March/April 2016 Issue

LEGION MAGAZINE MARCH/APRIL 2016

COVER FEATURE:
ILL-FATED TRENCH RAIDERS

The Royal Newfoundland Regiment has a storied past, but of all the stories, none is as captivating or tragic as its advance during the Battle of the Somme on July 1, 1916. The regiment’s first call to action on the Western Front was for two trench raids before the full-scale attack planned for July 1. Their mission was to assess the strength of the German line and bring back a prisoner. Although they failed to take a prisoner, the raiding party reported that a preceding weeklong artillery bombardment of the lines here had little impact on German preparedness and numbers. But by now, the massive British war machine was in full swing, and in the overconfidence that was the hallmark of the colossal failure on July 1, no thought was given to abandoning the attack. To read more of Frank Gogos’s story of the Newfoundland Regiment at Beaumont-Hamel, pick up the March/April 2016 issue.

Also in the issue:

• How I survived at the Somme: A Newfoundland Regiment soldier recounts the 1916 tragedy that was Beaumont-Hamel
• Focus on veterans: Bomb aimer Charlie Walker and dozens of other veterans are the subject of one photographer’s labour of love
• Mending fences: Kent Hehr, the new Minister of Veterans Affairs, promises to make veterans’ lives better in 2016
• The rarely mentioned war: How the Persian Gulf War changed the Canadian Armed Forces
• Profiteers of war: Unseemly profits were made during the First World War while men by the thousands were dying in the trenches