Terrible Victory:
First Canadian Army and the Scheldt Estuary Campaign
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by Mark Zuehlke
Douglas & McIntyre, Vancouver, 2007 ,br /> 560 pp., illus., $37.95 hardcover
Terrible Victory is the most recent work by Canadian military historian Mark Zuehlke. In September 1944, the Allied war engine was stalled on the German border as supply lines stretched across France and Belgium to the Normandy coastline. The Canadians were called upon to clear the Scheldt Estuary that guarded access to the already liberated port of Antwerp, which was desperately needed to supply Allied troops.
Zuehlke brings readers into the terrifying experience of Canadian soldiers slogging through the mud and wet of the Dutch polders, while providing the strategic context and importance of the battle before them.
The size and length of the Scheldt campaign test Zuehlke’s style, which served so well through previous books on the shorter, localized battles of Ortona and Normandy. Nonetheless, Terrible Victory continues Zuehlke’s impressive run of bringing to light Canada’s most important contributions of the Second World War.
— Joel Ralph (Read bio)
Joel Ralph is the director of programs for Canada's History Society.