The University of Western Ontario
Department of History
Oral History Project
An interview with a Veteran of W. W. II:
MR. WILLIAM DIXON of the First Hussars
Interviewed by
Karen Sykes
January 4, 1985
[This is a reasonable text copy of an undergraduate essay by Prof Karen Sykes, now at the University of Manchester. Used with her permission. My additions to her text will be in italics like this. I have added a "See Also" section at the end. Reg Quinton 06/06/2026]
Second World War
Canadian Oral History Project
1. Full Name: William McKay Dixon
2. Permanent Address: 66 Henry Street Mitchell; Telephone No. N/A
3. Date of Birth: Sept. 1 1922
4. Would you be willing to be interviewed concerning your service? Yes
5. Date and Place of Enlistment: Owen Sound, May 1940
6. Rank on Enlistment: Trooper.
7. Please list units in which you served: 1st Hussars & Kangaroos
8. Date and Place of Demobilization: Toronto, November 1945
9. Please check the following theatres in which you served:
a) Canada X
b) United Kingdom X
c) Italy N/A
d) Northwest Europe X
e) Other N/A
10. Were there special events during your wartime service on which you would like to comment. If so, please indicate briefly the nature of these events. N/A
Background Information to the Interview
Mr. William (Mac) Dixon has lived in Mitchell, Ontario for over twenty years. I was acquainted with this veteran of the First Hussars before the interview because I have lived in the same community for nearly as many years. It was during a high school history class that I learned of his participation in the Second World War as one of the men who came into the beaches of Normandy in a D.D. tank on D-Day.
On January second, I phoned Mr. Dixon. I explained this project and asked for an opportunity to talk with him so that he would be included in it. He agreed to talk to me and plans were made to meet the next morning at eleven at his home. During the course of the phone call I discovered that he had driven the D.D. tank in B squadron on D-Day. We also discussed the various name-changes of the regiment during their training period. This was noted as a confusing issue both then and now.
The following morning I arrived at Mr. Dixon's home on Henry Street. He showed a few books to me about the war which were very helpful in establishing my knowledge of his participation. He talked about the D-Day offensive and his part as a driver of a D.D. tank. At this time I learned that his tank had been hit during its approach to the beach. Mr. Dixon showed pictures to me of the dedication of this tank named BOLD as a memorial at Courseilles sur Mer, France. As well we looked at his pistol, now restored, that had been found in the tank after it had been taken from the sea. While we looked at the photograph album, I learned that Mr. Dixon's brother had been killed in England with the R.C.A.F.
Mr. Dixon discussed his regiment's incredible war record, pointing to the battle-honours that it holds. He noted the great odds against which his regiment fought on D-Day and on June 11th. Mr. Dixon is justifiably proud of his association and experience with the First Hussars. He noted, at the end of our talk that the regimental motto is "Hodie Non Cras". I planned then, to return the following day, instead of the next week, to tape an interview with him.
The Interview
The evening of January 4 th. I returned with my tape recorder and the books that Mr. Dixon had loaned to me. We talked for a time about the project itself and specifically about the tape, the transcripts, and their inclusion in the First Hussars Historical Committee's collection. The tape is about fifty minutes long. In its entirety, it is a story that traces the experience of Mr. William Dixon from his early, pre-enlistment days through training and into a series of battles. These include: the D-Day offensive, the regiment's Black Day at Beny-Sur-Mer, the capture of Caen, B Squadron's run at ifs, the closing of the Falaise Gap. He move to the Kangaroo's, the Canadian Carrier Regiment from the hospital after an injury. He returns to the First Hussars at the war's conclusion and was given charge of the vehicle park. Shortly, he returned home to his father's feed mill and, in two years, married his wife Shirley. The story ends happily with the dedication of his tank BOLD at Courseilles-Sur-Mer in France. The whole visit lasted two hours.
Commentary
Because Mr. Dixon, who will be sixty -one on September 1st, 1983 has an excellent memory and is one of the younger veterans of W.W.II. His reflections are thoughtful and his words are careful; for these reasons the interview has a sense of immediacy. He is a well-spoken man, the interview was left entirely in his words. Where four dots in succession appear, a passage of a sentence or more has been edited. Most often it is the interviewer's comment which has been removed because it seemed to destroy the flow of the story. Three dots indicate the editing of a phrase or sentence fragment. Material which appears in brackets has been included by the editor. Footnotes appear at the end of the text to expand the information or contextualize it within the regiment's experience.
