RHF Canada

The Royal Highland Fusiliers of Canada

The Regiment is having some pretty exciting times in 1998/99 . Bringing you up to speed might take a manuscript but we are going to try. In July 1998, the Commanding Officer Lt. Col. Bill McIntosh received the notice from Government House, Rideau Hall notification that the ‘Royal’ had been granted.

ROYAL

This fact has indeed been exciting news and creates many hoops before we can show the colours. A new badge must be decided upon before the colours can be made, however everything is in progress and we are looking forward to a Presentation of Colours in Spring or Fall of year 2000. We await to see if Her Royal Highness will be visiting Canada during that year and if so we have asked that she present the Colours to Her Regiment, The Royal Highland Fusiliers of Canada.

A little background on the start of this event is offered by the following letter from the past Honorary colonel Jack Harper, QC:

‘Over the years many letters went back and forth, but in the end, the war record of the Highland Light Infantry of Canada was a major factor in granting our request.

A caption from a letter to the assistant to the Minister of Defence written in June 1995 reference to the HLI of Canada:

The Regiment landed on D Day and accomplished its objectives. The Battalion’s first major battle was at Burron (8 July 1944) where, at great cost in casualties, the Regiment achieved its objective which, if it had not done so, the historians’ assessment is that the advance to Falaise would have been delayed for many days.

The Regiment was the lead Unit of the 3^rd Division in the capture of Falaise after others had failed, and again met its objectives. The Regiment suffered more casualties than any other Canadian Infantry Regiment in the period from D Day to Falaise and historians have singled them out for favourable comment for their contribution to the eventual success of that operation.

The Regiment was the first to take and hold an objective in the crossing of the Rhine after other Units had been unable to do so.

The Regiment’s contribution to the Canloan programme was exceptional.

As part of the local VE day celebration here, three plaques were unveiled in a ceremony at the armoury in Cambridge honouring the three Victoria Cross winners who were members of our Unit as it then was in the 1914-18 War. This is part of our heritage which represents an outstanding contribution to that conflict.

Historians such as John English, Desmond Morton, Jack Granatstein and Terry Copp have all spoken out in recognition of the accomplishments of the HLI of C.

Finally, we believe it is the only Regiment where the records demonstrate as to its contribution to the 1939-1945 War that it never gave up ground won in battle, it gave up no prisoners of war and it never failed to account for all of its casualties.

Along with the current activities of the HF of C, and its service to Country and Community and the war record of the HLI of C, we submitted our request through our Headquarters and this took approximately four years. Needless to say in July of 1998, when notified by the Governor General, Rideau Hall, that Royal status was to be conferred, The Regiment and the Regimental Council could not be happier.

November 9, 1998 we were officially notified by the Chief of the Lands Staff, Lieutenant General W C Leach, ‘It is my pleasure to congratulate you and your Regiment, on behalf of the CDS and the Canadian Forces as a whole, for being granted permission by Her Majesty The Queen to use the title 'Royal’.

Now the planning has begun for a Badge parade, Presentation of Colours, and of course opening of our new facility in Kitchener.

NEW KITCHENER ARMOURY

This is a long story and I will try to make it as short as possible. Firstly, there has never been an Armoury in this community. After WW1, the Minister of Defence of the day told the community that due to all the troops it had supplied to the war effort, a training barracks should be built. That was in 1918. Since then the battle has raged on. Kitchener had 6 reserve units in town in the mid ‘50’s, however none were in an Armoury. Always rented space, and never adequate. In 1990, the city of Kitchener was on the top of the Army list for an Armoury , plans were drawn, public meetings held, and $11 million supposedly committed. However the Government changed, all budgets were frozen, and the plans had to be suspended.

In 1998, our new Commanding General, for Land Force Central Area, visited the unit, along with his staff, and met with the CO and Honorary Colonel. He was shown around the Cambridge facility which has been upgraded constantly, whilst the rented quarters in Kitchener - in which we have been in for 20 years, had not been touched on the premise that eventually we would be moving. Needless to say, the General was a little taken aback by our poor facility for such a large community. The Commanding Officer was commended for the fine showing of The Royal Highland Fusiliers of Canada as reported, in its training and Land Forces Central Area Exercises. The Commander, Brig. W M Holmes, MBE CD ADC made the statement to the Honorary Colonel that he had the funds in his budget to build us a reasonably good Armoury. The Honorary Colonel was the CO for the second time in 1990, and of course worked on the Armoury proposal until once again the Government decided to wait. The Commanders visit was in July 1998, and we hope to have the work completed by December 1999.

The other side to the story is that the Canadian Army is in restructuring mode and the new facility should enable the Regiment to emerge favourably from a further set of cuts.

We have always enjoyed a close relationship with our sister Regiment, The Royal Highland Fusiliers and with our new name, The Royal Highland Fusiliers of Canada, I think we can only become closer.

TRAINING

Our training cycle for 1998-99 started in September with lead up training for the Combat Readiness Evaluation (CRE). The CRE is designed to evaluate the standard of combat effectiveness of each army militia unit within their brigade across Canada. This year’s theme was Defensive Operations. In true

‘Defence, not Defiance’ fashion, the RHF of C conducted themselves extremely well.

After a fine showing on the CRE the unit moved into winter warfare operations. This phase of training culminated in a gruelling exercise which, included toboggan forced marches, constructing snow defences, and live fire Canadianized ‘jungle’ lanes (snow included)!

The RHF of C is now working on live fire section and platoon attacks. Once these areas are covered, we will begin working on fighting in built up areas (FIBUA) training. Our final FIBUA exercise will be held at Fort Drum, New York, USA in May 1999. This will incorporate the use of the multi integrated laser engagement system (MILES) thus testing our soldiers in both the offence and defence within a built-up area.