VJ Day Reflection

You know the war wasn't over until those bombs were dropped and ah, Canadians in particular, don't know anything that happened in South East Asia. They don't know the war we've just been talking about. They don't realize that on the "Hammie" Grey, who's name you may know, the only Canadian in the navy, Canadian navy officer who won a VC, was the day before the war ended, an attack on destroyers in central Japan. And so the war was going on, and it was a fierce war, and we had, one of the papers I have given to you, I did some research on Canadian man power um, in the far east, mainly aircrew and mainly pilots. One quarter of all the aircrew in Burma Allied, no not Allied cause the U.S., Commonwealth aircrew, were Canadians at the end of the war. So there, a large Canadian establishment out there, even if there were only three Canadian squadrons. And ah, then again in the Pacific, the British carriers had a lot of Canadians on them, including Hamilton Grey, who won the VC by his, day before the end of the war. And ah, one of the things that upset some of us who were there is that, in Great Britain this year they're going to celebrate the sixtieth year of the end of the war in July and yet this is a compromise between V-E and V-J Day. And yet the war was fierce and could have been fiercer, and it wasn't finished until ah, V-J Day.

Interviewer: Very Good.