27. “Memorandum of meeting for Operation J_____ on July 16, 1942,” 25 July 1942, LAC RG 24, vol. 10,584.
28. Ibid.
29. At the time, the security classification for this history read Ultra Secret, which included not only signals but also the histories written after the war. They all came under one great Ultra umbrella.
30. “Naval Intelligence Division History, 1939–1942,” Manuscript II, Royal Navy Historical Branch, Portsmouth, U.K.
31. Ibid.
32. Message from McNaughton to Stuart, 18 August 1942, LAC RG 24, vol. 10,584.
33. For an excellent treatise on the bureaucratic manoeuvring by Mountbatten, see Stephen Prince, The Royal Navy and the Raids at St. Nazaire and Dieppe (London: Frank Cass, 2002).
34. Martin H. Folly, “Seeking Comradeship in the ‘Ogre’s Den’: Winston Churchill’s Quest for a Warrior Alliance and his Mission to Stalin, August 1942” (research paper, Brunel University, 2007), http://bura.brunel.ac.uk/handle/2438/5738 (accessed May 1, 2013).
35. Alexander Cadogan to Lord Halifax, “War: Soviet Union. Account of Stalin/Churchill Meeting in Moscow,” 29 August 1942, TNA FO 1093/247.
36. Ibid.
37. TNA PREM 3/463.
38. David Wragg, Sacrifice for Stalin: The Cost and Value of the Arctic Convoys Re-assessed (Havertown, PA: Casemate, 1105–6). Kindle edition.
39. Alexander Hill, “British Lend-Lease and the Soviet War Effort June 1941–June 1942,” Journal of Military History 71, no. 3 (July 2007): 773–808.
40. CHUR 4/ 25A/ 21–3.
41. David Reynolds, In Command of History: Churchill Fighting and Writing the Second World War (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books, 2005), 7422–24. Kindle edition.
42. Ibid., 7426–27.
43. Ibid.
44. Winston S. Churchill, Memoirs of the Second World War (Boston: Houghton-Mifflin, 1959), 636.
45. TNA CAB 120/66.
46. TNA CAB 120/69 (italics added).
47. TNA CAB 120/69.
THIRTEEN: THE CROSSING
1. “Anonymous member of Special Branch, Newhaven–Dieppe,” Weekly Intelligence Report [NID] no. 129, 28 August 1942, 11–20, DHH; Fleming to Casa Maury, 21 August 1942, DEFE 2/333.
2. Memorandum for CCO from Brigadier Truscott, n.d., c. Aug.–Sept. 1942, TNA DEFE 3/335.
3. “Anonymous member of Special Branch,” 11.
4. No. 40 Royal Marine Commando, “War Diary,” TNA ADM 202/87.
5. Jock Farmer, JOCK of 40 Royal Marine Commando: My Life from Start to Finish (Shanklin Chine: Shanklin Chine Publishers, 2007), 59.
6. “Memorandum on interview at Navy Office of Canada, on October 14th with Sto. I Pearson, V10685, and Ldg. Stm Cline, N.W., LAC RG 24, vol. 3951.
