By Murray Wood

Regina veteran Denis Chisholm’s story lives beyond his death

Jan 7, 2015 | 5:40 AM

His ability to play the bugle was his ticket into the Second World War. The fact that Denis Chisholm was only 16 was something the Canadian Army was willing to pretend it didn’t know.

Chisholm was a storyteller who recalled his experiences for students and members of the community. It was important to him that Canadians know what happened.

He passed away with his family by his side on Jan. 3 at the age of 90.

But his story remains.

Chisholm was in Prince Albert when the Second World War broke out. And he wanted to go.

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“‘D’ company regiment mobilized in P.A. We were just kids in high school,” said Chisholm.

“Most of our fathers, mine included, had been in WWI and I don’t know at that time it was kind of a patriotic thing you know, the mother country was threatened, Germany was at war and so when the regiment mobilized, a bunch of us went down and we joined up! You were supposed to be 19 years of age. I was a whole 16.”

But it wasn’t quite as easy as that. The army sent Chisholm home at first. Then it turned out the Regina Rifles needed a bugler.  

“In those days I’d had a little militia training in the Prince Albert Volunteers and I learned to play a bugle,” he said.

“In those days, in the old army, the army responded to the bugle calls. So I went down and they knew I was underage, so they said you better go home and grow up!  So I went home disappointed.

“The phone rang a day or two later and they said ‘Kid, you play the bugle?’  I said ‘Yessir.’  He said, ‘How old are ya?’ I said ’19’ and he said, ‘C’mon down!’”

Chisholm landed in Normandy shortly after D-Day, on the same beaches the Regina Rifles had stormed just days earlier.  His unit fought through France, Belgium and Holland, where the Canadians fought through mud and water to clear the Scheldt Estuary and a path to the port of Antwerp. 

The Germans destroyed the dykes, flooding the region.  It was brutal, dirty, wet fighting for every muddy foot, and is regarded as one of the most arduous battles of the war. 

Chisholm recalls it all too well.

“At times we used amphibious vehicles called Buffaloes and the others were Weasels and we attacked the dykes, what they called the polders along the dykes.  Most difficult, it was most difficult. 

“We were soaked a lot of the time; most difficult fighting conditions. Kind of funny, we got the name The Water Rats. The 3rd Infantry Division was called The Water Rats because in North Africa, the big fight down there was Rommell and the British troops were called The Desert Rats so we were called The Water Rats and we were proud of it.”

But if the Canadian soldiers were suffering, Chisholm remembers it was nothing compared to the misery of the Dutch people.  

“It was the coldest winter Europe had experienced in years and those poor people, y’know the Germans, I don’t know why or how, but getting towards the end of the war and they were strippping the Dutch of just about everything they had, clothing, furniture. It was awful and they were starving.”

Chisholm said farmers at least had some food but those in the city weren’t as fortunate.

“People were actually starving.  I can remember days my own crew, I was a Sargeant and had a crew, and we gave our rations away at times.  you couldn’t handle it. It was hard to take.”

Chisholm says the Canadian Army and Airforce brought food by truck and parachuted behind German lines to save thousands of lives.

After going into the war as a 16-year-old and coming out at the age of 22, Chisholm returned, joined the RCMP, then moved to the Regina Police Service, where he rose to the rank of Deputy Chief.

But always, he was restless, he says, wondering about the countries they had fought to liberate.  How had they made out?  

So in 1970, he returned with his wife and they rented a car.

“We drove the entire route.  We started up in Holland, went into Germany, came all the way back to the beaches, all the battle sites we were in. It was really a moving experience.”  

Chisholm went back for the 40th and 50th anniversaries of VE Day as well and was struck by the reception the veterans received.

“I couldn’t believe it. We’d march down the streets and just thousands and thousands of people yelling and throwing flowers and running out and kissing us. It’s just hard to describe.”

Chisholm was active in the Royal Canadian Legion and for many years spoke to school children around Remembrance Day, delivering what he felt was an important message.

“One thing they can never forget, you don’t glorify war. War is the most horrible thing there ever was. You don’t glorify but you must remember what happened in the past so you don’t repeat it again.”

Funeral arrangements are pending.

news@panow.com

On Twitter: @princealbertnow