The main objectives of the offensive, however, remained out of reach. Personnel of the 16th Canadian Machine Gun Company holding the line in shell holes during the Battle of Passchendaele. Canadian Corps commander Lieutenant-General Arthur Currie inspected the terrain and was shocked at the conditions he saw. He tried to avoid having his men fight there but was overruled by his superiors.
As at Vimy, the four divisions of the Canadian Corps would see action. However, the ubiquitous mud, flat terrain, and relative lack of preparation time and artillery support would make Passchendaele a far different battlefield than the one the Canadians had encountered at Vimy Ridge.
Currie took as much time as he could to carefully prepare and on October 26, the Canadian offensive began. Advancing through the mud and enemy fire was slow and there were heavy losses but our soldiers clawed their way forward.
On an exposed battlefield like that one, success was often only made possible due to acts of great individual heroism to get past spots of particularly stiff enemy resistance.
Despite the adversity, the Canadians reached the outskirts of Passchendaele by the end of a second attack on October 30 during a driving rainstorm. On November 6, the Canadians and British launched the assault to capture the ruined village of Passchendaele itself. In heavy fighting, the attack went according to plan. After weathering fierce enemy counterattacks, the last phase of the battle saw the Canadians attack on November 10 and clear the Germans from the eastern edge of Passchendaele Ridge before the campaign finally ground to a halt.
Canadian soldiers had succeeded in the face of almost unbelievable challenges. Wounded soldier being carried to an aid-post during the Battle of Passchendaele.
The fighting at Passchendaele took great bravery. Two of these men, McKenzie and Robertson, sadly lost their lives in the battle. The efforts of all these men were truly remarkable, but it has been said that the Battle of Passchendaele could not have been won if it were not for the heroic actions of Major George Pearkes of the 5th Canadian Mounted Rifles.
Despite a leg wound, he led a few dozen of his men through heavy enemy fire across open ground to capture a strategically located farm. They then fought off numerous counterattacks for more than a day, preventing the Germans from destroying the main advancing Canadian force from their vulnerable flank side. Canada's great victory at Passchendaele came at a high price. More than 4, of our soldiers died in the fighting there and almost 12, were wounded.
The some , members of the Canadian Corps who took part in the battle were among the over , men and women from our country who served in uniform during the First World War. The more populous Allies could better afford the losses, especially with the recent entry of the United States on their side, but the battle had delivered a blow to the collective morale of the British Expeditionary Force. Passchendaele, often remembered as the low point of the British war effort, remains synonymous with the terrible and costly fighting on the Western Front.
History Second Ypres Festubert St. Canada and the First World War. It was a gummy mess, but I did not get trench-feet. The mud gummed up rifle barrels and breeches, making them difficult to fire. It swallowed up soldiers as they slept. It slowed stretcher-bearers — wading waist-deep as they tried to carry wounded away from the fighting — to a crawl. Ironically, the mud also saved lives, cushioning many of the shells that landed, preventing their explosion. On 6 November, the Canadians launched their third attack on the ridge.
They succeeded in capturing it and the ruins of Passchendaele village from the exhausted German defenders. A fourth assault, which secured the remaining areas of high ground east of the Ypres salient, was carried out on 10 November — the final day of the more than four-month battle. More than 4, Canadians were killed and another 12, wounded — almost exactly the casualties predicted by Arthur Currie.
These were among the , casualties including 70, killed lost overall to the armies under British command at Passchendaele. The Germans suffered another , killed and wounded. At the end, the point of it all was unclear. In , all the ground gained there by the Allies was evacuated in the face of a looming German assault.
The sacrifice of Canadian soldiers in the battle is commemorated by the Canadian Passchendaele Memorial, located east of the city of Ypres now called Ieper. The Canadians who died in the battle are buried and remembered at war cemeteries throughout the area, and also on the Menin Gate Memorial in Ypres, which is inscribed with the names of 6, Canadians who died throughout the war in Belgium, with no known graves see Monuments of the First and Second World Wars.
Eloi Passchendaele Dancocks, Legacy of Valour A Heritage Minute from Historica Canada. See also related lesson plans. Battle of Passchendaele A detailed educational guide about the Battle of Passchendaele, a defining event in Canadian history.
Associated with the major Canadian feature film "Passchendaele. Search The Canadian Encyclopedia. Remember me. I forgot my password. A fresh British offensive was launched on the 20th September under the command of Herbert Plumer which eventually resulted in some small gains being made including the capture of a nearby ridge just east of Ypres. General Haig ordered further attacks in early October which proved less successful.
Allied troops met stiff opposition from German reserves being poured into the area, and many British and Empire soldiers suffered severe chemical burns as the Germans employed mustard gas to help defend their position. Unwilling to accept failure, General Haig ordered three more assaults on the Passchendaele ridge in late October.
Casualty rates were high during these final stages, with Canadian divisions in particular suffering huge losses. When British and Canadian forces finally reached Passchendaele on 6th November hardly a trace of the original village structures remained. The capture of the village did however give General Haig the excuse to call an end to the offensive, claiming success. In the three and half months of the offensive the British and Empire forces had advanced barely five miles, suffering horrendous casualties.
Perhaps their only consolation was that the Germans had suffered almost as badly with around , killed or injured.
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