Dieppe national 80th anniversary ceremony in Windsor honours Canadian soldiers
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A commemoration marking the 80th anniversary of the Dieppe Raid is held in Dieppe Gardens in Windsor, Ont., on Friday, August 19, 2022. Photo by Dax Melmer /Windsor Star Article content
The memory of those who fought and sacrificed in the Dieppe Raid took centre stage Friday in Windsor.
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On the 80th anniversary of the Aug. 19, 1942 raid that represents Canada’s bloodiest day of the Second World War — and proved particularly deadly for Windsor and Essex County — the City of Windsor and Veterans Affairs Canada hosted the Government of Canada’s signature event commemorating the historic mission.
“This part of Red Beach exists in Essex County, in the City of Windsor at Dieppe Gardens,” said Honorary Lieut.-Col. Joseph Ouellette of the Essex and Kent Regimental Association, noting the stones incorporated into the monument.
“And so we come in this year and pay our tribute, pay our obligation to the debt which was incurred by the death of our sons, our brothers, our grandfathers, a debt we can never repay.”
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Even after all this time, we want them to know that we remember
The ceremony in Dieppe Gardens included wreath-laying at the riverfront Royal Canadian Air Force and Anchor Memorial monuments; a parade from the Great Canadian Flag to the Red Beach Monument, led by the Essex & Kent Pipes & Drums and a national commemoration featuring dignitaries, veterans and youth delegates.
Dieppe veteran Sapper John L. Date attends the commemoration marking the 80th anniversary of the Dieppe Raid, in Dieppe Gardens in Windsor, Ont., on Friday, August 19, 2022. Photo by Dax Melmer /Windsor Star
Guests of honour Friday included Sapper (retired) John L. Date, a Sarnia native who first saw combat at Dieppe and was held as a prisoner of war. He is one of the last surviving Canadian soldiers on the beaches that day.
Date, now 100 years old, and his family, said they were honoured to mark the 80th anniversary of Dieppe in Windsor.
“We’re very grateful to everyone,” said Date’s daughter Carol McPherson. “It is an honour, it is heartfelt.”
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On Thursday night, Date — surrounded by family including a brother and sister, his daughters and several grandchildren — also received the National Order of the Legion of Honour bestowed by the French defence attaché to Canada. The award is the highest French order of merit, civil or military.
Theresa Sims, an Indigenous storyteller and elder, opened Friday’s ceremony with the Eagle Song. Sims’s father, Robert James Sims, was seriously injured but survived the attack on Dieppe while serving with The Royal Hamilton Light Infantry.
Arthur Boon is a veteran of the 19th Canadian Army Field Regiment as part of the D-Day landing in France who was also among the guests of honour Friday.
The Essex and Kent Scottish Pipe Band march during a commemoration marking the 80th anniversary of the Dieppe Raid, in Dieppe Gardens in Windsor, Ont., on Friday, August 19, 2022. Photo by Dax Melmer /Windsor Star
Boon now lives in Stratford and said he was honoured to participate in Windsor’s ceremony — but said remembrance gets harder with each passing year.
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“When we get 80 years away from those events and think about all the people we left behind, who never had the life we had … there’s a sad part to it, but we have to respect and honour what they did,” Boon said.
Boon credits the sacrifices made at Dieppe with saving lives on D-Day.
“We’ve come back home and we’ve had a full life here,” he said. “But we left 900 dead (at Dieppe), most were younger, their life was cut short. You feel for them and the families now.”
Of the 553 members of The Essex Scottish Regiment, just 51 were extracted to England following the raid at Dieppe, Windsor Mayor Drew Dilkens noted, and it was the regiment that suffered the most loss at that day.
“It is a privilege to stand side by side and to look at the men and women in uniform gathered here today and to say thank you,” Dilkens said.
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“We are thankful as a nation. We are thankful as a city for the brave acts, the individual and collective sacrifices and the stories of lives forever impacted by the events on that one beach 80 years ago.”
A parade was among the events Friday, Aug. 19, 2022, on Windsor’s riverfront as part of a national ceremony honouring those who fought and sacrificed during the Dieppe Raid on Aug. 19, 1942. Photo by Kathleen Saylors /Windsor Star
While the anniversary of the Dieppe Raid is marked annually in Windsor, Friday’s 80th anniversary ceremony was the first such national event held in Windsor.
Emcee for the event, Robert Löken, said it is a unique experience for Canadians to experience a national remembrance ceremony in their own community.
“Windsor was so engaged,” said Löken, the national manager for honours, awards and commemorations at Veterans Affairs Canada. “The local community came out in support, the regiments were here, veterans were here. I was truly amazed at the engagement of the folks in this city.”
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Besides being Canada’s bloodiest day of the Second World War, the Dieppe Raid was also the costliest sacrifice in terms of lives during the war for Windsor and Essex County — all to battle tyranny unfolding around the world.
