Big Loud Guns

The big howitzers that I mentioned before in Norfolk; Oh, the leaves would come down off the trees and we'd have headaches. No plugs ya know, no ear plugs. Fellas got deaf because of that you know. I didn't, but the little, little twenty-five pounders they were more just more less of a little crack, they weren't so bad, you know. Now probably if you were sitting on the gun itself, be a nice noise but they eventually got ear plugs, yeah. I remember one time we were at Lancenigo, Italian town and the Americans came in and put four long-toms about a quarter of a mile behind the village. And those long toms...,do you know the gun I'm talking about? No? 105mm, they were about 5 inch gun. Put four of them back there and we were stationed in the village and when they started firing, the dust would fall from the adobe or whatever the houses were built from eh, you know? And anyway, it was at that stage, that we were sent over to Cassino, we were on the Adriatic side, sent over to Cassino. We were over there three weeks, they never did take the hill or the, or the monastery..no. And when we went back you had to see it to believe it! The village was a shell. People were gone and all was left was the structure. The frameworks, all the adobean bricks and stuff were rubble from those long-toms.

Mr. Candow describes the noise made by Howitzers used in Norfolk, and recalls how vibrations from Long-Toms firing just outside Lanchiano, Italy, shook the town to ruins.

Gordon Henry Candow

Mr Candow was born December 15, 1920, and is the oldest of nine children. Joining in with the lads he was working with when war broke out, he signed into the navy but was quickly transferred to artillery. In May 1940, Mr. Candow sailed overseas as a part of the 57th Heavy Regiment, and was stationed to Norfolk, Great Britain, performing costal defence for a year and a half. After being shipped to Southern England the 57th was soon incorporated into the 166th Newfoundland Field Artillery Regiment. In January 1943, the regiment was shipped to North Africa. They remained in action until the end of the North African campaign, when they were shipped to Italy where the unit saw action in Fogia, Cassino, Ortona, and Boulogne. When the war ended, he returned to Southern England for a short period and then returned home to Newfoundland.