William Lukinuk of Canora was 25 years old when he enlisted in the Canadian Army in 1942 and trained for the largest landing invasion in the world’s history on the beaches of Normandy.
Lukinuk’s story first ran in the Canora Courier 30 years ago, in 1987.
Canora’s William Lukinuk saw action
D-Day saw the heaviest fighting of the Second World War on the beaches of Normandy and that’s where William Lukinuk of Canora was introduced to fighting action.
When he enlisted in the army on May 8, 1942, he expected to see action but little did he expect to be specially trained for two years in preparation for the largest landing invasion in the history of the world. Like thousands of others, he was being specially trained but not allowed to know the scope of his mission until the final hours.
Estimates are that more that 17,000 soldiers landed on the beaches of Normandy on June 6, 1944. Casualty numbers were intense but with the British on their left and the Americans on their right, the Canadian Forces went up the middle. It was the battle that marked the beginning of the end.
Felt drawn to duty
Two years earlier, William Lukinuk was farming a quarter-section of land in the Theodore area. Living alone, he felt drawn towards a duty which led him to the Regina 12th District Depot.
At first the training was routine, with six weeks of basics at Maple Creek. From there he was moved to Camp Shilo for two months of advanced training. This is where soldiers were given the chance to branch off into special fields such as engineering or communications. Lukinuk remembers both of these fields to be highly overrated.
The term “technical engineers” meant they operated equipment such as mine sweepers, and communications men were responsible for climbing poles and fixing communication wires in the midst of battle zones.
Joined an artillery regiment
Lukinuk was trained in handling 25-pound artillery as well as in anti-aircraft light machine gun techniques. For the latter every fourth bullet was a tracer enabling more accuracy with a .303-calibre machine gun. It was here that he became a member of the 24th field regiment.
Camp Shilo was getting cold as fall moved in and the recruits were living out of tents. It was a welcome move to Hastings Park, B.C., where advanced training continued. The reality of pending action suddenly hit Lukinuk when many men from his regiment and from the 21st Regiment were recruited by the 19th Canadian Army Field Regiment which was being readied to go overseas.
It is quite likely that this is where the 19th Regiment was marked as part of the D-Day invasion force. Instead of going directly overseas, the regiment made it to Camp Petawawa, Ont., where advanced training continued throughout the winter and into the middle of the next summer. Different scenarios were being introduced and the men were trained to cope.
To England on the Q.E. II
In July of 1943, the 19th Regiment finally boarded the Queen Elizabeth to sail across to Greenock, Scotland. From there they moved by train to Oxted, about 22 miles south of London.
Oddly enough, the men arrived but the guns didn’t and it was necessary to borrow guns from other regiments to continue training. It lasted about two months before the move was made to Eastbourne, in the southern part of England. The stay was only a few days before the presence of German shelling made a move to Bournemouth necessary.
It was a much more pleasant area, Lukinuk recalls. The area, by the English Channel, was a summer resort for England. Several weeks of training were devoted to the theory of water-borne landings. So ended 1943.
1944 brought intensive preparations
The new year began with training of quicker and easier methods of loading and unloading landing vehicles which included the self-propelled big guns. There were daily practises. Later, larger-scale invasions were practised by the Canadian assault force.
As spring became reality a strange order was received, Lukinuk said. Every vehicle and gun and much of the equipment was taken to the army service corps for waterproofing. A sort of plasticine was used to seal all moving parts and in vehicles the exhaust systems were made to reach high above the vehicles.
As the training continued, the regiment learned how to disembark with vehicles in as much as nine feet of water.
By this time, there were many rumours about a large scale invasion of France but no details or confirmations were received, Lukinuk said.
More than two months before D-Day, the regiments were ordered to begin loading their equipment on barges. However, unlike previous exercises, the vehicles were loaded with much more infantry ammunition than usual as well as ammunition for the big guns.
Men awed by size of armada
As the 19th Regiment, with its more than 1,000 men, went to the docks of Gosport and Southampton during the early days of June 1944, the men were in a state of awe.
As far as the eye could see, there were boats of every description and “that is when we knew we were about to see action” Lukinuk said. At about 10 p.m. that night, the gigantic armada began to move.
The commanding officers waited about two hours before reading sealed envelopes stating the duty of the regiment and the goals, he said. Even at this point, fictitious names were being used to protect the secrecy of the invasion.
Lukinuk recalls an army padre saying something to the effect of, “This is what you were trained for and it is something you shouldn’t be afraid to die for.”