Roughly nine out of 10 young men with The Essex Scottish Regiment who participated in the Dieppe Raid were killed or captured during the ill-fated mission on Red Beach the morning of Aug. 19, 1942.
A vintage formation flypast, courtesy of the Canadian Aviation Museum of Windsor, is performed during a commemoration marking the 80th anniversary of the Dieppe Raid, in Dieppe Gardens in Windsor, Ont., on Friday, August 19, 2022. Photo by Dax Melmer /Windsor Star
Within less than an hour of landing on the French coast at 5:25 a.m., 75 per cent of the Essex Scottish’s 553 officers and soldiers had become casualties, dead or wounded. Only 51 of those soldiers made it back to England that night.
Debate continues to this day about whether the Allies’ first major attempt to breach Nazi Germany’s Atlantic Wall was a useless slaughter or a terrible lesson that helped make the D-Day landings in Normandy less than two years later a success.
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Either way, the Dieppe Raid cost Windsor-Essex — and Canada — dearly.
“Even after all this time, we want them to know that we remember,” said MP Irek Kusmierczyk (Liberal —Windsor-Tecumseh). “We remember that fear they must have felt as they came up against the violent machine gunfire of an alerted enemy. We remember their sacrificing bravery as they fought to force the Germans from Dieppe.
“And most importantly, we remember them: who they were, what they did, and what they gave up so that Western Europe could be free.”
ksaylors@postmedia.com
twitter.com/KathleenSaylors
I’m here this morning at Dieppe Gardens for the national ceremony marking the 80th anniversary of the Dieppe Raid. Wreath laying will be underway shortly. pic.twitter.com/pWZ6Bps2ft
— Kathleen Saylors (@KathleenSaylors) August 19, 2022 Advertisement 9
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The parade has arrived and the national anthems were played. The ceremony is getting underway with an address from Theresa Sims, an Indigenous storyteller and elder. pic.twitter.com/Lm5M3Dp14U
— Kathleen Saylors (@KathleenSaylors) August 19, 2022 Advertisement 10
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Personnel landing craft draw away from a motor torpedo boat to start their run-in to the beaches during the raid on Dieppe, France, on August 19, 1942.
Col. Bruno Heluin, centre, Defence Attache, Embassy of France, lays a wreath during the commemoration marking the 80th anniversary of the Dieppe Raid, in Dieppe Gardens in Windsor, Ont., on Friday, August 19, 2022. Photo by Dax Melmer /Windsor Star 
Silver Cross Mother, Theresa Charbonneau, mother of Andrew Grenon who was killed in action in Afghanistan, is accompanied by Major John Weingardt, as she lays a wreath at the Silver Cross Monument during a commemoration marking the 80th anniversary of the Dieppe Raid in Dieppe Gardens in Windsor, Ont., on Friday, August 19, 2022. Photo by Dax Melmer /Windsor Star 
Dieppe Veteran Sapper John L. Date lays a wreath during the commemoration marking the 80th anniversary of the Dieppe Raid, in Dieppe Gardens in Windsor, Ont., on Friday, August 19, 2022. Photo by Dax Melmer /Windsor Star 
Honorary Col. Joseph Ouellette from the Essex and Kent Regimental Association gives remarks during a commemoration marking the 80th anniversary of the Dieppe Raid, in Dieppe Gardens in Windsor, Ont., on Friday, August 19, 2022. Photo by Dax Melmer /Windsor Star 
Honorary Col. Joseph Ouellette from the Essex and Kent Regimental Association gives remarks during a commemoration marking the 80th anniversary of the Dieppe Raid, in Dieppe Gardens in Windsor, Ont., on Friday, August 19, 2022. Photo by Dax Melmer /Windsor Star 
Silver Cross Mother, Theresa Charbonneau, mother of Andrew Grenon who was killed in action in Afghanistan, is accompanied by Major John Weingardt, as she lays a wreath at the Silver Cross Monument during a commemoration marking the 80th anniversary of the Dieppe Raid in Dieppe Gardens in Windsor, Ont., on Friday, August 19, 2022. Photo by Dax Melmer /Windsor Star 
Dieppe Veteran Sapper John L. Date receives a standing applause as he’s escorted to his seat in a vintage military jeep during a commemoration marking the 80th anniversary of the Dieppe Raid, in Dieppe Gardens in Windsor, Ont., on Friday, August 19, 2022. Photo by Dax Melmer /Windsor Star 
A member of the National Band Naval Reserve performs during a commemoration marking the 80th anniversary of the Dieppe Raid, in Dieppe Gardens in Windsor, Ont., on Friday, August 19, 2022. Photo by Dax Melmer /Windsor Star Share this article in your social network 
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