Faces of War

This database features photographs of men and women who served in the Canadian Forces during the Second World War. Taken from the Department of National Defence (DND) collection at Library and Archives Canada, these photographs depict military life during the Second World War.

Visitors can search almost 2500 images from the DND collection, representing each branch of the Canadian Forces: Army, Navy and Air Force.

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Signal officers of the Women’s Royal Canadian Naval Service (W.R.C.N.S.), Halifax, Nova Scotia, Canada, October 1943. Link

Signaller Irene Cheshire of the Women’s Royal Canadian Naval Service (W.R.C.N.S.), H.M.C.S. CORNWALLIS, Deep Brook, Nova Scotia, Canada, August 1945. Link

Signallers Marian Wingate and Margaret Little of the Women’s Royal Canadian Naval Service at work. Link

Signallers, Royal Canadian Navy Signal Station, Gordon Head, British Columbia, Canada, 17 March 1942. Link

Signalman A. McNeil entering Caen in a captured German halftrack vehicle, Caen, France, 10 July 1944. Link

Signalman F. Roy of the Royal Canadian Corps of Signals (R.C.C.S.), 9th Canadian Infantry Brigade, stringing wires for a signals exchange, Normandy, France, 24 June 1944. Link

Signalman F.R.J. Savage of the Royal Canadian Corps of Signals (R.C.C.S.) and the 9th Canadian Infantry Brigade reads the inscription on a plaque dedicated to an unknown British soldier buried on 9-10 November 1920. Boulogne, France, 19 September 1944. Link

Signalman J. Bennett of the 1st Canadian Railway Telegraph Company, Royal Canadian Engineers (R.C.E.), installing wire on a pole in the railway yards, Louvain, Belgium, 6 January 1945. Link

Signalman J.A. Knirchk, Royal Canadian Corps of Signals (R.C.C.S.), 4th Canadian Armoured Division, stringing a line on a statue, Eikelenberg, Belgium, 23 October 1944. Link

Signalman J.T. Prime of 1st Canadian Army Signals, Royal Canadian Corps of Signals (R.C.C.S.), operating a local radio receiver and remote unit, Zeddam, Netherlands, 4 April 1945. Link

Signalman N.L. Garrant and G.K. Gree of the 9th Canadian Infantry Brigade digging a slit trench in the Normandy beachhead, France, ca. 8-9 June 1944. Link

Signalman Rusty Forsythe and Captain R.W. Armstrong digging slit trenches during Operation SPRING south of Ifs, France, 25 July 1944. Link

Signalmen Clark and Waters operating a signal projector aboard the destroyer H.M.C.S. ASSINIBOINE at sea, 1940. Link

Signals Centre of the 5th Canadian Armoured Division near Castelnuovo, Italy, 17 March 1944.
(Foreground, L-R): Signalman C.H. Groat, Corporal W.G. Davenport, Signalman W.D. Lansdell, Lance-Corporal A.B. Mitchell, Signalman C.K. Hillyer. (Rear, L-R): Captain G.R. Kell, Sergeant-Major A.L. Hurst. Link

Tom Jenkins - NATO, Peacekeeping

Tom Jenkins joined the Artillery Reserves in Brandon, Manitoba while still in high school in 1972. In January, 1974 he was released from the Reserves and joined the regular force of the Canadian Forces. After basic training at Canadian Forces Recruit School Cornwallis in Nova Scotia, he reported for trades training at the Canadian Forces School of Communications and Electronics at Canadian Forces Base Kingston, Ontario. There he was trained as a Communicator Research Operator, working in the signals intelligence field.
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Heros Remembered - James Gratto - When the Belgian People Left

When the Belgian people were taken, fled out of the country, it was just like walking into a villa. Which is a villa, but it's a house like in Bay Ridge but they call them villas right? You walk into a house and the clothes are still hanging in the closet, a jacket might be still on the back of a chair because all they took was their money or valuables and left. If not, they would have been hacked to death. Link

Canadian Forces in Congo

Collection of interviews with veterans of the Canadian Forces recount their experience of military service in Congo. The veterans of this video are: Bob Terry, Fred LeBlanc, Ed Dubinsky, Ron Knapton, Bert Diamond and James Gratto. Link

Heros Remembered - Ron Knapton - First Impressions of the Congo

Mr. Knapton describes the sights when first arriving in the Congo. Link

Raymond LaBrosse - Behind Enemy Lines

Raymond LaBrosse - Behind Enemy Lines

Fighting a rising sense of dread, Lucien Dumais slowed his bicycle. Standing in the bombedout roadway ahead, with a rifle slung over his shoulder, was a German Army sergeant, signalling him to halt. It was late fall 1943. Dumais and his travelling companion, Raymond LaBrosse, had just left the French city of Rennes and were on their way to the Britanny coast to complete a dangerous task. This holdup could easily end their mission, endangering the lives of many people, including themselves.
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