Browsing by Author "Smith, Mackenzie"

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    Tulip bulbs and maple leaves: 1st Canadian Corp veterans’ memories of the Second World War from Sicily to the Netherlands
    (University of New Brunswick, 2024-08) Smith, Mackenzie; Windsor, Lee
    In 1995, around the 50th Anniversary of the Liberation of the Netherlands, Dr. Agatha Bonga collected over one thousand questionnaires completed by Canadian Second World War veterans. Dr. Bonga died before she could utilize the data. Three decades later, this project re-opens this untouched, rare collection that reveals new perspectives on the known, but thinly told story about the end of Canada’s Second World War. The questionnaire responses contained in the collection examine veterans’ prewar lives, their wartime service, and their postwar transitions. This thesis examines a sample of 336 questionnaire responses completed by 1st Canadian Corps veterans who fought in Italy and in the 1945 Liberation Campaign in the Netherlands. These questionnaire responses from middle and lower ranking Canadian Army veterans corroborate, nuance, and at times challenge Canadian historical writing, especially regarding the spring 1945 Liberation Campaign, the sudden shift from war to peace, and post-war veterans’ lives.