Mr. Dixon: I just came from school [EndNote #1] and I just finished a course on mechanics. My father owned a garage... Of course that was in the winter time and no cars were on the road. There was no snow plow around there (Walters Falls) So in the spring of the year I joined up.
Interviewer: Did you have any brothers and sisters?
Mr. Dixon: I had one brother and four sisters.
Interviewer: Were you the oldest or was your brother?
Mr. Dixon: My brother was older.
Interviewer: Had he enlisted before you?
Mr. Dixon: No, I was overseas a year and a half before he enlisted.
Interviewer: Were your sisters older than you or younger?
Mr. Dixon: Two older and one younger.
Interviewer: Did you go to enlist with your friends or on your own?
Mr. Dixon: I came from a little village of only a hundred population, Walters Falls, near Owen Sound. A chum of mine and I went to Owen Sound and I joined up at the armouries.
Mr. Dixon: I didn't know where I was going. I got on the back of a truck and ended up in Camp Borden. and there I found out I was with the First Hussars.
Interviewer: When you enlisted you made a choice of armoured or infantry?
Mr. Dixon: I had no idea where I was going. I ended up with armoured and my chum ended up in the medical corps.
Interviewer: Once you got to Camp Borden you started training with an armoured unit. What did you train with? I think you had some World War I tanks there, were you able to use them?
Mr Dixon: The first training we did there was our basic training. We learned to march, rifle range, pistol range, first aid, map reading. Yes they had some tanks there, old American tanks. Although I was never in them, they would hardly ever run.
Interviewer: I guess they would be trying their best... What date was it that you enlisted?
Mr. Dixon: It was May 1941, then six months in Canada and I went to England in November, and landed in Aldershot, England in November 1941.
Interviewer: Now, Aldershot was a big training place in England. What was it like?
Mr. Dixon: Yes, a real training place!
Interviewer: How long did you spend there?
Mr. Dixon: Just the winter, and it was all basic training there.
Interviewer: So did you go through basic training again?
Mr. Dixon: Yes but this was more...
Interviewer: Specialized?
Mr. Dixon: Yes we had tank driving, mechanic training, radio.
Interviewer: Did you have to choose one?
Mr. Dixon: We went through them all but we qualified in one.
Interviewer: What did you qualify in?
Mr. Dixon: I qualified as a driver-mechanic, but I took all the courses on wireless and map reading.
Interviewer: You spent several years in Britain.
Mr. Dixon: Yes, four years.
Interviewer: Was it towards the end of your stay that your regiment started D.D. training?.... It was a secret, right? [EndNote #2]
Mr. Dixon: No, the D.D. tanks came out of the Dieppe raid. The boats had to go right into shore to be launched. So they came up with the idea of the D.D. tank, and we'd done our training, the last 6-8 months in England, under very tight security. It was a secret weapon and only after D-Day was the tank known about. We had two squadrons in the Hussars in the D.D. tanks and the other two squadrons didn't know what we were doing. It was that secret. We were separated from them most of the time and they didn't even know what we were doing. We trained on the lakes on the smaller D.D. tank than what we went in with on D-Day. The valentine I believe it was...
It was a British made tank that we started training with. Then we ended up on the English Channel with the Sherman.
Mr. Dixon: Oh yes. We trained in Aldershot, a strictly military camp and then moved to a place named Green Gates. I suppose there was only a pub and a couple of houses there. We were near the commons, there were two commons and did some training there. That's where we were issued our first tanks. We had one or two tanks in Aldershot but when we got to Green Gates, out on the commons that's when we started getting our tanks.
Interviewer: How many tanks did the regiment get then?
Mr. Dixon: Well we had different tanks we had General Lee. We had General Grant and we had the Canadian Ram, Ram TT. Ram TII, and then we got the Sherman. So we had quite a number of tanks.
Interviewer: So you would say you had a good amount of experience before D-Day and were used to driving your tanks?
