9 April 1917 - Vimy Ridge

[54/102 CEF]

Vimy Ridge took place 88 years ago.

We are working on capturing locstat data for the 11th Cdn Inf Bde from mid Aug 1916 to Mid Nov 1918.

11 Bde fought to secure the site where the Vimy monument is (with others of course).

All locations will be shown in WGS 84 latitude and longitude for almost 800 days such that you can take a GPS and load in the various grid refs into it and walk to actual sites where certain actions happened with annotated summaries of the action per day.

So stay tuned - if all goes well samples will be aval later this summer.

In the mean time here is the unit history of the 54th Bn CEF for 1917 http://apollon_2.tripod.com/WARPAGES/Ops1917.htm

and that of the 102nd Bn from Comox http://www.donlowconcrete.com/102/warpages/102chap5.htm

explore both sites and you`ll see the cutting edge of the Canadians in France and Belgium

 

[1feral1]

In memory of a relative of mine,  775646 PTE Richard Marlin  , late of the 38th Ottawa Battalion, who like countless others was KIA at Vimy on the morning of the 9th. He is buried (in a communal grave with two others) only a few hundred metres from the Ridge.



Wes
 

 

[Canadian Sig]

My wife and I both stood at the Vimy memorial while we were both on leave from roto 0 Op Athena. It was the same day our guys were killed in the Jowaz (sp) valley mine strike. I have to tell you that the feeling was inspiring.

 

[bossi]

On my second visit to Vimy, some locals tried to steal my car (it had GB plates, since I was living in England at the time).  When the local police realised I wasn't British, but Canadian, they became incensed - they were angrier than I was!

Anyway ... I digress ... here's a Sun article on this Vimy anniversary:
http://cnews.canoe.ca/CNEWS/Canada/2005/04/10/990665-cp.html

 

[54/102 CEF]

The guy who is mentioned in the story above is Clare Laking

Here are his enrollment papers

http://data2.archives.ca/cef/gpc008/443304a.gif and http://data2.archives.ca/cef/gpc008/443304b.gif

and his pal Lloyd CLemett

http://data2.archives.ca/cef/ren2/025052a.gif and http://data2.archives.ca/cef/ren2/025052b.gif

I`ll check their files and see how close they may have got to Vimy - more to follow later this week.