminiscent of the First World War, with no tanks, no carriers, and no vehicles of any sort to help it. With the bridge complete, and the engineers and pioneers busy clearing the road of mines, the armour could be brought in to blast the enemy from his entrenched positions around Eede.”

  In the morning, the Germans seemed to sense this. After a spate of counterattacks repelled with help from the artillery, opposition noticeably slackened.47 While the Germans continued pounding the bridgehead–particularly where the engineers worked on the bridge–only the occasional sniper tried infiltrating the position. “As the strain has been relieved now,” wrote the Regina Rifles war diarist, “thirty men are sent out for a rest for 24 hours, the plan being to give all the men in the line a rest in this way. On their way out they get cleaned up at the mobile bath. The balance of the men are getting their baths throughout the day. Blankets have been brought in and distributed to the [companies].”48

  [ 16 ]

  The Toughest Yet

  ON OCTOBER 9, the day after 9th Canadian Infantry Brigade’s amphibious assault across the Braakman Inlet, General-major Knut Eberding recognized that 64th Infantry Division was losing control of the Breskens Pocket, with the most serious threat the “Canadian forces [that] took Hoofdplaat after bitter fighting.” His counterattack attempts “were delayed by air attacks and damaged roads.”1 Given the pressure on his front, Eberding mistakenly concluded that he faced two full divisions–3rd Canadian Infantry Division and 4th Canadian Armoured Division–and feared the latter would unleash an unstoppable armoured juggernaut despite the polders being so ill-suited to tanks.2

  Major General Dan Spry, meanwhile, had his own concerns, not least being 9 cib’s failure on October 10 to widen the beachhead. It had been a cloudy, showery day and the brigade’s war diarist noted “no lull in the enemy’s continuous efforts to dislodge us.” Vlissingen coastal battery’s shelling was increasingly more accurate and deadly. Any advance was met by “small arms and mortar fire from carefully sited positions along the roads and canals,” causing heavy casualties.3

  Spry planned to have 8th Canadian Infantry Brigade reinforce the beachhead by driving through the Isabellapolder south of the Braakman Inlet. On October 10 at 0300 hours, 4th Canadian Armoured Division’s Algonquin Regiment attempted to open a hole in the German front lines there. The Algonquins attacked behind the covering fire of artillery and the medium machine guns of the Cameron Highlanders of Ottawa. ‘B’ Company was immediately pinned down by fire from strongpoints and quickly withdrew after taking many casualties, including the wounding of its commander, Captain W.F. Grafton. ‘D’ company got through a network of barbed wire only to be “pretty well cut up as the obstacle was covered by enemy [light mac
hine guns] and grenade fire.” Lieutenant Colonel Robert Bradburn ordered it back. When ‘A’ and ‘D’ Companies tried again in the afternoon, they “met with no better success… and another withdrawal had to be effected.” Casualties for the day tallied twenty-one.4

  Well west of the Algonquins, the Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders had also tried to penetrate the German defences by sending a four-man patrol across the Leopold Canal south of Watervleit in two reconnaissance boats. Lieutenant Kerrigan Milne King and the others surprised a machine-gun post and killed its crew with grenades. But the single burst the gunners fired mortally wounded King. Sergeant Mooney and the other two men picked up the dying officer and slithered down the slippery bank to their boats. The patrol escaped despite being illuminated by flares and subjected to a rain of grenades and rifle grenade volleys. The severity of the German response to the patrol showed that no easy opening existed along the Argyll front.5

  Realizing that 8 CIB would be unable to advance overland, Spry changed plans again. This brigade, along with the 7th Reconnaissance Regiment, would land on the beachhead. The North Shore (New Brunswick) Regiment and the reconnaissance troops would move in on October 11, and the rest of 8 CIB the day after.

