Can anyone shed any light on a small mystery. People say that the villages of Lisors, Lyons-La-Forêt and the neighbouring areas were liberated by the Canadians whilst other say it was the British who liberated the area on August 30th 1944. I have tried locsl archives etc and found nothing. I know for a fact that the 53rd Welsh Reconnaissance Regiment were here that day but other that I have no other info on other regiments. I have checked up the war diary of the Regiment De La Chaudière but I don't think they were here.
Your own post says it was the 7th Armoured Division??? The where abouts of Field Marshall Montgomery in August 1944. Also, and excellent new resource is: THE ROAD TO LIBERATION by Canadian Research and Mapping Association Project '44 This website has plotted the route of every Canadian Unit from Normandy to the end of the war using War Diaries, maps and all sorts of references. You can open up maps and see the routes of individual units, so you should be able to see the location on the map......and if any Canadian Units went through the location It’s quite an interactive map, you can choose your position, them move the time marker to see where Canadian Units were......I did a quick check and it seems that on the 31 Aug, 44, their were NO Canadian Units near Lyons-La-Foret........the closest being units of the 2nd Cdn Infantry Division which was near Rouen on that day
The nearest Canadian unit on the 31st Aug 1944 was the 6th Cdn Armoured Regiment (1st Hussars) and their war dairies indicate: Place: MR 317083 Sheet 9E/5 Partly cloudy and cool, fair wind. Reveille was at 0400 hours and the Regt was ready to move at 0530 hours. We pulled out according to schedule and by 0900 hours were crossing the RIVER SEINE at CRIQUEBEUF-SUR-SEINE, MR 1899, sheet 9F/1 and then followed the main road EAST. We turned NORTH at MR 3102, sheet 9E/5 and continued with reasonable speed to our harbour at l'EPPINETTE, MR 3107, sheet 9E/5. The map allows you to zoom in on the area (or surrounding area) and if their are Canadian Units, their symbols will come up, you click on them, and they give you the War Diaries information and location for that day. It’s a great resource for exactly plotting unit movements
I took a quick screen shot of the Map from Project 44 for the 30 Aug 1944. You can see the location of Canadian Units on the map
And this map shows the next day, you can see the Canadian Units of the 4th Cdn Armoured Division have moved north, and the town is now “behind friendly lines”.....but these were NOT Canadian Units that liberated the area from the map information. You notice that the Canadian units are “faint red”.....as you ZOOM IN, they darken to red, and then you can click on individual units to read the was diary description of what they were doing that day.
I think it would be fair to point out that this question has been asked before and quite a lot of information provided, it may save newer members from duplicating previous efforts. Canloan deaths, August 30th 1944. Canadians in British regiments during the battle of Normandy.