Interviewer: On D-Day it's said that the water was pretty rough. Did you find it that way?
Mr. Dixon: On D-Day, we were supposed to go in on the Fifth of June, and the water was too rough that day, and so it was postponed until the sixth. It was going to be completely postponed because of the tides. The water we had trained in had been, at its worse, a 5sea. I presume that's a five foot wave. That was the highest we ever trained in D.D. tanks. On D-Day we hit a 7sea which is a seven foot wave, and they were pretty well coming in over the canvas as we launched. [EndNote #3]
Interviewer: So did you have problems with the water accumulating and have to pump it out?
Mr. Dixon: Yes, both bilge pumps were working. The water was splashing over the tops. Our biggest problem was the canvas collapsing with the waves, with the 70 the waves were really pounding the sides of the tank.
Interviewer: I think you told me that you were launched five miles from shore. [EndNote #4]
Mr. Dixon: Yes, roughly five miles.
Interviewer: And you got how close to shore before you were hit? [EndNote #5]
Mr. Dixon: We were roughly five hundred yards from shore, that's at low tide. It raises, I think they said eighteen feet deeper (and our position further from shore) The tank sank very fast. We couldn't get out of it until it filled with water. The crew in the turret could get out but down in the lower section we couldn't get out until it was filled with water.
Mr. Dixon: Yes.
Interviewer: and were you able to use it?
Mr. Dixon: No, we were issued a new escape apparatus and as we inflated it underwater we found that we couldn't get out the escape hatch with it, and so it was torn getting out. And so when we got to the surface we still had nothing to float with, we had to swim.
Interviewer: That takes a lot of energy. Were you in the water a long time?
Mr. Dixon: From roughly seven-thirty when we sank. My gunner, he was with me. We swam for quite a long time. The machine gun bullets got pretty hot and he just disappeared on me. He got hit. I guess in the excitement I found myself swimming back to England. I was picked up by a small craft heading back to a mother ship, that had landed some infantry. But, I had just nicely got on it when it hit a mine and blew up.
Interviewer: Do you know what time that was?
Mr. Dixon: That would be roughly ten o'clock. And of course I was back in the water again. I reached shore at roughly eleven-thirty or twelve o'clock....
Interviewer: And were you on your own at that time?
Mr. Dixon: I was strictly on my own. I had no helmet, had lost my pistol. I had nothing when I got to shore. One of the chaps on shore came running in and pulled me the last few feet into shore. I know I laid there for maybe fifteen minutes. I knew I was on the wrong beach. [EndNote #6]
Then, I started walking up to where I knew where the unit should be coming in. I walked up there and I found some of our chaps on the shore, the first dead I had seen. I knew they were our men. I went a little farther and I found a German pillbox and about twelve of our men were over there so I joined them.
... I stayed there until a lieutenant picked us up at about six o'clock in the evening. It was still quite daylight. [EndNote #7] I remember going up with a German rifle and spending the night with the infantry. The next morning I came back to the unit.
Interviewer: And were you back with B squadron at that time?
Mr. Dixon: Yes, what was left of it. The first day they had no tanks for me, Dodds, Sgt. Dodds [EndNote #8] and I went back and salvaged a tank that was on the beach. We got it fixed. It had a hole through the turret, but we got it back into action. The rest of the day we spent priming hand grenades.
Interviewer: The beach must have seemed pretty disorganized when you got there?
Mr. Dixon: Things seemed to be going pretty well on our beach. Our tanks had gotten off the beach and into the little town of Courseilles. That's when I met some of the boys, with the tanks, on the square at Courseilles. That's the first prisoners we had taken at Courseilles.
Interviewer: Does the time from D-Day to the black day of the regiment seem like one continuous day of fighting?
Mr. Dixon: Yes, the first month was continuous fighting. There was no let up at all. You got knocked out of one vehicle, you took another one, and filled in. We had a storm when no supplies came in for two days.
So we had no reinforcements, we had no extra vehicles, we had to make do with what we had.
Interviewer: How did you keep morale up in the troops?
Mr. Dixon: Well, we were pretty much on our own. Things were that warm and hot that you really didn't think very much. You keep your head low.
Interviewer: I guess we should talk about the 11th of June because it has been known as a particularly bad day for the regiment. What are your remembrances of that day?
