A Loss of One Hundred Men

Heroes Remember

A Loss of One Hundred Men

Transcript

And when we hit the beaches in Normandy that morning, we lost a hundred men right off the bat, first morning, 5:30 in the morning, 6 o’clock in the morning when we hit the beaches. We lost a hundred men. So I was going in and I saw a friend laying there dead, another fellow wounded hollering for help. You couldn’t touch him, you couldn’t stop, you had to keep going. There were other people coming along looking after those people. But when you lose a hundred people, almost brothers, they are closer than brothers, for all those years, and it kind of affects you the first morning and then the next day and on, days and days would go, you’d say, “What about Jim?” “Oh, he was killed last night.” It doesn’t affect you any, you’re so used to hearing that so and so had been killed, so and so had been wounded bad and it just, you know, it doesn’t bother you any. But it bothers you at first. But some people it did bother them a lot. Some people it did bother them. Some of us you get used to it.

Description

Mr. Chiasson witnesses the death of many comrades - a vision he will never forget.

Havelyn Chiasson

Mr. Chiasson was born May 14, 1921 in Misquamicut Island, New Brunswick. He attended an English and French school while his father worked as a fisherman. When war was declared in 1939, Mr. Chiasson was recruited to the Carleton York Regiment in Bathurst and later with the North Shore Regiment, a regiment he would remain with until end of wartime. Mr. Chiasson held the position of wireless operator and found himself travelling overseas which would become a 5 ½ year experience. Mr. Chiasson was part of the D-Day and Battle of Normandy landings where he reached the beaches in St. Aubin-sur-Mer, Normandy. He carried on through to Holland. Mr. Chiasson remains very active about his service years, speaking to our youth about the importance of service to our country.

Meta Data