Letter written days before end of WWII sheds light on Canadian soldier in Germany

A south Surrey, B.C., man is learning more about his father’s experience in the Second World War after discovering a letter his father sent home.

Tom Didmon wrote the letter to his family on May 2, 1945, just days before the end of the war.

The letter says, “This morning’s edition of the news says Hitler is dead and that his successor will fight until the last.”

The letter also details some of the daily life of a Canadian soldier in Germany.

With peace so close, they were still in danger. While out on patrol, they came under shell fire, ran for a ditch and spotted two Germans.

“They were proud as peacocks,” Tom wrote in the letter.

“A couple of our fellows wanted to shoot them, but I said, ‘No, wait. Maybe they have a message for me from the Führer’. Anyway, when they got close, we winged three shots over their heads. My, oh my, did they get off those bikes in a hurry and started hollering, ‘Comrade’.”

In the letter, Tom says that he went to a farmhouse just before it got dark to look for some food.

“I had some custard powders,” he wrote. “I told the German lady in the house to get cracking on some pudding for me. She even used her own sugar, which I returned to later on.”

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With a sense of humour, Tom talks about life back home and a picture his wife sent along with their eldest child in new outfits.

“I’ve been constantly looking at that snap of you and Graham,” Tom wrote. “You ask how did I like the spring outfit of you two whippersnappers, pretty smart I would say now that you have asked me. But to really appreciate new clothes in particular, perhaps leave the price tag where I can see it.”

Tom’s son, Grant, said his father had a good sense of humour and talked to everyone, but during the war, it became too painful.

“So I said, I stopped trying to be good friends with people and being a little bit aloof because I didn’t want to feel so bad if they happened to be killed in action,” Tom wrote.

However, he did sign off this letter with a joke.

“Well, my darlings, this is all for now. It won’t be long until I’ll be meeting you both up. Love from daddy, in brackets, people rave about Errol Flynn, Clark Gable, and me.”

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