Story of a Veteran

"There were times when I was just plain lucky," says Cliff Fryers of his time as a lieutenant during the Second World War.
Fryers, 90, is one of more than 700,000 people who enlisted in the Canadian Forces between 1939 and 1945. As a student at the U of M, Fryer's joined the university's contingent of the Canadian Officer's Training Corps--a unit in the Active Militia of Canada, which prepared undergraduate students to qualify as officers. He turned 21 in August of 1942 and soon began making plans to enlist.
"I had long since made a decision in my mind to volunteer, because I felt the war was so serious and the situation was so serious, that I should take part in it on behalf of Canada to the extent that I could,"
Fryers says.
He trained as an officer cadet in Quebec and graduated as a second Lt. in February 1943.
After more training in Alberta and at CFB Shilo, Fryers was told he'd be going overseas. He was given a short leave in Winnipeg, during which he got engaged to his girlfriend June. But duty to his country was at the top of his mind, so Fryers was in England by his 22nd Birthday.
On June 6, 1944 (D-Day), Lt. Fryers was attending a flame-throwing school when Gen. Eisenhower announced that allied troops had landed in France. Fryers was sent there as part of a group of reinforcements for The Queen's Own Cameron Highlanders of Canada, and taken ashore to a camp a mile or two inland from where the invasion occurred.
"The Lts. were platoon commanders while we were on shore there, but I don't think we would say for a minute that we took a platoon with us up front. No, everyone including those who were in the platoons would be sent up individually, or in groups, or whatever, as the need arose. When you get quite a few men shot, wounded or killed, then you have a need for reinforcements."
During the summer, two of Fryers's fellow Lts. and friends were called into service with the battalion. He was called a few days later.
"I reported into headquarters there and of course enquired about my two buddies, how they were doing. They had been killed already," says Fryers. "That was quite a shock, but that's the way things went at that time."
Fryers didn't have long to grieve. One day early in his time with the battalion, he heard the sound of an approaching German mortar. He dove for his trench, but the exploding shell sent a piece of shrapnel that ricocheted off his helmet.
"The steel helmet had saved my life of course, cause if that piece of shrapnel had hit my head, it would have taken a big chunk out of my skull."
In October 1944, Fryers’s time in the service ended when a German sniper’s bullet went through his big toe. It didn’t hit the bone, but put him out of commission for the rest of his stint overseas.
Almost 70 years after the war, Fryers finds Remembrance Day even more significant.
"Remembrance Day is so very important to me. It didn't used to be when I was younger: I didn't really absorb the fact that I was getting so much older when so many of my friends hadn't made it out of the war."
Fryers says he sympathizes with young people today who don’t understand war. He says he found it just as difficult to understand the First World War when he was young.