Tag Archives: Royal Canadian Regiment

Just a ciggy break and a Schmeisser

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80 Years Ago today. 24 May 1944. Here we see an S&W Victory .38 revolver-armed and cigarette-equipped LT W. Smith, along with platoon Sergeant F.G. White, armed with a captured German MP40 SMG– often incorrectly dubbed a “Schmeisser”– of the Royal Canadian Regiment (RCR), taking a breather in Pontecorvo, Italy. The two are clad in denim cotton battledress.

Note the good sergeant also has a Mills bomb at the ready while the fact that both men have field glasses count point to them being members of a recon element. The Canadian troops had entered the Liri Valley city that morning, after the breakthrough of the Hitler Line, and found it completely in ruins.

Canadian Army Photo by LT C.E. Nye, who has some 275 images digitized in the Library and Archives Canada. The above is MIKAN 3202714, PA-144722

Pontecorvo May 24, 1944, Canadian troops enter the ruins of the city after hard fighting. (Canadian Army Overseas Photo)

With a lineage that goes back to the War of 1812 and the Fenian Raids but a name that was only bestowed in 1902 after service in the Boer Wars, the RCR was bled white at the Somme, Arras, Vimy Ridge, and Passchendaele during the Grear War.

At the outbreak of WWII, the RCR was deployed as part of the 1st Canadian Division, garrisoned England for four years, then finally hit the beach in Sicily (Operation Husky) followed by the amphibious action at Reggio di Calabria on the Italian mainland. The RCR fought up the Italian boot, including key battles around the Moro River valley near Ortona in December 1943, and the battles on the Hitler and Gothic lines in 1944.

Sent in February 1945 to join the First Canadian Army in Northwest Europe for Operation Goldflake, they ended the war in Holland, where they inherited lots more German hardware. 

Privates J.A. Taylor and J.D. Villeneuve of the Royal Canadian Regiment stacking rifles turned in by surrendering German soldiers, IJmuiden, Netherlands, 11 May 1945. LAC 3211669

A common theme that would follow them to Korea in 1951. 

Soldiers of the 2nd Battalion, the Royal Canadian Regiment, with assorted captured DP-28 and PPS 43s in Korea.

The Royal Canadian Regiment has been awarded a total of 61 battle honours since 1812, including 27 for its WWII service.

Comprising three active and one reserve battalion today, their headquarters is at Garrison Petawawa in Ontario.

 

Tow Buggies!

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Now this looks fun.

Photo: Master Corporal Richard Lessard, Garrison Petawawa; Master Corporal Matthew Tower, Canadian Forces Combat Camera, Canadian Armed Forces

The above shows an experiment by the 3rd Battalion, The Royal Canadian Regiment (3 RCR), using Polaris MRZR ATVs as weapon carriers mounting TOW anti-tank missiles, Heckler & Koch GMG 40mm grenade machine guns (Designated as the C16 Close Area Suppression Weapon, or CASW), and assorted GPMGs, at Petawawa last month.

Photo: Master Corporal Richard Lessard, Garrison Petawawa; Master Corporal Matthew Tower, Canadian Forces Combat Camera, Canadian Armed Forces

Photo: Master Corporal Richard Lessard, Garrison Petawawa; Master Corporal Matthew Tower, Canadian Forces Combat Camera, Canadian Armed Forces

Photo: Master Corporal Richard Lessard, Garrison Petawawa; Master Corporal Matthew Tower, Canadian Forces Combat Camera, Canadian Armed Forces

Such vehicles could prove useful in a fast-moving RDF scenario, especially in Third World countries ala Kolwezi, a sort of modern version of the old 106mm recoilless rifle-armed M151 Mutt.

A simple concept is still well-loved in out-of-the-way parts of Asia, Africa, and Latin America:

 

Now that is a good ambush position that American anti-armor teams of the 1950s and 60s will easily recognize.

And, don’t forget, the Marines swapped out their 106s for TOWs on their M151s back in the mid-1980s, so this is nothing new.

Marines of the 3rd Battalion, 6th Regiment, fire a jeep-mounted tube-launched, optically-tracked, wire-guided (TOW) heavy anti-tank weapon during Combined Arms exercises Five and Six. Wires used to guide the TOW missile can be seen extending from the barrel of the weapon, 5/1/1983 NARA 330-CFD-DM-ST-83-09020

Marines of the 3rd Battalion, 6th Regiment, fire a jeep-mounted tube-launched, optically-tracked, wire-guided (TOW) heavy anti-tank weapon during Combined Arms exercises Five and Six. Wires used to guide the TOW missile can be seen extending from the barrel of the weapon, 5/1/1983 NARA 330-CFD-DM-ST-83-09020

DF-ST-86-07566

Those chocolate chips! U.S. Marines drive an M-151 Light Utility Vehicle from a Utility Landing Craft (LCU) to shore during the multinational joint service Exercise BRIGHT STAR’85. The vehicle is armed with a BGM71 Tube-Launched, Optically-Tracked, Wire-Guided (TOW) missile launcher, 8/1/1985 NARA 330-CFD-DF-ST-86-07566

Of course, with such light-skinned vehicles, they are risky as hell, both in terms of offering no protection against any sort of incoming fire or shrapnel and in the basic fact that these will usually be driven by a 19-year-old gassed up on Rip Its and Sabaton. Plus, with all that extra top weight on vehicles already prone to rollover…yikes.