7. McAlister memoirs, courtesy of the McAlister family and Phillip Lloyd of No. 40 Royal Marine Commando Association.
8. Farmer, JOCK, 59.
9. Paul McGrath, The Dieppe Raid, Wednesday 19th August 1942: Recollections of W.P. McGrath DSM, self-published, 1.
10. Farmer, JOCK, 59.
11. Douglas Charles Bevan, interview, Imperial War Museum (IWM 14882), 1995.
12. McGrath, Dieppe Raid, 1.
13. Bevan, interview.
14. John Kruthoffer to Robin Neillands, 25 March 1986, Robin Neillands Papers, RMM.
15. McGrath, Dieppe Raid, 1.
16. John Hughes-Hallett, “Before I Forget,” 177, LAC Hughes Hallett Papers.
17. Ibid.
18. Ibid., 178.
19. Jock Hughes-Hallett, “Naval Force Commander’s Narrative,” Hughes-Hallett Papers, DHH 78/492.
20. R.E.D. Ryder, unpublished memoirs.
21. Ibid.
22. ZIP/ZTPG 68844 and ZIP/ZTPG 68845, DEFE 3/187.
23. Battle Summary No. 33: “Raid on Dieppe, August 19th 1942” (1946), 13, TNA ADM 223/354.
24. Ibid.
25. ZIP/ZTPG 68850, TNA DEFE 3/187.
26. Fleming to Casa Maury, 21 August 1942, DEFE 2/333.
27. Enclosure 13 “Extract of Report from HMS Locust,” app. 20, LAC RG 24, vol. 10,872; NMM GRO/24.
28. “Combat Report of four Coastal Motor Ships,” 22 August 1942, DHH Steiger Papers SGR II/285.
29. Battle Summary No. 33.
30. Dieppe Operation Naval Commander Channel Coast, “Lessons Learnt August 30 1942,” DHH Steiger Papers SGR II/280.
31. Ibid. “According to information from 81st Army Corps, one of our convoys has been attacked by fast British ships at 0400hrs, at about 20 kilometres off the port of Dieppe. Troops have intensified their lookout. Navy and Air authorities have been advised.”
32. Robin Neillands, The Dieppe Raid: The Story of the Disastrous 1942 Expedition (London: Aurum Press, 2005), 129.
33. Interview with author for DU, 3 March 2011.
34. “Action of the Essex Scottish (Red Beach), Statement by Capt D.F. McCrae,” TNA DEFE 2/339.
35. Ibid.
36. Author’s interview with Howard Large for DU, 3 October 2011.
37. Denis W. Whitaker and Shelagh Whitaker, Dieppe: Tragedy to Triumph (Toronto: McGraw-Hill Ryerson, 1992), 253.
38. Jock Hughes-Hallett, “Naval Force Commander’s Narrative,” Hughes-Hallett Papers, DHH 78/492.
39. Bevan, interview.
40. Ibid.
41. John Parson, correspondence with author.
42. R.E.D. Ryder, unpublished memoirs.
43. Ernest Coleman, unpublished memoirs, courtesy of John Barker.
44. McGrath, Dieppe Raid, 5.
45. Ibid.
46. Ibid.
47. Ibid., 6.
48. Ibid.
49. Naval Force Commander’s Narrative, encl. no. 5, “Operation Jubilee List of Important Signals,” LAC Hughes-Hallett Papers.
50. Farmer, JOCK, 60.
51. LAC RG24, vol. 17,506.
52. Naval Force Commander’s Narrative, encl. no. 5.
53. “Operation Jubilee: The Raid at Dieppe 19/08/42, Part II: The Execution of the Operation, Section 2, The Attack on the Main Beaches, Report Battle Account of St. Pierre Dubuc, Fusiliers de Mont-Royal,” DHH CMHQ 108.
54. Hughes-Hallett, “Before I Forget,” 185.
55. “Lord Mountbatten’s Comments on Dieppe Chapter,” c. 1970, LAC Hughes-Hallett Papers. In this case, it is Mountbatten quoting Hughes-Hallett back to Hughes-Hallett.
56. Wallace Reyburn, letter to the editor, Sunday Telegraph (London), 17 September 1967, LAC Hughes-Hallett Papers.
57. Quoted in Neillands, Dieppe Raid, 238.
58. Naval Force Commander’s Narrative, encl. no. 5, “Operation Jubilee List of Important Signals,” LAC Hughes-Hallett Papers.
59. “Report Operation Jubilee Royal Marine Commando 19/08/42,” TNA ADM 1/11986; Capt. P.W.C. Hellings RM DSC, “Report on Events of 19/08/42 off Dieppe of A Coy Royal Marine Commando,” TNA ADM 1/11986.
