Responsibility of the 8th Canadian Reconnaissance Regiment

Heroes Remember

Responsibility of the 8th Canadian Reconnaissance Regiment

Transcript

Interviewer: Are you proud of the service that you and your comrades gave to Canada? Oh yes, I think we're proud of our regiment and our service. Interviewer: Can you explain to me a little bit about your regiment? What regiment you belonged to? It was the 8th Canadian Reconnaissance Regiment, and we were an armoured reconnaissance. We were the eyes for the 2nd Division. There was four squadrons. There was Headquarters Squadron, and A, B and C, and one squadron was attached to each of the brigades. There was three brigades in the 2nd Division of infantry, and so one squadron would be attached to each. We never fought together as a regiment. We were the eyes for whatever brigade we were attached to. Sometimes we'd be quite a ways ahead of the infantry, because that was your job, to go out and scout what was ahead of you. Sometimes it was foot patrols. And of course, the infantry regiments had foot patrols, too, but ours was an armoured one, and we were supposed to go farther. Interviewer: So when you say you were the eyes, how did you report back as to what you were seeing? Well, you come back, but you also radio. Some of the cars, Bren gun cars, and some of the trucks too, I guess, they had radios they operated. They were signallers, you know. The signaller corps. Some of them were attached to us, too, but every regiment has its own signals, you know, so you can talk from one part of the regiment to another. If you sent out a patrol, they've gotta be able to report back, either if they can't do it that way, they come back on foot. You try and find where their headquarters was or where there was an ambush set up. Like one patrol we run in to a bunch of Germans. Well, before we got out of that I don't know if we killed any, but they killed a head man of our patrol and one of my, a close friend of mine, he lives in Biggar, he's still alive today. He was shot in the knee and he was shot in the shoulder and in the foot. Of course, he passed out and the rest thought he was dead so we backed off and when he come... this just shows a little compassion on even the old German army. The SS troops and those, no they didn't, but the old German army. When he come to, he'd been bandaged up, he was put on a bed in an empty house and that's where he was. And there was a free French fella sitting on the bed with a gun and he says, “I started hollering out, I'm a Canadian. I'm a Canadian,” you know, thought he was going to be shot. But the Germans apparently had dressed his wounds, put him in a blanket and carried him in and put him on a bed and went off and left him. He was a lucky man but it was the SS troops that were the worst. Like that Colonel Fritzmeyer, I believe his name was, he had, this is from down your way, was it the North Nova Scotia Regiment? He had about twenty eight of them shot. Once you're taken prisoner, you know, under the Geneva convention you're disarmed and that's it. You're supposed to be treated with respect anyway. But that was that Abbey in France where they found the skulls two or three years later. They were all shot there, shot in the back of the head. Now that's something that I don't think most parents would like to hear. That's stories from the battlefield. There's one that's a good one about my chum being patched up and taken care of, and others just the opposite. But it was the SS troops. Hitler had brought these up from ten year olds you know, they were the black shirts, the brown shirts, whatever you want to call them, the SS troops, and they were, they would never give up. Like the old German army if they were, knew they were lost they would surrender, but they would fight to the last man.

Description

Mr. Young speaks about his pride for the regiment and identifies the role they played during battles in seeking out the enemy.

Joseph Young

Mr. Young was born in 1919, on a small farm in Moosomin, Saskatchewan. He was raised in a family with three brothers and two sisters. In 1941, Mr. Young decided to join the army and travelled to Saskatoon, Saskatchewan, to enlist. There he joined the 8th Canadian Reconnaissance Regiment, 2nd Division, a regiment better known as the suicide regiment. During combat in Normandy, Mr. Young was seriously wounded by a large piece of shrapnel, which perforated his upper back. Despite his injury, he was still able to serve until the end of war. After the war, Mr. Young married and began farming, a passion instilled in him by his father. Mr. Young has written a book of poetry, “My Thoughts in Rhyme” sharing his special times in life both as a soldier and a farmer.

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