  In the beachhead, the immediate concern during the night of October 10–11 was the gaps developing in the front line. The Highland Light Infantry near Biervliet and the adjacent North Nova Scotia Highlanders were not tied together. The North Novas also had lost direct contact with the Stormont, Dundas and Glengarry Highlanders to their west. This gap could only widen further as the Glens were moving away from the Novas in an attempt to seize the western part of Hoofdplaat.6

  Immediately south of this village, the Glens’ ‘B’ Company was still harassed by heavy fire from 20-millimetre flak guns hidden among a clutch of farmhouses. It was also being fired on from positions in the gap between the Glens and North Novas. On Hoofdplaat’s seaward side, ‘A’ Company remained pinned in front of the bunker system covering the dyke. Only ‘C’ Company, in Hoofdplaat’s centre, enjoyed limited freedom of movement.

  While the North Novas controlled one side of a dyke east of the Glens, the Germans were dug in opposite, resulting in the routine grenade exchange. With the dawn, the North Novas’ ‘D’ Company– its thirty-five men bolstered by a ‘C’ Company platoon commanded by Sergeant Andy Cannon and the battalion’s three Wasp Bren carriers–had attempted to eliminate the Germans. The moment the Wasps finished releasing a salvo of flame over the dyke, the infantry charged with the carriers close behind. Any German dugouts that refused to surrender were burned out by the Wasps. A thirty-minute action won the dyke, for the loss of only one damaged Wasp.7

  The North Novas now pushed southwest towards Driewegen, which lay two and a half miles away across open polder. ‘A’ Company made good progress until being “stopped by very heavy machine gun fire and [having] to go to ground about 100 yards in front of the enemy position.” The men remained trapped there the rest of the day, unable to evacuate their ever growing number of wounded. Nightfall brought no respite, for shelling had set several nearby farm buildings alight and the fires illuminated the battle-field. The company had nearly exhausted its ammunition when Company Sergeant Major Dave Smith assembled a small party that carried ammunition forward on stretchers and brought out the wounded. The csm kept this shuttle force going all night, each trip made through withering fire.8

  While the battalion’s main effort had been directed at Driewegen, the North Novas also slipped a company to the right to establish contact with the Glens’ ‘B’ Company. This enabled the Glens to attack the gun positions hidden in the farm buildings. Without regard for its own casualties, ‘B’ Company punched through a storm of shells from the 20-millimetre guns. One platoon was cut to only ten men. Although the position was taken by mid-morning, no sooner had it been cleared than the Germans counterattacked. But the Cameron Highlanders of Ottawa, who had been supporting the Glens, broke the attack with long-range fire from their machine guns. This was considered “a great sight for the tired, wet riflemen.”9

  From Hoofdplaat, ‘C’ Company struck the flank of the bunkers pinning ‘A’ Company down. Captain B.G. Fox and the antitank platoon pushed their six-pounders forward manually to support this attack. The large bunkers were heavily reinforced and fitted with steel doors, so Fox ordered the guns fired from a range of just fifty yards. The combined infantry and antitank gun assault silenced the 20-millimetre guns, and fifty Germans surrendered.10

  As ‘A’ Company advanced into the bunker system in the early afternoon, it found that each contained two or three rooms separated by internal steel doors. In one bunker, a section of Glens discovered an adjoining room full of Germans. They could hear someone talking on a wireless set, and realized that he was directing artillery fire against the battalion. Unable to break the door down or to gain a safe firing angle for a PIAT, the pioneer platoon was summoned. They blew the door in with an explosive charge. Thirty more Germans were dragged out as prisoners and the wireless set was secured.11

  Still facing heavy opposition, the three companies advanced in line, with ‘B’ Company on the southern outskirts of Hoofdplaat, ‘C’ Company in its centre, and ‘A’ Company on the seaward side of the dyke. Artillery fire stalked them, prompting the war diarist to note that “the SDG are being badly cut up… and have suffered quite a few casualties.” Despite the low ceiling, brigade kept an artillery spotter plane codenamed Skylark overhead, and the forward observation officer aboard directed counterbattery fire against the German guns. The moment the plane was forced to land, however, the volume of incoming fire surged, driving the Glens to ground. “Skylark was over,” Lieutenant Colonel Roger Rowley signalled brigade. “He seems to keep the big guns quiet. If possible we’d like to keep that fellow overhead. Every time he buggers off the guns open up.” He warned that “we will soon need reinforcements as we are gradually being eaten away.”