The emotions were unexplainable, he said. There was a certain excitement about the attack and a sort of confidence that was instilled into the troops. Fear numbed the body’s usual reactions and everyone seemed to operate mechanically.
Armada offshore at daybreak
It was about 4 a.m. when Lukinuk recalls looking at the horizon as daylight broke. The whole armada had stopped, quietly waiting in the water, about five miles from shore.
Everything was quiet for several more hours and it wasn’t until his regiment had sat down for breakfast that the first big navy guns began firing.
“Everybody dashed to see what was happening but all we could see were puffs of smoke where the shells hit the beach,” Lukinuk said.
While the infantry corps shot out for the beach, the artillery regiments began providing a cover of fire, shelling the beaches from about 9,000 yards.
Getting to the shore was difficult
The most difficult part of the whole war and a terrible initiation to battle was getting the guns to shore, he said, even though the Germans had been badly shaken by the devastating barrage of artillery fire which had reduced their defensive efficiency.
Men were being killed all around him as shells continuously exploded in the vicinity.
There was a great deal of confusion as instincts battled a sense of duty. There was a lot more trouble getting the guns and vehicles off the barges than anticipated. Many of the water-proofed vehicles stopped dead.
Lukinuk was not in charge of manning a gun immediately. There were six men assigned for each gun but only three were needed for operation. The other three were support staff.
His first landing at Normandy was when he jumped off the barge and landed in the water up to his chest. He had a Bren gun in his hands and fought like any of the infantry.
Soon the German fighter planes were overhead, battling with the Allied fighters and causing a lot of distress for ground forces.
The shelling continued constantly to try to support the infantry, which couldn’t move, Lukinuk said. The Germans had strongholds in “pill boxes” (reinforced cement barricades which were hard to destroy).
The first day, the regiment made it about one kilometre in from the shore. It was that night that Lukinuk got one of his worst frights in the war. He became entangled in a barbed-wire barrier as German mortar shells were exploding all around. He was cut up slightly but the wounds were of no serious consequence.
A terrifying night
It was a terrifying night, he recalls. The huge shells kept the sky lit through the dark hours. There was the smell of blood and motor fuel and the fumes from explosions. Bodies lay all around.
It was difficult to even think about sleep. When the men were hungry they used their emergency rations of sweets and hardtack biscuits. Water was more appreciated than either sleep or food.
Lukinuk said that, while three men manned the gun, the other three were able to rest somewhat but were on constant alert.
The shelling continued throughout the next day as the German guns were slowly knocked out of action. By this time the infantry was able to make some progress. In most cases the pillboxes had to be destroyed by grenades before the infantry could move on.
By the second day, Lukinuk and the other men from his regiment found that they could take short catnaps to fulfill their sleeping needs but rations were still in short supply.
On the third day, they had pushed into the town of Basly where snipers were continually “knocking” men. When it was determined that the fire was coming from a church steeple, mortar shells were used in the 105-mm guns. Three shots blew up the steeple, killing four female snipers.
Regiment moved often after D-Day
Once the push was well established, the location of the 19th Regiment changed frequently, Lukinuk said. Orders were given on short notice to move and the guns were moved, always to give support for the infantry and, on one part of the campaign, to give support to the Polish infantry.
He and his fellow soldiers had seen battle for almost two months straight before being given their first break when the guns had to be refitted and overhauled.
The 19th regiment was considered to be a specially-trained unit and was not given the same time off as the infantry.
“We were considered crack soldiers because of our training.”
Often raided for food
Once they had become more accustomed to battle duty, the soldiers in the regiment quickly became “fed up” with army food and often raided farms in the area to search for fresh food. This often meant chickens or cattle and the occasional pig. Lukinuk recalls the thrill of his regiment when a wild pig was killed in the Hochwald Forest in Germany but it only lasted for one meal.
Usually it was just food that was taken from farms but, considering the number of soldiers, he recalls his officers warning that the looting must be controlled, “because some day soon we might have to be feeding these people.”
The soldiers “needed their liquor” and often took as much as they could carry. In the early part of his fighting days, he recalls a distillery being knocked out and the soldiers filling jerry cans with whiskey.
Encounters a Ukrainian peasant couple
Raised a Saskatchewan farm boy, Lukinuk found it difficult to go so many years without fresh milk. One morning he spotted a man and a woman on a small farm going to their barn early in the morning to milk the cows. Seizing the opportunity, he went in with a bowl and motioned for the man to fill it. Reluctantly, the bowl was filled but as he was leaving, Lukinuk was sworn at in the Ukrainian language.