Mr. Dixon: Well, …
Interviewer: You went in with 'B' squadron.
… We happened to run into it. We were lead squadron and we were by ourselves and the other two squadrons couldn't get in to help. So we ran into the Germans and all hell broke loose.
Interviewer: Did you make it back that day?
Mr. Dixon: I crawled back. I lost my tank. Yes, I crawled back. There were two other chaps and myself we crawled back, sneaked back. I don't know how we got back really.
… We crawled like ground hogs. The dead on both sides, and the wounded was just fantastic in that action. That's one action I'll never forget, I think we came out with three tanks [EndNote #10] and probably seven men that night. But there was a few who came back without their vehicles. (They) made it back to their regiment to fight another day.
Interviewer: Throughout the next few days?
Mr. Dixon: Yes it took quite a few days to get back to the regiment.
Mr. Dixon: I got back that night.
… That was my first rum ration, that night. They say you always got a rum ration, but in the tank corps I never got a rum ration. That was the only one I ever got.
It was issued to me after we got back. The Sgt-Maj. came up and when he saw what was left of his squadron he took out a gallon of rum and we each had a (bit) We got our initiation to the rum ration.
… That was the last ration I had of rum.
Interviewer: After that the regiment was able to take a rest was it?
Mr. Dixon: We were about two days resting.
Interviewer: You had to get your supplies?
Mr. Dixon: The regiment went together to make a squadron until 'B' squadron got built up again. I think we were out of action. I don't ...
Interviewer: You were at the front.
Mr. Dixon: We were at the front and there was no pulling back.
Interviewer: Did you sleep on shifts, or something like that?
Mr. Dixon: As a rule there was no sleeping. You started fighting about four-thirty in the morning and you would fight right through until one-thirty or two o'clock the next morning. So the only sleeping you got was when somebody was gassing up for you or getting ammo back in your vehicle. Or you slept standing up. I don't know, but you never really slept.
I say you don't sleep, but when you did quit for a couple hours and got back to echelon you dozed off. But, you were still awake. The creaking of the tank would wake you and you were alert. I don't know, it just seemed to...
You always were with your vehicle: Slept in it, slept with it. If you were stopped for harbour at night, there was always two men on the guns and one man on the radio. The other two or three of your crew members used to dig a hole under the tank and then backed the tank over it. Then you'd crawl in this hole under the tank until you had to take your shift on duty.
Interviewer: Well, it would be the safest spot there. After the 11th, would you say your next major action was at Ifs?
Mr. Dixon: No. the major action was at Caen. The big action was at Caen. We were days at Caen when we put the the big drive in. We out skirted Caen and we moved on to Ifs. Ifs was the battle we fought for days, but only at squadron strength. We were getting ready then for the drive on the Falaise gap. One squadron was up at Ifs supporting the infantry. We were kind of poking away at the Germans, holding them in check, until we got organized for the push on the Falaise Gap.
Interviewer: That was 'B' squadron at Ifs.
Mr. Dixon: Yes, that was 'B' squadron at Ifs. That was where I made my first big run.
Interviewer: Would you explain that?
Mr. Dixon: Well, it's a thing you don't do very often. We went right in the town there, Ifs is only a small municipality. But there was a gun down in the corner that was knocking everything out that showed its face. So the infantry had pulled back and we got the word that we had to hold at all cost. There was a smokescreen laid down by the Germans which we thought was our own screen for the infantry to pull back. It happened to be a German smokescreen and when it lifted we were surrounded by Germans. We couldn't back up, so we went forward, we rushed for about two miles, through the German lines to the centre of Ifs and took out that gun that had been causing that havoc in taking out our tanks.
Interviewer: Was it an 88?
Mr. Dixon: It was a German 75. The 80's were worse than a 75.
Mr. Dixon: The 75 was taking out our tanks. We took three tanks on that rush and only one of us came back. It happened to be another lucky day for me to get back out of that.
On the way back out we were bazooka'd and our tank was useless. We only had one round of ammunition left in the tank and I think we had fired roughly 97 rounds of 75mm that day. We had no machine gun left and we had roughly 6,750 rounds of 30 caliber that we had fired. The last round we fired was one smoke. We fired it at the Germans that were in a house that we bypassed and that's when we got bazooka'd. The turret ring was melted, so we had to go back to echelon. We were out of petrol at the same time.
