Canadian War Museum

Last night a group of co-op students went to the Canadian War Museum.

The first exhibit started out with artifacts collected from wars prior to the World Wars such as the uniforms of important lieutenants and majors, surgeons' operating and blood transfusion kits, and the world's first machine gun. You can see the bullet hole in the chest that killed this lieutenant.

Then there was the First World War exhibit. Canadian infantry captured this German 77 millimetre gun during Vimy Ridge. The muzzle is destroyed at the end, and the story is that the Germans tried to explode the gun before Canadians got to it, but were killed before they could escape.

I found it interesting to read the stories on specific Canadian soldiers. This boy was only 17 and is the youngest Canadian to be awarded the Victoria Cross. He served with the Royal Newfoundland Regiment in Belgium, and volunteered to run 100m across a field of open gunfire to get more ammunition. On his way back across, he captured German artillery, machine guns and prisoners.

Some exhibits shared letters exchanged between families, or other dreaded letters like the ones below.

The car below was Adolf Hitler's black armoured Mercedes Benz limousine. It was captured by American troops in 1945 and brought to Canada a few years later.

This is a photo of "depth charge canisters" that were filled with a couple hundred kilograms of explosives and launched over the side of a ship. After sinking to a pre-set depth they would explode to destroy a submarine below with shock waves.

There was a section dedicated to the Royal Canadian Engineers, who built roads and bridges and cleared minefields in the rugged terrain of Italy. Many engineers were killed or wounded since they had to perform their work under enemy fire. And I thought class projects were stressful enough...

This is just a small corner of the last exhibit that housed rows and rows of armoured cars and tanks.

This is Valentine, a British designed tank manufactured in Canada and used in World War II.