Even with veterans gone, devastating Dieppe Raid not to be forgotten

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Several times a year, Dave Woodall totes bucket, stepladder and cleaning materials down to Windsor’s riverfront to do a little extra to honour and remember the huge sacrifices made by local soldiers on a single bloody morning long ago.

We can never forget, Woodall said Friday as he polished the shiny steel letters and symbols on the Dieppe Raid Memorial at downtown Windsor’s Dieppe Gardens.

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The 81st anniversary of the Aug. 19, 1942, raid along the French shoreline of Nazi Germany’s Fortress Europe will be commemorated this Saturday from 12:30 to 1:30 p.m.

Spit and polish of remembrance: Dave Woodall, whose firm helped design and build the Dieppe Raid Memorial at downtown Windsor’s Dieppe Gardens (it’s an exact replica of the Windsor-built original in Dieppe, France), visits several times a year to give it a good cleaning. Photo by Doug Schmidt /Windsor Star

It was Canada’s bloodiest day on the battlefields of the Second World War, and a staggering nine out of 10 young men belonging to The Essex Scottish Regiment who participated would end up killed or captured within hours of scrambling ashore at Red Beach.

Everyone in Windsor knew someone who didn’t return that day, said Woodall, whether family, friend, classmate, colleague or neighbour.

Last year’s Dieppe national memorial service held in Windsor had one living veteran from that raid, John Date, who was 100 years old, a Sarnia man who signed up to serve in his youth and who would spend the rest of the Second World War — another 32 months — as a prisoner of war.

Dave Woodall is shown Friday, Aug. 11, 2013, polishing the ground-embedded maple leaf at the foot of the black granite monument. At 1 p.m. each August 19, if the sun is shining, a shaft of sunlight beams through the monument and onto the national symbol surrounded by beach stones brought to Windsor from Dieppe, France. Photo by Doug Schmidt /Windsor Star

But even after the last veteran of that period is gone, Woodall said we can never forget their sacrifices in securing freedom from tyranny. In a “Canada et Dieppe” message sent last year to close to 30,000 residents of his seaside city, the mayor of Dieppe pointed to Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine and reminded them “it is our duty … to prolong the memory” of those who fight for the freedom of others.

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Woodall’s Windsor business was involved in engineering and building the original black granite memorial designed by then-University of Windsor student Rory O’Connor, which was erected along the beach in Dieppe. A second, exact replica, followed along Windsor’s waterfront.

A unique feature of its design sees a shaft of sunlight pierce through the inside at exactly 1 p.m. local time each August 19 — the time the raid’s withdrawal was signalled — and illuminate a stainless steel maple leaf on the ground. The maple leaf in Windsor is set among stones brought overseas from the Red Beach landing zone.

Woodall is a former honorary lieutenant-colonel of the The Essex and Kent Scottish Regiment, and remains a member of Delta Company, the reserve infantry regiment’s civilian support group.

With Detroit in the background, Dave Woodall is shown during his latest visit to downtown Windsor’s Dieppe Raid Memorial on Friday, Aug. 11, 2013. The 81st anniversary commemoration of the raid on Nazi-occupied France, which came at a huge price in Windsor soldier lives lost and captured, is this Saturday, Aug. 19, 2023, at 12:30 p.m. Photo by Doug Schmidt /Windsor Star

A close-up of a portion of the Dieppe Raid Memorial at downtown Windsor’s Dieppe Gardens is shown on Friday. Photo by Doug Schmidt /Windsor Star

Dave Woodall, whose firm helped design and build the Dieppe Raid Memorial at downtown Windsor’s Dieppe Gardens (it’s an exact replica of the Windsor-built original in Dieppe, France), visits several times a year to give it a good cleaning. Photo by Doug Schmidt /Windsor Star

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