laststandonzombieisland

80 years ago today. Original Kodachrome color Image of Lt-General Henry Duncan Graham Crerar, commander of the First Canadian Army, seen on the open bridge aboard the Canadian V-class destroyer HMCS Algonquin (R17), while part of the Normandy Operation Neptune fleet, 18 June 1944.

Via Library and Archives Canada

Built 1942-43 as HMS Valentine (R17) and transferred to the Royal Canadian Navy on completion, Algonquin opened up with her 4.7-inch QF guns on German targets off Juno Beach at 0645 on D-Day and spent the next 48 hours providing very active NGFS for the British and Canadian troops until their advance inland had outstripped her range.

A 4.7-inch (12 cm) gun crew of the destroyer HMCS Algonquin piling shell cases and sponging out the gun after bombarding German shore defenses in the Normandy beachhead. LAC 4950888

Bofors and gunner and white ensign on HMCS Algonquin. LAC 4950797

Putting back in at Portsmouth on 9 June, she carried VADM Percy W. Nelles, RCN, and his staff to Normandy the next day and would return to carry Gen. Crerar to France as shown above.

Graduating from the Royal Military College in 1909, Crear served with distinction in the artillery during the Great War, witnessing the hell of Ypres, Neuve Chapelle, and Vimy Ridge, and was ready to finish up a 30-year career as colonel commandant of the Royal Military College of Canada when Hitler marched into Poland. He had led the 2nd Canadian Division and I Canadian Corps in Italy before Normandy.

Going on to see much Arctic service in the rest of the war, including sinking a trio of German subchasers off Norway, Algonquin would be modernized to a Type 15 frigate (pennant DDE 224) in 1953 and continue to serve into the 1970s when she was scrapped, her name passed on to the lead ship of a new class of destroyers for the RCN.

Gen. HDG Crerar, CH, CB, DSO, CD, PC, would retire from the Army in 1946 and go on to the diplomatic service. He passed in 1965, age 79.