[derrida]

Leo Major

In 1940, at 19, the French-Canadian from one of Montreal's toughest working-class east end neighbourhoods joined Montreal's Regiment de la Chaudiere.

He distinguished himself early in his army career.

After losing an eye to a grenade on D-Day on the beach in Normandy, he refused a medical evacuation. He claimed he could still sight a rifle with one eye.

“He always said doctors were a bunch of fools,” his son Denis said in an interview.

But it was his bravery on a cold, rainy April night in 1945 that won him his first medal and the lasting respect of the people of Zwolle.

On that night, Mr. Major single-handedly liberated the town.

It was April 13, 1945 when Pte. Major and another French-Canadian soldier, Willie Arsenault, were sent to scope out the German presence in the Dutch town, about 120 kilometres northeast of Amsterdam.

Mr. Arsenault was killed by German machine-gunners on the outskirts of the town.

But Mr. Major, using a combination of luck, cunning, and guts, was able to capture Zwolle from the Germans by killing them when he could and setting off enough grenades to create the impression a large Canadian force had entered the town.

By early morning, they had fled the town.