The Remnants of 1 & 2 Can Para, 80 Years on

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The 1st Canadian Parachute Battalion was formed in July 1942 with an authorized strength of 26 officers and 590 other ranks, formed into a battalion headquarters, three rifle companies, and an HHC. Incidentally, 2 Can Para was formed shortly after and shipped south to Montana to join a U.S. force to form the First Special Service Force (aka The Devil’s Brigade).

1st Canadian Parachute Battalion shakes hands with Russian officer Wismar Germany on May 4 1945. Source: Photo by Charles H. Richer Department of National Defence / National Archives of Canada, PA-150930.

1 Can Para jumped into Normandy during Overlord/Tonga alongside the 6th British Airborne division– the first Canadian unit on the ground in France since Dieppe– and after reforming (the battalion suffered 367 casualties in the D-Day operation) would fight in the Ardennes and jump across the Rhine in Operation Varsity.

32 Canadian paras with 22IPC Pathfinders, were the first Canadians in France on D Day

Uniform and equipment worn by the 1st Canadian Parachute Battalion paratrooper via Legion Magazine, note his helmet and toggle rope

2 Can Para would fight with the Devils Brigade up the length of Italy earning battle honors at Monte Camino, Monte Majo, Monte La Difensa/Monte La Remetanea, Anzio, and Rome.

Devils Brigade…

Post War

With its battalion-sized parachute units disbanded after WWII in favor of a few smaller units dispersed through its infantry regiments, the Canadian Airborne Regiment was stood up in 1968, composed of two “commando” battalions (one English speaking, one partially French) at Edmonton, Alberta, then later shifted to Petawawa, Ontario. The Regiment was soon at work in Cyprus in 1974 (and would return there several times in future years).

By 1977, this changed to an airborne-capable commando company in each of Canada’s three active infantry regiments (The Royal Canadian Regiment, Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry, and the “Van Doos” of the Royal 22e Régiment), seen as capable of landing at a remote strip in the Canadian far wilderness (or Greenland, Iceland, or Alaska) and setting up for fly-in units in the event of a Soviet incursion over the North Pole, while the Canadian Airborne Regiment was reduced to a battalion-sized rump.

Today

Following a terrible scandal stemming from the Canadian Airborne Regiment’s 1992 tour in Somalia, the regiment was disbanded. However, that doesn’t mean the canucks don’t still maintain an airborne capability.

The 1977 program, with the 3rd Battalion of the RCR, PPCLI, and The Van Doos all maintaining a parachute-certified company, typically the “M” company, persisted. Further, the Canadian Special Operations Regiment (CSOR), carrying the lineage of the old Devil’s Brigade, was formed in 2006 to pull off the sort of ops that the old Canadian Airborne Regiment was tasked with from 1968-1995. In short, the Canadians could put together a reinforced airborne battalion combat team if needed, i.e. the old 1 Can Para. 

As the RCAF only has 29 active CC-130J/CC-130H Hercules and a few elderly CC-130Es in storage, they could only combat drop a battalion-sized force in one go anyway, so the size fits what the Air Force can deliver. 

Today, M(3)PPCLI and M(3)R22R are airborne-capable while the entire 3rd Battalion, RCR, is rated as airmobile/air assault and includes a paratrooper company as well, and they recently got some canvas time in, conducting parachute and helocast maneuvers in Petawawa, Ontario as part of Exercise Royal Trident.

Milsurp Mauser dreams

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When you come across a nice Kar98K Mauser without import marks, and the guy selling it gives a story about how it was taken from the “body of a dead Nassi,” keep in mind most of those rifles were quietly stacked by their former owners in the end days of the war in Europe in 1945, rather than battlefield pickups clawed from a scarred corpse.

