Scared all the Time

You’re scared all the time. Anybody who says there are not scared are lying because you think, you know, you think I’m not going to get hit today but you do. I’m not gonna get killed today but some get killed. That’s the way it is every day, all the way across France and Holland, all the way. Interviewer: And yet with all those soldiers getting killed, you survived. Yes. We don’t know the answer. You don’t know the answer. You’d be standing alongside of, when we got going through France, we set our wireless sets up in these carriers, these Bren gun carriers and you’d stop and you’d get out of the carrier and you’d be standing on this side, you’d be on that side and then you’d change sides and this fellow would be killed - a shell would come over and kill him and if you had stayed there you would have been killed. Why, we don’t know why it happens that way. It’s just one of those things that there doesn’t seem to be an answer to.

Mr. Chiasson expresses his emotions during his time and the wonder of his own survival.

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.