Kind Words for Lost Comrades

Interviewer: Looking back now, Mr. Curry, on your service with advantage of 55 years having passed since that time, when you reflect on the raid at Dieppe and you think of the men that you served with and the fact that some two thousand Canadians were taken prisoner and some nine hundred were killed, what's your attitude towards that raid now? Well, when I think of it I, it's very easy to get choked up. To me, it's like yesterday. I lost my friends and I think it was a waste, a waste of a lot of good soldiers and the three boys I had in the mortar platoon, we were as thick as thieves and when I think, you know, they didn't have to die, at least not like that. And sometimes I get very, very bitter but then again as I say there's nothing I can do about it now, except, I got my memories. But some of them memories are, as I say I've told you some of the funny ones but I could never begin to tell you some of the horrible ones. I couldn't bear to repeat them, although mind you they're still, they're still, they're still in my mind. You know I was severely beaten by a German for singing "We'll Hang Out Our Washing on the Siegfried Line" when I was a POW and I still have nightmares about this and I feel very bad about it in as much as I could have ate him. He was only a little guy but he was armed and if I'd have hit him or touched him, he would have shot me and things like this, and a lot of other little things. They're too much to go into. Interviewer: Are you still bothered by nightmares? Oh yeah, I still get, I mean they live with you, ya know it's, I've always had them. They're not as bad as they were, but I've always had them. I guess I'll have them until the day I die. I think if it wasn't for my wife, that's that's got me through a lot of the stuff, it can, it can be mind boggling sometimes. Interviewer: Mr. Curry, when you think back on the men that you served with in the Royal Hamilton Light Infantry and the other men of the 2nd Division, are you proud to be one of them? Am I ever. Am I ever. I'm really proud to say that I was one of them Very proud. But we're getting, our ranks are getting, there's not many left.

Mr. Curry reacts emotionally as he reflects on the loss of several of his friends during the Second World War. He also speaks of some of the poor treatment he received while a Prisoner of War in Germany.

Kenneth Curry

Mr. Curry was born in England in 1922. He was the youngest of two brothers and emigrated to Canada with his family at the age of one. The family settled in Stoney Creek, Ontario where Mr. Curry went to school and also served in the Army reserve. Mr. Curry falsified his age by one year in order to enlist with the Royal Hamilton Light Infantry. His war service included participation in the Dieppe Raid where he was taken prisoner of war.