This was amazing he thought, a German speaking perfect Ukrainian. Being of Ukrainian descent, he asked the man if he spoke Ukrainian and the man shared the amazement.
It appears the Germans had brought this man in from Ukraine and used him as forced labour. Suddenly, the old man was offering Lukinuk as much milk as he wanted.
It was years later that Lukinuk found out, but it appears the Germans had made some fantastic offers of land and prosperity to the Slavic people. His own cousins were in the German army and possibly they did fight against each other at one time.
Many more tense moments
There were many tough spots in which the fighting became more intense, he said, at points such as St. Germaine and Cormelles in France.
There were three times in France during which air waves of Allied bombers dropped their payloads on Allied forces and, in terms of morale, it was a situation that really hurt.
One particular bad incident was when his regiment came across a Polish army regiment which had 80 tanks knocked out by Allied bombers.
The winter of 1944-45 was spent in Belgium and Holland and in the spring their guns were part of a barrage of 1,400 big guns that pounded away in the “Siegfried Line” as the Allied forces moved on to Germany.
On May 5, 1945, it was Victory Day in Europe for the Canadians. Apparently, VE-Day for the Americans didn’t take place until May 8, Lukinuk said.
By this time, the nature of the battle was so much different, he said. As the regiment moved further into Germany, they would occasionally be followed by German officers on bicycles, trying to catch up so that they could surrender.
Back to Holland after VE-Day
Once the war in Europe was officially over, the 19th Regiment stayed only a couple of weeks in Germany, dismantling the guns, polishing them, oiling them and making them ready for storage.
From there the regiment was sent back to Holland, to a friendlier atmosphere where life was one long party. There was little work to do, the men were billeted out to private homes, and there was little else to do than enjoy the newfound feeling of freedom.
When the flags were raised “on every building” in July, they knew the war in Japan was also over and it was time to go home.
Lukinuk recalls a padre telling him that he had an awful time getting used to the army but he would have a worse time getting used to civilian life. In the years following, these words echoed over and over in his mind.
Farm was quiet, unbearable
When he came back to Canada in January of 1946, it was very cold and his small farm offered no electricity, no lights no radio and unbearable silence. Within a few days he tried to re-enlist for occupational duty but was turned down.
Theodore was a “one-horse town” and seemed to offer no comfort. Every day he would try to get used to his new freedom but by evening it would turn into a yearning to move on and find some action. Every time he saw a train, there was a yearning to hop aboard and just go somewhere, but where?
It was the attitude that made him and the other members of his regiment into “crack” soldiers but it was an attitude that was impossible to get rid of.
All through training, they were brainwashed into hating the enemy and itching to kill them but the reality of war hit a sensitive spot soon after the initial shock of Normandy was over.
The soldiers found themselves questioning each other why they were killing other humans and yet, whenever a situation presented itself, instinct took over. It was a matter of kill or be killed.
“We were fighting the enemy and not the men.”
Years pass, memories stay
As the years passed, the memory of the war left a strong respect for the German soldiers. He referred to them as smart soldiers, good soldiers and brave soldiers. The capabilities of some of their weapons were frightening but it was usually a matter of being outnumbered that kept them pushed back.
There was never time to think. It was the instinct instilled by training. Killing was done by instinct but, afterwards, many did question their own actions. Why was any of this necessary?
“Once the killing began, we began to understand who we were killing,” Lukinuk said.
Meeting fellow soldiers years after the war, they still asked each other what was it all about?
The army lifestyle had been very hard to get used to. There was never a kind word from anyone. Everyone swore at everyone else. Even the uniforms became an eyesore.
“We called them monkey suits.”
Oddly enough, once overseas the Canadian soldiers had found themselves a little more appreciated. It seemed that civilians from every country had a special love for the Canadian soldiers, except in Germany.
In Holland, the people had a saying in their own language which called the Canadians “special soldiers.”.
Resigned himself to the farm
After the war ended, Lukinuk resigned himself to being a farmer. In 1947 he married Doris Kuzek and they farmed in the Theodore area for 16 years. In 1963 they moved to Canora and he worked on a number of construction jobs such as the addition to the high school. Doris worked at the Robinson store for 14 years.
Later on he worked on a CN extra gang for 14 years and for the Canora Bakery for about 11/2 years.
They had two children, Ron and Gloria.