Thus, 75 years ago today, in IJmuiden, Netherlands:

Unidentified German soldier turning in his rifle to a Canadian soldier, IJmuiden, Netherlands, 11 May 1945. Library and Archives Canada photo # 3210799. Photographer: Stirton, Alexander 

Privates J.A. Taylor and J.D. Villeneuve of the Royal Canadian Regiment stacking rifles turned in by surrendering German soldiers, IJmuiden, Netherlands, 11 May 1945. LAC 3211669

Holland’s gateway to the North Sea, IJmuiden was protected by 18,000 Germans in seaside defensive roles. The principal German unit there was the 703rd Infantry Division of Maj. Gen Hans Huttner, formed late in the war from drafts strengthed with former battleship sailors of the 10th and 24th Schiff Stamm Abteilung and the volunteer “Turkomen” of the 787th Turkistanische Abteilung, the latter formed from Soviet POWs from the Caucus and of Central Asian extraction.

Units of the 1st Canadian Army arrived in town on 7 May and observed a quiet cease-fire with the local garrison until 11 May when they disarmed the Germans with the help of local Resistance.

The last of the 120,000 Germans in “Festung Holland” would surrender on June 1 at Vlieland. With the exception of 3,000 German sappers retained for the remainder of the year to remove landmine and roadblocks they installed, the rest of the former occupiers were repatriated by July, with most simply walking over the border.

This fate excludes the “Turks” who would be handed over to the Soviets and introduced to the beauty of Siberia in winter.

But what of those stacks of Mausers?

NORWAY AFTER LIBERATION 1945 (BU 9763) Storeroom at Solar aerodrome, Stavanger, holding some of the estimated 30,000 rifles taken from German forces in Norway after their surrender. Copyright: © IWM. Original Source: http://www.iwm.org.uk/collections/item/object/205205892

By the end of 1945, the millions of military surplus former Axis weapons became a juggernaut that took on a life all their own. For more on that, check out my column at Guns.com.

Canadian grunt gear, 1900 edition

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Here we see the barracks bedroll and equipment of a soldier based at Wellington Barracks, Halifax Citadel Hill, 1900, first packed then unpacked. Note the kit on the shelf in the first image.

Notman Studio, Nova Scotia Archives accession no. 1983-310 number 8570 negative N-1069

Note the Magazine Lee-Metford rifle (MLM) of Mr. James Paris Lee’s design. First produced in 1884, the 8-10 round bolt-gun was faster to work than its predecessors but was still black powder, firing the Cartridge .303 Mk I, and by the time this image was taken was already undergoing replacement with the Lee–Enfield.

During the time this image was taken, the Nova Scotia Company, the first group of local troops to serve abroad, had just left headed to the Boer War. The 1st battalion, Prince of Wales’s Leinster Regiment (Royal Canadians) was also relieved from duty at the garrison about this time for service overseas while a new unit was raised to watch over Halifax. The 3rd Battalion, Royal Canadian Regiment, consisting of 29 officers and 975 enlisted, was stood up at the Citadel on 25 March 1900 and remained in possession of the Citadel until 2 October 1902 when a detachment of the Royal Garrison Artillery arrived and the 3rd Battalion was disbanded. If you note the cap badge in the above image, it is of the RCR.


The Citadel, which had housed such famous regiments as the 78th Highlanders, was garrisoned by the British Army until 1906 and afterward by the Canadian Army throughout the First World War and is now maintained by Parks Canada.

As for 3 RCR, the unit at Halifax when the above images were taken, they are still around and were recently designated Canada’s first airmobile battalion, garrisoned at Petawawa.

217 years ago this week: The Battle of Paardeberg Feb. 18-27, 1900.

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canadian-soldier-firing-his-lee-metford-rifle-during-the-battle-of-paardeberg-1900-boer-war

Photo via Veterans Canada, caption via British and Commonwealth Forces.

This photo shows a Canadian soldier firing his Lee-Metford rifle during the Battle of Paardeberg where 31 officers and 866 other ranks of the 2nd (Special Service) Battalion, Royal Canadian Regiment of Infantry. The battle included “Bloody Sunday ” on Feb. 18 wherein 21 of the 39 RCR soldiers killed in South Africa fell along with 60 to the 123 who were wounded.

The losses came when the regiment launched a frontal assault against the Boer positions in conjunction with the Duke of Cornwall’s Light Infantry–which was also mauled. A siege then followed that ended with the Boer surrender on Feb. 26 and the marching of 4,000 Boers into captivity. On that day Canadian losses were 13 killed and 21 wounded.

This was both the first major Canadian action of the South African War– providing a sense of nationality– and the first significant British victory of the conflict.

Today the RCR endures with the 1st Battalion a regular light infantry unit at Victoria Barracks assigned to the Canadian Division’s 2 Canadian Mechanized Brigade Group alongside the 2nd Battalion at Gregg Barracks which is a mechanized infantry unit in the same brigade. The 3rd Battalion at Foulkes Barracks specializes in airborne, airmobile and amphibious operations, and the 4th is a training unit at Wolseley Barracks, London, ON.