Landing at Juno Beach

Heroes Remember

Landing at Juno Beach

Transcript

So from then on, they lined us up for ready to go over to, to Juno Beach, to the second front, and we'd found out from being in 2nd Division. Second Division was the division that went to Dieppe, and some of them had come back. Some of them didn't, some of them got killed. Quite a few in fact. So they briefed us and told us what to expect, so that made us a little scared. So at night we loaded on the, on the ship. Now I don't know, to me I can't remember whether it was Portsmouth, Portsmouth or London. They brought us in at 30 hundred weights, maybe 30 us of at a time out, and we'd run up the plank and in then there'd be others lining up and going in. You had a card you put on where you'd go and they'd put you in that part of the ship, on the deck, right? And I think we were on a cruiser, I don't know for sure, on the deck of a cruiser, I don't know for sure. And we spent two days and two nights, but one there... 3rd Div. went in ahead of 2nd Div. 2nd Div. was reinforcement for 3rd Div., If 2nd,3rd Div and, and 1st Div. and 3rd Div. got in trouble, then we'd have went in. We were already packed and ready to go too all that time. And during that time there was a shell in the ships between the big guns and cut loose, you know, and “whoom". Boy it would just rock you. And then the, the, the boats chasing to see, the submarines would come by and big waves would come. And you had to climb down a rope fence as you see on the movies now, you'll see that. You had to climb down and get into a, a motor, into a landing craft, and I, if I remember, it was early in the morning. It was dark when we went into the craft and we stayed against the ship and I don't know how long. I think it was hours, standing there and leaning, then finally they opened up and in we went. And when we got to shore, everything was good. No, no Germans shooting at us. 3rd Div. and the boys had cleared the beach and we just quietly going up and went up with our pack on and then there was MPs up there and other soldiers said, “Here, this way, you go down that road two miles and cut in there and there's your headquarters down there." Right? But we heard some fire, you know and apparently somebody said that some snipers had got a couple of soldiers further down. But we didn't see them, and it was nothing to scare us. It was really a, a picnic going up into there. But the picnic ended for me shortly after that.

Description

Mr. McNiven recalls embarking on the Juno Beach invasion, and landing on the beach with 2nd Division as reinforcement for the 3rd Division.

John Percy McNiven

Mr. McNiven was working as a truck driver in Regina, Saskatchewan, before the Second World War began. As propaganda increasingly encouraged young men to join the service, one weekend evening Mr. McNiven and a friend worked up the courage to join. After basic training as a truck driver and mechanic, Mr. McNiven rejected the opportunity to serve in Canada and instead entered the Signal Corps. in order to make it overseas. After completing signaller training, Mr. McNiven was sent overseas to northern England to reinforce 2nd Division. Eventually the division shipped out, destined for Juno Beach. Since 2nd Division was part of the 3rd wave behind 1st and 3rd Divisions, the fighting at the beach had finished by the time Mr. McNiven reached shore. From there Mr. McNiven served in a special force of signallers, working with three others in the division. As the War progressed the division worked its way across France and Holland, and eventually into Germany where they were when the War ended.

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