We just about had the biscuit there. We got bombed as well that night. That vehicle, it did run out of gas, but it was about twelve o'clock at night that it did run out.
Interviewer: Is this the same tank that you had after the l1th?
Mr. Dixon: This was my third tank. That tank went all the way through after that. But I wasn't with it.
When I left it I went to the hospital, after the Falaise Gap. And when I went to the hospital that tank went the rest of the way around.
Interviewer: So, what happened at the Falaise Gap. That's where the Americans were coming up from the south and the Canadians came from the north.
Mr. Dixon: We had them surrounded. We had to close the Gap. The Americans were coming down the one section, and we were trying to close in. It looked to be awfully easy, but it's a very hard thing to close a gap when there's so many troops in there. To close the Gap we went in there on another one of our rushes. But, it was done by the regiment. We went in at full speed. "B" squadron was supposed to be the last squadron to go in, and it ended up we were the first squadron to go in. Some of the guys got turned around in our directions. We got bombed by our own planes. When we ended up, "B" squadron, instead of being in last position, was in the first. We were the first to get to our objectives.
Interviewer: Was it at this time that you were injured?
Mr. Dixon: No, I got thru the Falaise Gap. (It was) After closing the Falaise Cap. I got out of that alright. It was down in the.... I really can't tell you where it was. I came back to the harbour, it was in harbour where I got wounded. I don't know where the shell came from because we came back into harbour. I had just nicely got out of the vehicle when I got a chunk of shrapnel in the groin. Of course I was taken to hospital then.
Interviewer: How long were you in the hospital?
Mr. Dixon: I was only in the hospital for about a week. Then, the hospital was moving, and I was sent to the holding unit. I had no clothes and was sent to the holding unit in my pajamas. The hospital was moving and (it) didn't have any equipment, so I had to go to the holding unit in my pajamas. I had to draw a uniform from my holding unit.
Interviewer: Did that happen very often?
Mr. Dixon: I think that was about the first and only time.
Interviewer: How long were you (in the holding unit)?
Mr. Dixon: I was in the holding unit for about three days. After I got my uniform there was an order in from the 1st Hussars. They wanted me back. But in the meantime a bulletin came thru, a special order to go to the Kangaroos. They were forming the Kangaroos, the 1st Canadian carrier regiment: It was known as the Kangaroos. I was sent to it...
Interviewer: It was noted that you were the only troops...
Mr. Dixon: Yes, we were the only troops attached to the 51st.
Interviewer: Was it attached to the 79th?
Mr. Dixon: Yes, it was the 79th British Armoured Brigade, their command. [EndNote #11]
Mr. Dixon: Mostly the crews of the Kangaroos, we had two squadrons, were drivers from the armoured corps and the artillery. They were all casualties that had got wounded before and had came back through the holding unit. (They) were sent on priority to form this brigade.
Interviewer: How big was it?
Mr. Dixon: There were two squadrons and roughly about 100 carriers to the squadron and each carrier had a driver and a radio operator; a two-man crew. They were the Canadian Ram tank that we used and with the turret taken off they held roughly fifteen infantry. Of course the idea was to get the infantry in there and rush the enemy lines. The infantry had to jump out and start fighting. The Kangaroos would go back for another load.
Interviewer: That did not take very long?
Mr. Dixon: That didn't take very long. [EndNote #12] The Kangaroos were from one front to the other, on the go all the time. You worked with, I guess, pretty well every Canadian infantry unit we had, every infantry unit in Canada that was overseas had a ride in one of the Kangaroos, or worked with them.
Interviewer: It was a pretty successful unit it seems.
Mr. Dixon: They were a very successful unit and (had) very few casualties. The unit was short-lived. It was formed in Holland about August and we disbanded it at the end of the war in Holland. Then, each man went back to his original unit. I ended up back with the 1st Hussars, back in Holland in Groningen.
Interviewer: When did you finally end up back with the 1st Hussars? Do you remember what month that was?
Mr. Dixon: No, I don't know.
Interviewer: You were in Europe for a while after V-E Day?
