War Heroes: Sergeant Ernest "Smokey" Smith

Another Victoria Cross winner, this time a Canadian - Sergeant Ernest "Smokey" Smith

Had a vote been taken by his immediate comrades in the Seaforth Highlanders of Canada as to whom among them was “the man most likely to succeed”, they would undoubtedly have voted for “Smokey” Smith.
He had a special air of confidence about him, with just a touch of guile. No one really knows why he was called “Smokey” — but he did like cigars.

The Seaforth Highlanders of Canada, a militia regiment mobilised for service in 1939, was serving with the 2nd Canadian Infantry Division of the 1st Canadian Corps in the Eighth Army in Italy in 1944. Commanded at this time by General Sir Oliver Leese, the Eighth Army was preparing an offensive on the Adriatic coastal plain to breach the German Gothic Line before the onset of winter. The advance went well in the initial stages but the sequence of lateral rivers slowed it down. Even so, the Canadians reached Rimini on September 21.

The American 5th Army under General Mark Clark renewed the offensive on the west of the peninsula on October 2. The Eighth Army began a simultaneous drive on Ravenna, with the Canadians in the lead on the coast. On the night of October 21-22, one of the Canadian brigades was ordered to force a bridgehead over the River Savio which flowed north-eastwards to the sea. According to the official record, the weather was “most unfavourable to the operation”. Torrential rain had caused the Savio, to rise 6ft in five hours and the soft, vertical banks made bridging for light tanks or anti-tank guns temporarily impracticable. Hence the infantry crossed in assault boats with the Canadian Seaforths as spearhead.

As the right-hand forward company was consolidating its position on the north bank, it was counter-attacked in typical German tactical manner by a small mixed force of infantry, tanks and self-propelled guns producing seemingly overwhelming fire power. Private Smith, as he then was, led his two-man team with the PIAT (projector infantry anti-tank) — a primitive form of bazooka — to a point from which they could hit the Mark V Panther tanks in their less heavily armoured sides. Having got his team into position, Smith dashed back for a second PIAT, but the Panthers were by then moving down the road firing their machineguns into the ditches, wounding one of his companions.

Smith fired his PIAT and hit the first tank. A group of German infantry appeared from behind it and charged the Canadians. Firing his Thompson sub-machinegun at a few yards range, he killed four of the enemy and drove the others back. Almost at once a second Panther opened fire and more infantry appeared. Grabbing fresh magazines from his wounded comrade, Smith reloaded his Thompson and held off the enemy infantry until they withdrew. He then dragged his comrade into cover and applied a field dressing to his wound.

Instead of returning to the company’s main position, Smith remained throughout the night on the right flank to cover that approach in case of any further counter-attack. None came. The Canadians held their ground north of the Savio until bridging could be put in place. The bridgehead was then used to open up the advance on Ravenna before the winter and, subsequently, into the strategically important valley of the River Po the following spring.

“Smokey” Smith was awarded the Victoria Cross for his outstanding bravery and determination in the face of greatly superior enemy firepower. He received the decoration from King George VI at a private investiture at Buckingham Palace on the evening of December 18, 1944.

As he was not a regular soldier, he was demobilised in 1945, but he re-enlisted at the outbreak of the Korean War in 1951. He then served on until 1964, completing his final years of military service as a recruiting sergeant.

Image from CBC

By: Brant