Detail from the Canadian Memorial at Vimy Ridge: the figure of Canada Bereft, or Mother Canada, looking down at a casket below her, mourns her dead. In the distance are the slag heaps of Lens and the Douai Plain. © 2013, John Shea
"By nightfall [April 10, 1917], the 'Southern Operation' had been completed; of Vimy Ridge, only the Pimple remained. It had cost the Canadian Corps 7,707 casualties (including nearly 3,000 killed), plus some 400 casualties in the brigades of the 5th Imperial Division. 8,000 killed and wounded, approximately, in two days' fighting. Light losses by the standards of the time. But as George Alliston put it, 'By the 11th, we had been reinforced twice to bring us up to strength, and I'm telling you we lost a few of the best boys a mother could have—all of them A-1 kids—all in a few days. The flower of the land, you might say Just a big loss to us.' Some 4,000 German prisoners had been taken (3,400 had been counted by midnight on the 9th). But prisoners live to return home, in the end."
Britain's Arras Offensive, part of the Franco-British Nivelle Offensive, commenced Easter Monday, April 9, 1917. The Canadian Corps was assigned the task of capturing Vimy Ridge. On the first day, the Corps had largely completed its task, taking high ground that had cost thousands of French and Allied lives since 1914. 'The Pimple', Point 120, was captured on April 12.
The Battle of Vimy Ridge by Alexander McKee, page 194, copyright © 1966 Alexander McKee, publisher: Stein and Day, publication date: 1967
1917-04-10, 1917, April, Vimy Ridge, Vimy, Battle of Arras, Arras, Canadian Corps, Canadian Corps, Bereft Canada