Mr. Dixon: Yes... It would be October before I left Holland. I was one of the singles over there. The married men seemed to get their preference, and got their leaves home. But I got home in November of 1945.
Interviewer: Did you come home on your own or was there a whole bunch that came at once?
Mr. Dixon: I came home on the Queen Mary. She was fully loaded. But, I didn't come back with the regiment. I came home on the point system. I had been over there since... Well, I was over there since 1941. The reinforcements, they had to stay later, some of them had been over since 1943-1944.
Interviewer: What did you do in Holland after the action had ceased and you were waiting to go home?
Mr. Dixon: After that of course the tanks were all turned in. A lot of the men were returning home. I was put in charge of the vehicle park: in charge of the trucks and that...
Interviewer: That was when you got your promotion to Sgt.?
Mr. Dixon: No, that was quite a time before that. When I was waiting to go back and I was in charge of the vehicle park. That was quite an experience. Every weekend I would have a truck signed out and used to go to Paris. I spent the weekend in Paris.
Interviewer: But when you got back to Canada you had to start looking for a job.
Mr. Dixon: Yes, I got back. I got a month's leave of course. That was when you got your city clothes and a free suit, of course the government paid for that, and went to Canada for a month long holiday. I did a little bit of touring around and then I got my discharge. I had to go to Hamilton for a discharge, so the army said. But when I got there, they sent me back home, so I had to go to Toronto. So, I got my discharge from Toronto.
Interviewer: Do you remember what day that was?
Mr. Dixon: ... Roughly a month after so that would be November ... middle of November 1945 when I got my discharge. I have it in my paybook if I went and got it for you.
Interviewer: That's alright. So, how soon were you able to find a job after that?
Mr. Dixon: Immediately, my father owned a garage and of course, my brother was killed, he was a pilot in the air force.
Interviewer: Was that before you went in on D-Day?
Mr. Dixon: Yes, I was to visit his grave, I was to go to his funeral, but I was an hour late getting there. But, I got there. But when I got home my father had the garage. He also had a feedmill. He gave me my choice: if I wanted to take over the garage it was mine; or, if I wanted to go into the feed business in the mill I could go in it with him. I thought I'd had enough mechanical work in diesels, smoke and grease. So I went into the mill business with my father. I worked with him until I bought him out when he retired. So that was my career in the feed business.
Interviewer: Did you marry shortly after you came back?
Mr. Dixon: About two years after I got home I met my wife Shirley who came from Meaford in the tank range. [EndNote #13] They put them off the range in 1942. So she was a farm girl. She had moved to Markdale with her father and mother and two sisters. I met her and after two years we got married and we have four in the family, two girls and two boys.
Interviewer: Did you have a lot of association with the Regiment after the war? There'd be reunions maybe?
Mr. Dixon: Yes, every year we have a reunion.
Interviewer: Do you attend every year?
Mr. Dixon: I've only missed one, and that was last year in hospital. I got home from the hospital on June sixth, the very day of our reunion. So, some of the boys were over after the reunion to visit me. I was quite pleased and happy.
Interviewer: One event I know you told me about was when they dedicated the memorial in Normandy.
Mr. Dixon: Oh yes, our vehicle, the D.D. tank that we lost, [EndNote #14] it was found in the beaches. It was brought to shore and restored. The regiment, the association, presented it as a momento, a memorial on the very road it should have come in on D-Day. There it is a memorial now. That was a big day for us, the 1st Hussars. Today on that memorial pretty well every regiment and brigade that went in on D-Day has got their badge on the turret of that tank. We went back to the dedication of it with the regiment and our honour guard. I've just seen in the Legionaire where the battery from--Where was it Shirl?
Mrs. Dixon: 4th battery from...
Mr. Dixon: Bright? No. Little Britain are going over this summer to put their badge on.
Interviewer: What were some of the things they found in the tank when they brought it up?
Mr. Dixon: Oh, I got my revolver back, my pistol. We call it a revolver now but, it was my pistol. It's a .38 and I had it restored in Camp Borden after thirty some years in sea water. It took them a long time to restore it but I have it as a momento. We also got a bottle of the sea-sick pills that came back, as they were still there. The bottle of Johnny Walkers that we had hidden behind the radio was found, but we didn't get it. I think the Dutchman that restored the tank had a celebration.
