90 years
The moon sank lower into a black cloud in the west, the Glen went out in an eclipse of sudden shadow - and thousands of miles away the Canadian boys in khaki - the living and the dead - were in possession of Vimy Ridge.Vimy Ridge is a name written in crimson and gold on the Canadian annals of the Great War. "The British couldn't take it and the French couldn't take it," said a German prisoner to his captors, "but you Canadians are such fools that you don't know when a place can't be taken!"
So the fools "took it" - and paid the price.
- L.M. Montgomery, Rilla of Ingleside
Brigadier-General Alexander Ross had commanded the 28th (North-West) Battalion at Vimy. Later, as president of the Canadian Legion, he proposed the first Veterans' post-war, pilgrimage to the new Vimy Memorial in 1936. He said of the battle:"It was Canada from the Atlantic to the Pacific on parade. I thought then . . . that in those few minutes I witnessed the birth of a nation."
[About the Vimy Memorial]
[Four Days in April
[Canada must not allow Vimy to fade away]