Lieutenant Hubert C Cox

Charlie Cox was a Canadian, married to Gladys, from Ontario who came over to the UK as part of the CANLOAN scheme.

Battle casualties had resulted in a shortage of junior officers in the British Army and a scheme was agreed with the Canadian Army to help fill this gap. Under the scheme 673 officers served on a voluntary basis in the British Army (623 in Infantry Regiments) and they acquitted themselves with distinction: 41 Military Crosses (1 with bar), 1 US Silver Star, 1 Distinguished Service Cross, 4 Croix de Guerre, 1 MBE and 1 Dutch Order of the Bronze Lion were awarded to CANLOAN officers. They also paid a high price: 128 were killed or died of their wounds and a further 310 were wounded.

On arriving in the UK, Charlie was posted to the 12th Battalion, The Devonshire Regiment of the 6th Airlanding Brigade which formed part of the 6th Airborne Division. Charlie took part in Operation Varsity, the Rhine Crossing, which required American and British Airborne Forces to establish a bridgehead east of the Rhine in the Wesel area for advancing Allied troops. The Devons were tasked with the capture of the village of Hamminkeln.

The battalion took off from a Norfolk airfield on 24 March 1945 and, after a four hour flight, landed in the Hamminkeln area at around 10.40 hours against considerable flak and some ground opposition. The large amount of smoke laid by the enemy over the landing zones made it almost impossible for the glider pilots to find their bearings, resulting in several crash landings.

One such crash landing was to have tragic consequences for Charlie Cox, as he was killed on the landing zone after being hit by the wing of a glider as it landed. The incident was witnessed by his friend John Box, who was greatly saddened by his death and remembered Charlie very fondly for the remainder of his life.

Charlie Cox died on 24 March 1945, aged 25 years, and is now buried at Holten Canadian War Cemetery in the Netherlands.

Cemetery photograph reproduced courtesy of CWGC.