60. Ernest Coleman, unpublished memoirs.
61. Farmer, JOCK, 61.
62. Naval Force Commander’s Narrative, encl. no. 5. Hughes-Hallett’s only response was to order Ryder, who had remained on Locust, to pick up the wounded on the beach once the Royal Marines landed.
63. Naval Force Commander’s Narrative, encl. no. 5.
64. Hugh G. Henry, “The Planning, Intelligence, Execution and Aftermath of the Dieppe Raid, 19 August 1942” (Ph.D. dissertation, St. John’s College, University of Cambridge, October 1996).
FOURTEEN: ALL IN ON THE MAIN BEACH
1. Paul McGrath, The Dieppe Raid, Wednesday 19th August 1942: Recollections of W.P. McGrath DSM, self-published, 1.
2. Ernest Coleman, unpublished memoirs.
3. McAlister, unpublished memoirs.
4. Jock Farmer, JOCK of 40 Royal Marine Commando: My Life from Start to Finish (Shanklin Chine: Shanklin Chine Publishers, 2007), 61.
5. J.J. Dwan to Neillands, 7 November 2002, Robin Neillands Papers, RMM.
6. McGrath, Dieppe Raid, 9.
7. Kruthoffer, quoted in Robin Neillands, By Sea and La
nd (Barnsley, U.K.: Pen and Sword, 2004), 29.
8. McGrath, Dieppe Raid, 8.
9. Kruthoffer, quoted in Neillands, By Sea and Land, 29.
10. Ernest Coleman, unpublished memoirs.
11. McGrath, Dieppe Raid, 8.
12. Kruthoffer, quoted in Neillands, By Sea and Land, 29.
13. Ernest Coleman, unpublished memoirs.
14. McGrath, Dieppe Raid, 11.
15. “A History of 30 Commando (Latterly Called 30 Assault Unit and 30 Advanced Unit),” ch. 2, TNA ADM 223/214; “Camp 020 Interim Report on the case of Erich Pfeiffer,” TNA KV 2/267.
16. Huntington-Whiteley to Sergeant Kruthoffer, n.d., c. 26 August 1942; quoted in Neillands, By Sea and Land, 33-34.
17. R.E.D. Ryder, unpublished memoirs.
18. Weekly Intelligence Report [NID] no. 129, 28 August 1942, DHH.
19. The exception was John Campbell’s masterful Dieppe Revisited, in which he cites the document but fails to understand its true significance. Rather, he focused on the security issues and on Fleming’s veiled references to his own Ultra indoctrination.
EPILOGUE
1. DU.
2. Mountbatten to Godfrey, 29 August 1942, BNA DEFE 2/955. As Mountbatten would later tell Godfrey after the DNI petitioned for the VC winner’s services to head the new 30 Assault Unit following Dieppe: “I know you will agree it will not be much use having the most perfect Intelligence Assault Unit unless the operations on which they are sent are properly planned and carried out.”
3. Of course, if Jock Hughes-Hallett did not agree, he had the power as naval force commander—not to mention the cocksureness—to call off any attempts to land further reinforcements simply by refusing to provide the boats or by turning for home. Despite their difference in rank, for the raid Roberts and Hughes-Hallett were equals, masters of their own military and naval domains respectively.
4. Intelligence Control Station France, “Evaluation of Dieppe Operation,” 14 September 1942, LAC RG 24, vol. 20,488.
The classic photo taken by a German propaganda cameraman of the carnage on Blue Beach at Puys, where over five hundred men from the Royal Regiment of Canada (including Ron Beal) and the Black Watch of Montreal landed, suffering close to 95 percent casualties in just a few hours. In the distance, below the white house on the escarpment, are three of the five bunkers and pillboxes that housed the German machine guns, which took such a heavy toll on the Canadians. (photo credits nts.1)
Happy to be home: Two unidentified infantrymen of the Essex Scottish Regiment, relieved to be home after surviving the hell on earth on Red Beach, in England on August 23, 1942. (photo credits nts.2)
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
The research for this book unfolded over a period of nearly two decades, and I would like to begin by thanking everyone who helped to make it possible. One of the best aspects of this historical research journey has been meeting a wide range of people who have influenced my work and become colleagues—and some, lifelong friends.
