The Battle of the St. Lawrence by Nathan M. Greenfield Page B
Authors: Nathan M. Greenfield
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as Macdonald told the House several months later, to establish two types of information: local rumour and official news, only the latter to be broadcast and hence accessible to the enemy.
The notes explained what type of information was useful to the enemy. In addition to such obvious points as the exact location of an attack (whichrevealed the strength of Canada’s defences) or the type of ship (which revealed information about supplies of food or oil), the notes explained that such seemingly innocuous information as the nationality of the ship or the names of survivors was useful to the Germans: “If any crew members are nationals of German occupied territories, their [the crew’s] morale can be attacked through persecution of relatives, or friends.” The notes are equally clear on what German naval authorities could glean from such statements as “there were other ships within hunting distance” (that river traffic was unescorted), or even from statements about the weather.
Since high-frequency directional finding (HF/DF, or “huff-duff”), a system of listening posts in Greenland, the United Kingdom, eastern Canada and the United States that allowed the navy to locate a U-boat by triangulating on its radio broadcasts, was top secret, it’s hard to know what crusty news editors would have made of the statement: “It is in our interest to encourage U-boats to use their radio. It is detrimental to our interest to spare them this necessity.” No doubt, news editors winced at the navy’s purple prose:
The morale in U-boats is a highly variable morale. Success will send it rocketing; failure will plunge it to the depths. Apparent success, without full knowledge of its extent, is irritating and tantalizing.
It is safe to assume that a comprehensive report on this exploit will now be made for the use of U-boat commanders, and that it will give the fullest particulars [i.e., details taken from Canadian news reports] regarding the whole matter. It will tell more of this operation than could have been told by the commander of the attacking U-boat.
This will increase the respect of U-boat commanders and crews for the German Naval Intelligence Department, and will, in every way, assist in building U-boat morale.
But, on the whole, they took the navy’s admonition to heart while not flinching from reporting the horror of the war.
* * *
At 3 p.m. on May 13, as
Medicine Hat
and EAC’s planes searched for
Nicoya
and
Leto’s
killer, two centuries-old rituals were about to begin: one in Ottawa, the other in the corner of a cemetery in Pointe-au-Père.
One hundred and fifty feet to the west of the hushed Hall of Honour, which to this day holds the leather-bound folio-sized Book of Remembrance that lists the names of Canada’s dead from the Great War, is the entrance to the House of Commons. On May 13, as he did every day when the House was in session, at precisely 3:00 p.m., the black-robed Speaker rose, looked toward his left to the leader of His Majesty’s Loyal Opposition and asked if there were any questions for the government sitting three swords’ lengths away. A moment later, Thomas L. Church, the Progressive Conservative member for Toronto-Broadview, rose, answered “Yes” and, after looking across the green carpet at the cabinet, turned toward the Speaker and told the House of Commons that his question was for the minister of naval services.
Sixty years later, and even taking into account that over the year and a half Canada had been at war parliamentarians had learned that operational matters would not be discussed in open session, the exchange that followed has a certain unreality about it. Instead of asking whether the attacks inside Canada would affect the government’s plans to send, if necessary, conscripts to Europe, or even whether the “long-prepared plans” Macdonald had referred to in his statement of the twelfth now required revision, Church asked, “Is the Government aware that
The notes explained what type of information was useful to the enemy. In addition to such obvious points as the exact location of an attack (whichrevealed the strength of Canada’s defences) or the type of ship (which revealed information about supplies of food or oil), the notes explained that such seemingly innocuous information as the nationality of the ship or the names of survivors was useful to the Germans: “If any crew members are nationals of German occupied territories, their [the crew’s] morale can be attacked through persecution of relatives, or friends.” The notes are equally clear on what German naval authorities could glean from such statements as “there were other ships within hunting distance” (that river traffic was unescorted), or even from statements about the weather.
Since high-frequency directional finding (HF/DF, or “huff-duff”), a system of listening posts in Greenland, the United Kingdom, eastern Canada and the United States that allowed the navy to locate a U-boat by triangulating on its radio broadcasts, was top secret, it’s hard to know what crusty news editors would have made of the statement: “It is in our interest to encourage U-boats to use their radio. It is detrimental to our interest to spare them this necessity.” No doubt, news editors winced at the navy’s purple prose:
The morale in U-boats is a highly variable morale. Success will send it rocketing; failure will plunge it to the depths. Apparent success, without full knowledge of its extent, is irritating and tantalizing.
It is safe to assume that a comprehensive report on this exploit will now be made for the use of U-boat commanders, and that it will give the fullest particulars [i.e., details taken from Canadian news reports] regarding the whole matter. It will tell more of this operation than could have been told by the commander of the attacking U-boat.
This will increase the respect of U-boat commanders and crews for the German Naval Intelligence Department, and will, in every way, assist in building U-boat morale.
But, on the whole, they took the navy’s admonition to heart while not flinching from reporting the horror of the war.
* * *
At 3 p.m. on May 13, as
Medicine Hat
and EAC’s planes searched for
Nicoya
and
Leto’s
killer, two centuries-old rituals were about to begin: one in Ottawa, the other in the corner of a cemetery in Pointe-au-Père.
One hundred and fifty feet to the west of the hushed Hall of Honour, which to this day holds the leather-bound folio-sized Book of Remembrance that lists the names of Canada’s dead from the Great War, is the entrance to the House of Commons. On May 13, as he did every day when the House was in session, at precisely 3:00 p.m., the black-robed Speaker rose, looked toward his left to the leader of His Majesty’s Loyal Opposition and asked if there were any questions for the government sitting three swords’ lengths away. A moment later, Thomas L. Church, the Progressive Conservative member for Toronto-Broadview, rose, answered “Yes” and, after looking across the green carpet at the cabinet, turned toward the Speaker and told the House of Commons that his question was for the minister of naval services.
Sixty years later, and even taking into account that over the year and a half Canada had been at war parliamentarians had learned that operational matters would not be discussed in open session, the exchange that followed has a certain unreality about it. Instead of asking whether the attacks inside Canada would affect the government’s plans to send, if necessary, conscripts to Europe, or even whether the “long-prepared plans” Macdonald had referred to in his statement of the twelfth now required revision, Church asked, “Is the Government aware that
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