← Back to the front page

The Not-So-Nice Canadians of World War I

Khalid Elhassan December 9, 2024 15 min

Canadian - A WWI Canadian recruitment poster — A WWI Canadian recruitment poster. Library and Archives, Canada

10. Canadians From the German Perspective

A wounded Canadian captured by the Germans, 1917. K-Pics

In response to the Canadians’ exceptional ferocity towards them, the Germans came to fear, loathe, and hold in contempt the Canadian Corps, whom they saw as unpredictable brutes and savages. One Canadian who had been captured recalled that he was singled out and beaten up on orders from a German colonel. As the colonel put it, “I don’t care for the English, Scotch, French, Australians or Belgians but damn you Canadians, you take no prisoners and you kill our wounded“.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.