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National Impact
After the Cheering
Once the celebrations and ceremonies of the Armistice ended (the celebrations
in Mons, liberated by General Currie and the Canadians, went on for the better
part of a week), there was work to be done. The Canadians, under Currie, were
chosen to join the British Second army as part of the Occupation force in Germany.
On November 18, two divisions began the long, 400-kilometre march to the Rhine
where they would take up positions at bridgeheads in Cologne and Bonn. The rest
of the troops remained in Belgium. Troops in Germany were billeted with local
families until the occupation duties finished in early February, 1919, when they
returned to Belgium. There, awaiting demobilization and return to Canada, many
of the men played sports, fraternized with locals and took classes at the Khaki
University established in late 1918, which taught high school and university
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All the men yearned to return home.
Demobilization of the Canadian Expeditionary Force (CEF) was a complicated and
difficult task, fraught with political infighting and controversy. Moving more
than 300,000 men back to Canada in the chaos of post-war Europe proved to be
no easy task.
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Fifth and Seventh Batteries
Demobilized soldiers arrive in Montreal train station,
1919. |
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