Without the work of at least two generations of historians before me, this book could not have been written. Starting with C.P. Stacey’s pioneering work in the days following the raid, through Terence Robertson’s work in the sixties that embedded Dieppe in the Canadian consciousness, to the stellar and seminal offerings of Brian Villa and John Campbell in the late eighties, followed by historians such as Ben Greenhous, Steve Prince, Peter Henshaw, Hugh Henry, Denis and Shelagh Whitaker and more recently Beatrice Richard and Timothy Balzer, all these historians have made dramatic and lasting contributions to our understanding of the darkest day in Canadian history. Contextually, the many publications by J.L. Granatstein, David Bercuson, Holger Herwig, Desmond Morton and Terry Copp have been invaluable to my research.
In the area of cryptography, the work of Ralph Erskine continues to inspire, as do the lasting contributions by David Kahn, David Syrett and Richard Aldrich. Likewise, Hugh Sebag-Montefiore’s excellent study on the early days of pinch operations is clearly groundbreaking, as is Nicholas Rankin’s book on 30 Assault Unit, Richard Hopton’s on Robert “Red” Ryder, Robin Neilland’s on the Royal Marines, Jack Copeland’s on Alan Turing, and Jock Gardner’s on Ultra and the Battle of the Atlantic.
I am grateful to Dr. Stephen Harris, who recruited me some twenty years ago, when I began my graduate studies, to work at the Directorate of History and Heritage in Ottawa. That appointment not only gave me a job but laid the path for a career. Likewise, there were many others at DHH who have generously helped me over the years: Serge Bernier, Alec Douglas, Bill McAndrew, Bob Caldwell, Bill Rawling, Donna Porter, Isabelle Campbell, Mike Whitby, Richard Gimlett, Sean Hunter, Ken Reynolds, Michelle Litalien, Jean Morin, Greg Donahy, Bill Johnston, Yves Tremblay and the late Ben Greenhous, among others. This list also includes a historian’s best friend—the archivist. In this case, without the support and expertise of Owen Cooke, Warren Sinclair and Valerie Casbourn at DHH and the wisdom, friendship and advice of Paul Marsden at Library and Archives Canada, this research would never have been possible.
Although he has moved on from DHH to greener pastures at the Laurier Centre for Military and Disarmament Studies in Waterloo, I must thank Dr. Roger Sarty, who was a friend, mentor and boss all those years ago when I was a very small cog in the machine that created the official history of the Royal Canadian Navy in the Second World War. In addition, I would like to thank Mike Bechthold and Professor Emeritus Terry Copp at Wilfrid Laurier University, who gave me sage research advice that I have never forgotten.
Equally, I would like to thank Brian Villa, Peter Henshaw and Hugh Henry, whose scholarship and encouragement kept me on my toes, constantly posing a battery of salient questions throughout this process. Similarly, I am grateful to Beth Crumley at the United States Marine Corps Historical Center for information on the USMC commitment to the Dieppe Raid. I am indebted to Ralph Erskine and, at Bletchley Park, to Bob Horner and the late Brian Oakley for their insights on British cryptography. In addition, I must thank Bob Hanyok for his generous help with the American cryptographic landscape, and Adrian Smith at the University of Southampton for his assistance with Mountbatten. This research could not have been completed without “bird dogs” on the ground—the researchers at various archival facilities, particularly Simon Cawthorne, Bob O’Hara, Gregor Murbach and Greg Hill, who fulfilled that role with remarkable skill.
