Veteran of the First Special Services (Devi's Brigade) and winner of the Congressional Gold Medal dies at 98
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/nova-...ium%3Dsharebar
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Herb Peppard, a Second World War veteran from Truro, N.S., who was part of an elite special service force and was awarded the highest U.S. civilian honour, has died.
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His enlistment started a stellar military career that culminated in his membership in the Devil's Brigade, a U.S.-Canada combined force that was trained to do hand-to-hand combat, climb mountains, parachute on to targets and become demolition experts.
The Devil's Brigade was a precursor to special forces such as the U.S.'s Green Berets and the Navy SEALs.
The force was called the "black devils" by Germans after members of the brigade snuck behind enemy lines in Italy under the cover of darkness, their faces blackened with boot polish, to eliminate targets.
"I recall him saying he didn't even quite know what the force was when he first became part of it because it was so secretive," Dickson said.
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https://www.ctvnews.ca/w5/the-devil-...kind-1.2646196
The Devil's Brigade could have been called a experimental unit, tough and inventive they were designed to take on jobs that were deemed suicidal or impossible.
They fought in the Aleutian Islands, up through Italy, Anzio and participated in the liberation of France before being disbanded in 1944.
While the excellent movie portrayed Canadian soldiers as the best of the best trained army in the world who were hardened battle veterans of the Dieppe Raid, and the American's as criminals it was really true.
In reality while the Canadian's were tough veterans who had already been bloodied, the American's were drawn from recruited outdoors men, hunters, rangers and men that were used to tough environments.
However that doesn't mean that I still don't love this scene from the movie.