Interviewer: Really, it was well sealed and was good after all that time.
Mr. Dixon: It was well sealed. I have my knife, fork, and spoon. I don't know if I have anything else or not. My chum, co-driver has the machete.... He lives in Galt and has it made into a nice plaque on the wall. Now a machete is a knife about that long (measuring with his arms). He has that. There were quite a few things that were left, in the tank. The worst thing they had to do when they restored the tank was removing the grenades we had in there. We had hundreds of grenades in there that we carried extra for the infantry for D-Day. The pins were pretty well ate through and that was the hardest job they had in clearing the tank tank out.
Interviewer: That would be dangerous wouldn't it?
Mr. Dixon: Oh yes. They were still live. But the pins were just about gone. A little jar and the pin was gone. We got commended afterwards. They had wondered how long we were going to stay over there (in 1944). We had a lot of canned food left in there. We had ox-tail soup. They found a lot of that in that tank when they brought it up.
Interviewer: So that was quite a day, the dedication.
Mr. Dixon: It was, that was the big day. They had a memorial at the cemetery that morning for our comrades we had lost. There's quite a few of them buried in there. In the afternoon the dedication was for the tank. The French had their honour guards, they had their army, navy and air force there. I would think there would be roughly 2,000 people that had gathered for the dedication of the tank.
Interviewer: Well, thank you Mr. Dixon, it has been a very interesting time I have had listening with you and I would like to add at this time that any tape or record couldn't do justice to your experience. I certainly admire your service to your country.
Mr. Dixon: Thank you.
end of interview
End Notes
1. Mr. Dixon had finished grade eight several years earlier.
2. We had discussed his training on the D.D. tank the day before this interview. I also knew the story of the sinking of the tank at this time. D.D. stands for Dual Drive.
3. This storm was noted at a gale force of four to six. Mг. Dixon corrected the interviewer's mistake of transcribing sea.
4. The D.D. tanks were let out 3000 yards from shore not five miles as I stated.
5. Mr. Dixon was in Major Duncan's tank. The account of its sinking can be found in the appendix of the regiment's war diary for June of 1944, as recorded by Lt. Gariepy who noted the incident from his own tank. Major Duncan discusses some of the difficulties in a separate report on the D.D. tanks.
6. Mr. Dixon was on a beach to the south of his objectives. The nearby, incoming troops were British.
7. This is noted in A History of the First Hussars Regiment on page 58.
8. Sergeant Dodds has written accounts of both D-Day and June eleventh to be found in the war diary of June 1944.
9. The regimental history notes that the orders for this move gave them little time to prepare.
10. This action took place outside of the town Beny-sur-Mer.
11. We had a pamphlet describing the Kangaroos open in front of us at this time.
12. Mr. Dixon had informed me earlier that a usual run to the front would take about ten minutes.
13 Mr. Dixon is referring to the expropriation of farm land in the Meaford area in 1942, for the building of a tank range. Mrs. Dixon's father was one of the farmers affected.
14. The tank referred to is BOLD which is identified, perhaps erroneously, as Anemic in The First Hussars Regiment.
See Also:
- Oral History -- Mac Dixon (2022/11/11). Original text of essay (this blog)
- Oral History - Correspondence (2022/11/12). Correspondence with Karen Sykes (this blog).
- Sgt Walter A Dixon (2021/11/11). Our uncle Walter, Mac's brother (this blog).
- Home From Overseas (1945) (2024/12/17). Newspaper clipping (this blog).
- William (Mac) Dixon (2020/11/10). Includes link to video (this blog)
- Kangaroos (2026/05/01). Link to Facebook story (this blog)
- “Mac” Dixon and the “BOLD”, Juno Beach Center
- With family, in her father’s footsteps… (2024/07/04), Juno Beach Center
- D-day, comprehensive article. Juno Beach Center
- 1st Hussars Association, London & Sarnia, museum and records.
- 1st Hussars, Wikipedia. Good section on D-Day and Normandy.
- Can You Make a Sherman Tank Float? (2026/05/29), Tim Hartford, Cautionary Tales. Podcast
