New Brunswick students set to retrace steps of North Shore Regiment

Just in time for the 75th anniversary of the D-Day landings, students and staff from the Anglophone North School District are in Europe to retrace the steps of New Brunswick's North Shore Regiment.

The students left on Thursday. Their journey starts in Amsterdam and ends on the beaches of Normandy.

Over the course of a nine-day trip, 134 students from eight high schools will visit museums, historical sites and cemeteries.

These include the Holten Canadian War Cemetery, the Groesbeek Canadian War Cemetery, Vimy Ridge, Bény-sur-Mer Canadian War Cemetery and the Juno Beach Centre.

The Allied invasion of Normandy occurred on June 6, 1944. The North Shore Regiment took heavy casualties at Juno Beach.

Aaron Johnston, a teacher at Blackville School, said the journey was the brainchild of the district superintendent.

"He thought, 'What brings Anglophone Norths all together?' And it is our history," Johnston said.

Johnston said it's important for students to see these places in person, since it's the history of their grandfathers and great-grandfathers in many cases.

"We're going to have the opportunity to meet some survivors from that day, people who were present when the North Shore Regiment came through," he said.

"These people are the primary sources and this may be the last chance to talk to talk to those individuals who have a direct connection to that element of history. So, I think it's really important to allow our students that opportunity to meet, talk and learn from them."

Marlie Astle, who is on the trip, is a student at North and South Esk Regional High School in Sunny Corner. Both of her great-grandfathers were in the war.

"Because of where we're from pretty much everyone here has some ancestor that was in the war."

Astle said she expects the experience to be emotional.

"All of us are just going to realize what people actually went through to get our freedom in Canada and get everything we [have] now," she said.  "We're all probably going to be crying."

Students from Miramichi Valley High School took 134 wooden crosses bearing the names of soldiers. At Juno Beach, each student will take a cross and release it into the sea.

Johnston hopes the students see how willing northern New Brunswickers were to help during the war.

"The people from that area, they were farmers, they were fisherman, they were lumberman, and they dropped it all to sign up to head overseas and help out," he said.

"All of these people, they banded together and showed what New Brunswickers, what Canadians, can do when we work together."