  Late in the afternoon, Skylark was grounded permanently, the battlefield obscured by rain and mist. The Germans counterattacked, fighting “practically hand to hand.” Two captured Germans had flamethrowers strapped on their backs. Night fell with Hoofdplaat still disputed. The Glens found about fifty civilians cowering in basements and evacuated them to the beach for shipment out of the battle zone. In the darkness, they could see the flashes of the Vlissingen coastal guns.12

  ON THE BEACHHEAD’S opposite flank, the Highland Light Infantry’s ‘A’ Company had driven west from Amber Beach to close the gap between their battalion and the North Novas, while Major J.C. King’s ‘B’ Company assaulted across the main dyke on the left flank. ‘B’ Company was supported by the battalion’s Wasps, and after several bursts of flame, the Germans surrendered. Many, in the words of the HLI war diarist, were “badly scorched.” Although the HLI now controlled the dyke, German snipers across the facing polder posed a deadly hazard. Forward Observation Officer Captain John Lawrence Murdoch was shot dead. The thirty-six-year-old 19th Field Regiment officer had always been right out front, despite the wireless set’s tell-tale whip antenna marking him clearly for snipers.13

  Major Tom Prest’s ‘C’ Company pushed out from the main dyke to increase the depth of the beachhead. Initially, gains were measured in yards, but by afternoon the situation loosened, and the advance became so rapid that a couple of wagons loaded with German wounded were overrun. Leaving the wounded Germans to be taken in by stretcher-bearers, Prest and his men had gone only a short distance beyond when gunfire broke out behind them. Spinning around, the men watched shells from a German 20-millimetre gun riddle the carts. Some of the wounded tried to escape, but were cut down as they crawled or hobbled away. Prest was shocked by this cold-blooded murder. When the guns turned on ‘C’ Company, it was forced to pull back to a more defensible position just ahead of the carts. During the withdrawal, several dead Glens had to be left behind, including twenty-nine-year-old Company Sergeant Major Johnny McDonald. On September 2, his brother Donald Russell McDonald–three
years younger, and also a CSM with the Highland Light Infantry–had been killed.14

  With three companies engaged, a steady stream of wounded flowed into the farmhouse on the south side of the main dyke that served as the Regimental Aid Post. “An awful lot of the lads were getting wounded,” Padre Jock Anderson recalled. “I think there were more wounds there than any other battle because it was Small Arms fire. Usually in a battle… there was a lot of SA fire when you got into the village, but a lot of casualties were before they ever got in sight of the enemy. There were the mortars and the shellings and a lot were killed outright. But in close-in fighting, when there was Small Arms, they might get wounded in the arm or leg, or a chin blown off.”15

  Hearing of the ‘C’ Company deaths, Padre Anderson set out by jeep with his driver Mitch to retrieve the bodies. Passing the carts, he noticed “all kinds of German dead lying around them.” Reaching Prest’s position, Anderson asked where McDonald was. When the major said the body was too exposed to recover until after dark, Anderson decided to return later. Heading back to the RAP, Anderson saw a German lurch out of a ditch beside the carts and collapse. “I slammed on the brakes and told Mitch, ‘We’ve got to get him. He’s still alive.’

  “Mitch looked at me and said: ‘You’re not stopping here?’ I told him, ‘Sure, why not?’ So I backed up and we ran into the ditch and picked him up and all the time we were putting him on a stretcher on the jeep there was a German sniper out in the field trying to get us. I think I almost lost my head that time.

  “Then we went over and felt all the bodies in the other cart and there was one still alive so we got him on a stretcher and took both of them down to our RAP.”16

  With nightfall, 7th Reconnaissance Regiment (17th Duke of York’s Royal Canadian Hussars) took over part of the HLI front so it could reorganize for a breakout to Biervliet in the morning. Nobody was sorry to leave the embattled front. “Fighting today has been hard and the men are having a grim time. So far this operation is the toughest yet,” the war diarist concluded.17