Ardennes Salient

In Belgium, Holland, our outfit got caught, I don’t know if you’ve ever heard of the Ardennes Salient? Interviewer: I’ve heard of it, yes. We were in that. Interviewer: Tell me about that. We woke up this one morning, well this (inaudible) woke up, he was going out to the john, we were in this farmhouse, in a barn. He gets up in the morning to go to the john and he’s standing at front door, he says, he hollered, like, “Holy shit.” “What?” “C’mon take a look.” This army walking this way up the road single file, and walking single file, when you see army doing that, you know something’s wrong. And we’re standing, we start coming outside and the next thing you know this American sergeant major come along. He says, “Guys take it easy, lay low.” And he told us, “You’re cut off, three sides.” “Well, where’s the closest enemy?” He says, “About 100 yards that way.” Well, we were somewhat, somewhat scared and we pretty well hit the deck and stayed there for awhile, pretty well all day. You, you didn’t dare, I think it took about three days before we got out of there. I don’t think death ever crossed our minds, at least not mine. It was just one of those things. But I never actually worried about it, til years later and I’m reading the history books on the Ardennes Salient and I said, “I was there. I was in the middle of that.”

Mr. Abdallah speaks about the time he spent in the Ardennes Salient.

Wilf Abdallah

Mr. Abdallah was born in London, Ontario, in 1923. His father immigrated from Lebanon to the United States at the age of 12 and eventually ended up in London, Ontario, where he was a candy maker and owned a few stores in the area. In 1936 the family moved to Petrolia and then on to Sarnia. Mr Abdallah attended high school in Sarnia before moving back to London in 1939-40. After lying about his age Mr. Abdallah joined the Royal Canadian Air Force when he was seventeen. He went to Toronto for three weeks training at Manning Depot before going to Paulson, Manitoba, to complete his training. In March of 1944 he sailed on the Louis Pasteur to Bournemouth, England, where he was stationed with 129 Airfield. Mr. Abdallah worked with the tactical air force, building airfields and then joined the air force’s return salvage unit. He moved through France, Belgium and Holland recovering aircraft to be repaired or stripped for parts. When Mr. Abdallah returned to Canada after the war he went back to live the rest of his life in London, Ontario.