Stuart McComish

🇨🇦 LEST WE FORGET 🇨🇦 OCTOBER 2, 1944 — THE BATTLE OF THE SCHELDT On this day in 1944, Canadian soldiers began one of the most difficult and costly campaigns of the Second World War. The Allies had captured the great Belgian port of Antwerp a month earlier — but there was a problem. German forces still controlled the Scheldt estuary, the long waterway connecting Antwerp to the North Sea. Until the Scheldt was cleared, the enormous port was virtually useless to the advancing Allied armies. On October 2, the 2nd Canadian Infantry Division began pushing north from Antwerp toward South Beveland, while Canadian forces prepared to fight their way through a landscape seemingly designed to favour the defenders. Much of the country was flat and flooded. Soldiers advanced across exposed ground through mud and water, under fire from well-entrenched German positions. Mines, booby traps, driving rain and flooded fields made every kilometre costly. The battle would rage for more than five weeks through the Breskens Pocket, South Beveland and Walcheren Island. When organized German resistance finally ended on November 8, the First Canadian Army had taken more than 41,000 prisoners and opened the approaches to Antwerp. The victory came at a terrible price. The First Canadian Army suffered 12,873 killed, wounded or missing — including 6,367 Canadians. On November 28, the first Allied convoy finally sailed into Antwerp, opening the supply route that would help carry the Allied armies through the final months of the war in Europe. Today, we remember the Canadians who fought through the mud, water and gunfire of the Scheldt. Lest we forget. 🇨🇦 📸 Canadian troops during the Battle of the Scheldt, 1944. #LestWeForget #CanadianHistory #WWII