They hit him with a Schmeizer

Heroes Remember

They hit him with a Schmeizer

Transcript

Then we spent the winter on the Maas River, a place called Lith and then the Polish division was supposed to be, some of them were up at Wilde and we had to night patrol every night between, so that.. Once in a while we went into a German patrol and get a few prisoners and sometimes we didn't. But, but we were pretty lucky. And then, I guess I should tell you when we're at it that, that they had a standing patrol across the Maas River, on the German side, and it was no mans land and they would, they would send a group of ten or twelve or quite often mostly five, across in a boat and then leave you there and come back the next night and get ya. And so you had to find a place to hide and, and in the daytime you didn't do much moving around, but all we would do was take bearings of, of German gunfire and if you see a troop moving, you took bearings and then our artillery was to bomb them or, shell them like. And I think, I made three of four trips over there, being young, oh yes. Being young they picked the guys that were, seemed to have a sense of what's going on. We got close enough to hear the Germans talking, oh yes, lots of times. And, and but it was dark, when we'd get... Once in a while we'd hear a Schmeizer, that's a German submachine gun. And Bill said, "Close enough Cliff, we'll get the hell out of here." But they weren't shooting at us, they were shooting at movement, you know and maybe a dog or a cat or, you know, just to let us know that they were awake. And the last time that we were over there, this guy from the 14th Battery, his name was Sergeant Chalmers and he took a crew over and relieved us five. And the Germans, they knew we were there I'm sure, maybe not sure what house we were in, but they come along and called out in English. They were lost and he opened the shutters on this house he was in and they hit him with a Schmeizer, that's a real fast German machine gun. And the guys thought he was dead, they pulled him out of the thing and, and then of course I don't know, the Germans didn't, just got him and took off. And, and they come back the next night when they went to pick him up and they said that Chalmers was dead. Well 25, 30 years later we had a reunion in Moose Jaw and this guy sitting across the table, big, nice looking fellow and I said, "Chalmers," I said, "The only one I knew, he bought it across the Maas River. He said, "No he didn't!" I said, "What are you talking about?" He said, "That was me!" And he said, "You know", he said, "They pulled me out of that window, took me back to their camp," he said. "I got the best medical treatment I could have gotten." And he said, "They treated me real well." This is exactly what he told me and my wife was sitting right beside me when he said that, like you know. And had he had've waited until the next night to get that boat to come get him, he'd have bled to death. So there, you know some of them treated people well too.

Description

Mr. MacDonald describes night patrols at the Maas River, and a German act of mercy.

Clifford MacDonald

Mr. MacDonald was born near Hughton, Saskatchewan, on March 28, 1923. He left home at the age of 15, and worked at odd jobs until becoming an underage recruit in the army, 67th Battery at Rosetown, Saskatchewan. After completing gunnery training in England and Ireland, Mr. MacDonald spent some time on a Bofors gunnery crew in England's coastal defence system. He then became a gunner with the 5th Anti-tank Regiment, and was involved in forcing the German retreat from France, Belgium and Holland. After the war, Mr. MacDonald returned to Saskatchewan and purchased a farm under the Veterans Land Act. He has been a Legion member for more than 60 years.

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