I wish I had seen this awesome thread sooner.
My grandfather Joseph Sonzena served in the Canadian Army during WWII. He drove a truck that was pretty much out fitted to be a mobile welding/fix anything shop. I have a stack of pictures he took while overseas. I have yet to get them all scanned so I took pictures of some of them.
This might turn out to be longer than expected, but here goes. My grandfather (he is 90) usually ends up telling stories or talking about his experiences overseas during family dinners. I think it was Christmas night last year he really got in depth about it, more so than usual. I quickly got a pen and paper and wrote as fast as I could to keep up with him. We even got the world atlas out to aid his memory. To the best of my ability to write down every detail I could and still read my writing without missing anything... here is the basics of it.
My grandfather left Canada to New York City. From NY he sailed on the Queen Elizabeth to Glasgow Scotland and then on to the UK. Once in the UK they prepared for war and were soon put on alert that the invasion could be any day.
Once word the invasion was underway, he and his group were loaded up on a ship and headed out into the English Channel. There they waited circling for their time to head in. While at sea waiting my grandfather distinctly remembers the battle ship next to them. It was the HMS Rodney. He recalls the loud booms as it fired shells toward the coast. His group finally went to shore at Juno Beach in the early morning the day after D-Day. (D-Day +1). There was a large door from the ships hold that dropped down and he drove his truck (large truck) right out of the ship into the shallow water and onto the beach.
From Juno they were to head towards Caen, France. Grandpa doesn't talk too much about getting from the beach to the city. Being the morning after the invasion it was not pretty. A lot of dead and dying men and equipment. He does talk about the occasional German fighter coming along and strafing them. When he got to Caen it was pretty much destroyed from allied bombs, broken and burned out shells of buildings. One big ruble pile.
From Caen they went to Brussels, Belgium and camped on a riverbank. He remembers there being a museum to Napoleon, or rather to the place where Napoleon was defeated. From Brussels it was on to Antwerp Netherlands then Eindhoven. From Eindhoven he went to Nijmegen where the Germans had blown up a retaining wall that held back the ocean or some body of water. Trucks got bogged down and had to be towed out of the muck. Grandpa also remembered seeing dead paratroopers hanging from telephone poles where they had gotten tangled. There the Germans closed in on the Canadians and they could not move forward or retreat back. Not sure how long that lasted, but Patton came through and broke the German line. At this point I have a scribbled note about the Rhine river and Holland. After Patton broke the German line they were able to move forward to Arnhem and the Rhine River. I have another note about the Battle of Arnhem. At Arnhem his unit built a bridge (that was one of their primary objectives was building bridges as they went) and crossed the Rhine into Germany and ended up not far from Hamburg, Germany.
While in Germany he remembers seeing Gliders and Paratoopers. Grandpa recalled it was a beautiful night with a full moon (would explain the paratroopers). After the drop they had to get a bridge built to cross a river. When the bridge was built the Paratroopers crossed and moved towards Berlin. Not long after that point his unit was pulled back. They were not allowed to fraternize with the Germans while they were there. He remembers being in Solingen Germany and that it was known from making knives. While sitting idle having been pulled back they explored the area and came across a wall safe in a house. Somehow they opened it up and it had dentist tools in it. My grandfather still has some of those tools. While still in Solingen they got word the war was over. Germans came into their camp at night to surrender so not to get shot during the day. They came across a place where the Germans had stored confiscated radios, so as you would imagine the everyone in the unit ended up with a radio. They left all of their equipment in Solingen and were transported on a truck to Calais, France.
From Calais they took a ferry across the channel to Dover, UK. Went from Dover to London and London to South Hampton. He departed South Hampton for the coast and was loaded onto the Queen Elizabeth, the same ship that brought him to Europe and headed for home.
Now...Pictures!
HMS Rodney (Not one of my Grandpas pics)
http://www.naval-history.net/xGM-Chrono-01BB-Rodney.htm
The Queen Elizabeth. Ship on the left in the second pic. (also not my gpa's pics)
Bombers Flying
German Aircraft
I think this was Caen Fance. Not sure
Damaged Train
Barren Land
Vehicles
More Vehicles
a few more to follow.....
