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In memory of:

Private Roger Leblanc

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Military service

Service number: C/33264
Age: 21
Rank: Private
Force: Army
Unit/Regiment: Royal 22e Régiment, R.C.I.C.
Birth: October 16, 1922 Ottawa, Ontario
Enlistment: January 11, 1942 Ottawa, Ontario
Death: January 2, 1944 West of Ortona, Italy

Burial/memorial information

MORO RIVER CANADIAN WAR CEMETERY
Grave reference: X. A. 10.
Additional information

Baptized Joseph Onésime Gérald Roger Leblanc. Son of Roméo Leblanc and L’Aurore Brunette of Ottawa, Ontario. Brother of Privates Eugène Leblanc and Georges Leblanc who fought during the Second World War. They survived the war.

Enlisted in the 1st Battalion of the Royal Canadian Army Service Corps of the Hull Regiment, he was assigned to the Voltigeurs de Québec on February 14, 1943, following an extended period of training in Ontario and British Columbia. He embarked for Great Britain on July 21, 1943, and arrived in Greenock, Scotland, on the 28th. On paper, he was transferred to the Royal 22nd Regiment in October 1943 and assigned to the Mediterranean theater of operations with Force M. On October 27, he embarked and set foot on the Italian mainland on November 9. He joined his new unit in combat on December 23 and took part in the bloody Battle of Ortona. He was killed in action on January 2, 1944, west of Ortona. He was buried near the chapel. Around June 1944, his remains were exhumed and reburied at the Moro River Cemetery in Ortona.
 

Related media

Second World War (1939 – 1945)

In the Books of Remembrance

Commemorated on:

Page 362 of the Second World War Book of Remembrance.
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MORO RIVER CANADIAN WAR CEMETERY Italy

By the winter of 1943, the German armies in Italy were defending a line stretching from the Tyrrhenian Sea north of Naples, to the Adriatic Sea south of Ortona. The Allies prepared to break through this line to capture Rome. For its part, the 1st Canadian Infantry Division was to cross the Moro River and take Ortona. In January 1944 the Canadian Corps selected this site, intending that it would contain the graves of those who died during the Ortona battle and in the fighting in the weeks before and after it. Today, there are 1,615 graves in the cemetery, of which over 50 are unidentified and 1,375 are Canadian.

The Moro River Canadian War Cemetery lies in the locality of San Donato in the Commune of Ortona, Province of Chieti, and is sited on high ground near the sea just east of the main Adriatic coast road (SS16). The cemetery can be reached from Rome on the autostrada A25 (Rome-Pescara) by branching on the autostrada A14 and leaving it at Ortona. The approach road to the cemetery from the main road passes under an arch forming part of the little church of San Donato. The cemetery is permanently open and may be visited anytime.

For more information, visit Commonwealth War Graves Commission.

 

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