THE BOMBERS STARTED COMING
anonymous

It was 1944 and we were in France. I was with the 5th Field Regiment and the North Shore were beside us up 011 a hillside. I think they fought through the day or night before. I remember the bodies. They were all covered with camouflage gas sheets. They were just lying there on the ground waiting to be picked up. I wondered if there were some there I knew. The outfit I was with was held up at the time and we were set up by some big mine shaft towers. Some German tanks were dug in ahead of a Polish group who were positioned just ahead of us.
The day started out real funny. As a matter of fact I was cutting a feller's hair. Somebody in the crowd always had a pair of clippers in their pack. I couldn't really cut hair mind you, but it was a bit of a pass time. Of course, every once in a while yon would give certain people a really horrible haircut, but it was all in fun and nobody really minded. Anything for a laugh! As I said before the North Shore was on a hill beside us. The Polish group was ahead of us and beyond them were the Germans. I remember the Poles had tanks and anti tank guns with them. You couldn't beat those Polish crews! Most of them came from everywhere. They didn't all come from Poland you know. They were all of Polish ancestry and could speak the language but they came from different places all over the world. Some were Canadian, some American, some British•••• They wanted to get together as a group and that's what they did. It was a lovely morning and we were just getting squared away when the bombers started coming. Wave after wave of them flew right over our position. They were only about five hundred feet off the ground. That's all. They were so low we could see the bombs inside the planes' belly. The bomb bay doors were open. And the noise! The roar of those bombers was tremendous. Everything shook. It was a frightening experience but we didn't mind. We thought, "That's great. This will help us get out of here."

They flew over our positions and over tile Polish positions and started bombing tile German positions. And they bombed and bombed and bombed. Those planes just kept on coming. However, the wind was blowing the dust and smoke from the bombing in our direction. It covered tile Poles and ns and tile first thing we knew tile planes started bombing short! They got bombing the Polish troops just ahead of us! Then to make matters real hairy someone called for a smoke bomb and it landed right on our position. Now we were about to become a target!
We had a big yellow flag in our toolbox and Jesus I run for her. I got up on the seat of the fun and me and another feller held it up for the planes to see. God only knows if anyone say it. Probably not.
The yellow flag was a signal that we were friendly troops but this was one day the color signal had been changed to red. Of course nobody informed us the change. Nothing seemed to go right that day.
I sent two other lads up to put out the smoke shell. They weren't long getting a couple of shovels and putting it out.
Then we noticed a small observation plane go up and try to warn the bombers off us. The turbulence of the air flow from those big bombers was terrific. He tried everything he could to warn them off but he would get in a slip stream and be driven towards the ground like a leaf.
He pretty near hit the ground several times but boys he'd go right back up again. He kept this up until at last the bombers were called back. Talk about guts!
The mess they left behind was heartbreaking. We needed every tank, gun and piece of equipment we could lay our hands on and here we were bombing ourselves.
After it was all over we went up and saw that many of the wounded and the equipment was all smashed to hell. There were Hundred of casualty's. Words can't describe what....
A comical part of this incident involved a new recruit from over in the 28th Field Battery. He was a really tall kid. They said he was one of the tallest men in the Canadian Army.
Someone asked him after if he had run during the bombing. He Replied " I dont know if I was running or not but I sure passed a hell of a lot of other guys who were there.
I can still see that tall fellow coming across our position and wondering where in blazes he was going. There was no place to go! You couldn't outrun a bomber!