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Vimy Ridge remembered on 104th anniversary
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Today marks the anniversary of a day that will be forever remembered by Canadians.
The Battle of Vimy Ridge, in Northern France, began at 5:30 a.m. on Easter Monday, April 9, 1917. Fully 104 years later, B.C.’s Conservatives are taking pause to remember all the brave Canadians who fought in this historic battle and, in particular, the 6,000 British Columbians who made the ultimate sacrifice for our freedom during the First World War.
That single battle took the lives of 3,600 Canadian soldiers—an almost unfathomable number—and fully six per cent of all Canadian lives lost during the entire duration of the war. The same battle also saw another 7,000 Canadians wounded.
Their sacrifice was not in vain, as the capture of the ridge, by the Canadians, was essential to the advances by the British Third Army to the south, and of crucial importance in helping bring about the end of the “war to end all wars”.
Many have said that in this victory a new sense of Canadian identity was established. In fact, Brigadier-General A.E. Ross declared, “in those few minutes I witnessed the birth of a nation.”