Review by Choice Review
Seventeen essays, all but one by Canadians, look at almost every aspect of the Canadian victory at the great battle at Vimy in April 1917. Able British scholar Gary Sheffield has long downplayed the Canadian Corps' trumped-up (in his view) reputation. Other authors examine the German view, the role of each of the four Canadian divisions, the artillery, the engineers, the medics, and even the great monument that towers above the ridge. In the book's best chapter, Andrew Godefroy takes a deliberately revisionist approach on the German army and succeeds in breaking new ground. For the first time, readers learn how the Germans tactically fought the battle. What this collection does not provide is any attempt at debunking the Vimy mythology that has washed over Canada since 1917. Some essays make the point, quite properly, that Lieutenant-General Sir Julian Byng was British, as were most of the staff planners, much of the heavy artillery, and most of the Canadian soldiers themselves in April 1917. None of the essays rigorously looks at how Vimy was perceived in Francophone Quebec, or analyzes why there was no military follow-up to the Vimy success. Nor does anyone look at the strategic (in)significance of the battle--the treatment here is relentlessly tactical. More important still, none of the essayists really analyzes the impact of the victory on the Canadian Corps' sense of itself or its planning and performance through the rest of the war. This is a good book nevertheless, practical, detailed, and superbly researched. Summing Up: Recommended. Upper-division undergraduates and above. J. L. Granatstein emeritus, Canadian War Museum
Copyright American Library Association, used with permission.
Review by Choice Review
