Dieppe:Canada's Darkest Day of World War II
Hugh Brewster
Scholastic Canada Ltd.
2009, 48 pages
ISBN: 9780545994200
ages 9+
Learning about, and remembering, Canada's history in times of war, and peace, is important. So many Canadians have given so much to ensure that the world is a better place. This needs to be taught, remembered and reflected upon.
A very good book that provides a glimpse into the horrific battle at Dieppe in World War II and the roles that brave Canadians played is Dieppe: Canada's Darkest Day of World War II by Hugh Brewster. Brewster, who also wrote On Juno Beach and At Vimy Ridge, is a historian whose informative books educate readers about Canadian soldiers and their important roles and contributions.
Lots of photographs with informative captions complement the text. Brewster's description of the almost 1,000 Canadians who were killed at Dieppe along with his accounts of how the close to 2,000 more held as prisoners lived in captivity is an important read for all Canadians.
Truce
Jim Murphy
Scholastic Press
2009, 116 pages
ISBN: 9780545130493
ages 12+
Truce is the interesting, heartwarming and, at times, sad account of the First World War and a miraculous Christmas truce that saw Germans, French, English and Belgian soldiers put aside their fighting and celebrate Christmas with their "enemies."
During the war, rising casualty rates and a closeness to the enemy resulted in opposing soldiers building trenches in close proximity to one another as the soldiers lived in the "narrow, zigzagging dirt enclosures four feet wide and six or seven feet deep."
"Here two parallel trenches - one held by the Germans, the other by the French, English, and Belgians - from fifty to one thousand yards apart stretched from the North Sea coast all the way to the Swiss border, a total of over 475 miles. In between was a ravaged wasteland crisscrossed by tangles of razor-sharp barbed wire and appropriately nicknamed No Man's Land."
Besides the enemy, illness and disease killed many soldiers as conditions in the trenches were brutal and unsanitary. Jim Murphy states that between 1914 and 1918 "over 6,200,000 men would die in the trenches on the Western Front alone. More than half of them - 3,528,000 - died from one disease or another."
As the Christmas of 1914 approached, opposing soldiers who weren't far apart began sharing comments and even songs. On Christmas Eve soldiers on both sides sang carols. In some places of No Man's Land soldiers from both sides met and exchanged items such as food and talked to one another. Christmas day saw similar friendly meetings between soldiers on both sides. A truce had occurred along the Western Front where gifts and souvenirs were exchanged after the dead were buried. A miraculous Christmas truce where opposing soldiers got to know their opponents a little occurred replacing the brutalities of war - at least for a while.
Truce is an exceptional read complemented by excellent photographs (many from the author's collection) and illustrations.