I would also like to thank the staff at the National Maritime Museum in Greenwich, the Imperial War Museum in London, the University of Toronto Archives (in particular Eric McGeer), the Royal Marine Commando Museum and Archives in Portsmouth, and Hugh Alexander and Mark Dunton at the British National Archives (fondly remembered as the PRO).
I am grateful to Stephen Prince and his staff at the Royal Navy’s Naval Historical Branch in Portsmouth, and especially to Jock Gardner and Mark Bentinck (who put me on to Paul McGrath), for their generous help with numerous naval queries from this all too “military” of historians. None of this could have come to fruition without the help of the historian at GCHQ who, when presented with the evidence, immediately provided key technical advice and judiciously expedited the release of key documents that helped take my research to a new level.
A special note of appreciation goes out to the veterans and their families who generously gave of their time to talk to me and granted permission to quote from their letters, diaries, journals and unpublished memoirs—all of which add to the drama and human reality of this story. They include Ron Beal, Howard Large, Ted Bennett, John Parsons, Paul McGrath, the family of Ernest “Lofty” Coleman, Edward Peter Yard-Young and Andy Wilkinson, Simon McAlister and the family of Robert McAlister, Miles Huntington-Whiteley and Leo Huntington-Whiteley, Barry Batterton and the family of Roy Batterton Jr., David McKellar and the family of Bob McKellar, Lisle Ryder and the family of Red Ryder, and David Lloyd of No. 40 Commando Association. I would like to thank the Honourable Stephen Blaney, Kelly Power and Andrew Bernardo from Veterans Affairs Canada for their help in loca
ting veterans and for all they have done to help promote the research.
One of the bonuses of conducting historical inquiries such as this one is having a reason to visit the site in question. In this case, I was most fortunate to spend close to six months over an eighteen-month period in Dieppe. The City of Dieppe Archives proved crucial to establishing the whereabouts of the Hôtel Moderne, as were the owners of the Hôtel Les Arcades, Karine and Mathieu Leducq, who energetically joined in the search. I also want to thank Nicola Bucourt, Frederick Jeanne, Mathieu Masson, Hervé Fihue, and Heimdal publications in Caen for their help.
What took me over to Dieppe on a regular basis was the filming of the documentary Dieppe Uncovered for History Television in Canada and UKTV in England. This project would never have happened without the support of Sarah Jane Flynn, Nick Crowe and Cameron Mask at History Television. I have happily worked in conjunction with them for fifteen years, and they continue to support groundbreaking historical research on their network. Special thanks go to my “partner in crime” in several documentary productions, the talented producer/director Wayne Abbott—who has traipsed across many a battlefield with me, from Hong Kong to Europe, in our effort to bring history to life on the small screen.
Having taught history at the university, college and high school levels for close to twenty years, I was most fortunate to sign on with Marianopolis College in Westmount a few years ago. There, I have always received tremendous support for my research endeavours. In particular, I want to thank Len Even and Norma Raimondo for their visionary approach to professional development and Kareen Latour, my incredible and supportive department chair, for making everything work out smoothly. I must also thank a fantastic faculty and staff who truly value excellence and the spirit of collegiality, especially my office mate, Dr. Maria Salomon, who listened with great patience as I droned incessantly about all things Dieppe. Thanks for being a friend.
To put a complex book together requires a team of experienced and talented professionals. My literary super-agent, Rick Broadhead, went beyond the call of duty to ensure that everything came together and that it stayed on the rails. The excellent group at Knopf Canada—especially copy editor John Sweet, proofreader Doris Cowan, designer Andrew Roberts and indexer Barney Gilmore—deserve special mention, along with Deirdre Molina, Kate Icely, Tracey Turriff, Shona Cook, Matthew Sibiga and Nina Ber. My picture researcher Avril McMeekin overcame many obstacles and, like the rest of the team, worked long hours and gave up weekends with friends and family to complete the book on time. They all have my deep respect and admiration for a job well done.
One Day in August Page 42