Lieutenant-Colonel Bruce J. S. Macdonald and the Kurt Meyer Trial

Lieutenant-Colonel Bruce J. S. Macdonald moved to Windsor, Ontario, after graduating from Harvard Law School in 1927. In 1930, Macdonald became the city’s first full-time solicitor. He successfully aided the movement of legislation to amalgamate Windsor, Sandwich, East Windsor, and Walkerville into the City of Windsor in 1935. Although Macdonald was not a Windsor native, he devoted a significant amount of time and effort to the city's improvement. Macdonald joined the Essex Scottish Regiment in 1939, and later became a Lieutenant-Colonel. Macdonald’s contributions to the Regiment were notable, as he served as a Commanding Officer during the invasion of Normandy and Operation ATLANTIC in July 1944.

After the catastrophic events of Operation ATLANTIC, Lieutenant-Colonel Macdonald was called to participate in the Nuremberg Trials of 1945 as a leading investigator and later prosecutor in the Canadian War Crimes Commission for the war crimes committed by the German military.

On June 6th, 1944, the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division landed at and secured Juno Beach in Normandy, France. After a hard resistance from the German 716th Infantry Division, the Canadians pushed through and headed toward Caen. However, many Canadian soldiers were taken prisoner during this operation. Between 7 and 8 June alone, approximately 55 of these Canadian prisoners of war were executed by the German 12th SS Panzer Division. In the ten days that followed D-Day, a total of 156 Canadian POWs from the 3rd Canadian Infantry Division were murdered. This series of unlawful killings was known as the “Normandy Massacres.” The German 12th SS Panzer Division carried out this series of war crimes under the command of SS Major-General Kurt Meyer. Subsequently, it was recorded as one of the worst war crimes committed against Canadian soldiers in history.

In August 1944, Macdonald was appointed as the Canadian representative on the SHAEF (Supreme Headquarters Allied Expeditionary Force) Court of Inquiry. Macdonald’s earlier investigation revealed wartime offences. SHAEF were determined to identify the soldiers who were killed and prosecute the offenders. The standing court reported on the cases related to the 12th SS Panzer Division after Canadian bodies were discovered in Authie, Buron, Chateau d’ Audrieu, and Mouen.

According to a follow-up inquiry by Macdonald, Major-General Kurt Meyer instructed his troops to murder Canadian soldiers without justification. A testimonial mentioned that SS Private Jan Jesionek overheard Meyer ban the taking of prisoners. He also witnessed the second round of executions at the Ardenne Abbey soon after. In addition, to the evidence provided by Jesionek, Macdonald travelled to POW camps across Canada and the United States to interview 99 German and 15 Canadian soldiers. Historian Howard Margolian later noted that “these interviews were of limited value as many survivors of the Normandy massacres did not get a good look at the perpetrators while many SS men felt bound to their loyalty oaths.” Furthermore, a modification in the law in August 1945 made it illegal to be associated with a unit that committed a war crime or to command soldiers who committed war crimes. Meyer and the other witnesses involved in the case were therefore disinclined to incriminate themselves in court.

However, the breakthrough in court, which successfully solidified the case, was the interrogation report of Kurt Meyer. Meyer pleaded that in June 1944 he was informed by two officers that the bodies of eighteen or nineteen Canadians were found in Abbey’s Garden. After a subordinate confirmed their presence, he then looked for himself and relieved his subordinate for allowing those killings to happen. Meyer continued to claim that he reported the bodies to his supervisor, who in return ordered him to identify the killers. Meyer stated he did not disclose the murders to a higher judicial body out of shame. Macdonald was able to disprove Meyer’s statement by interviewing a 14-year-old boy who was present in Abbey’s Garden on the same date and saw no deceased bodies. With a solid testimonial provided by Macdonald to the court, Kurt Meyer was flown to the court in Aurich, Germany.

The trial against Kurt Meyer took place on December 10, 1945. Macdonald’s first major witness was SS Private Alfred Hezel. Hezel, who was imprisoned in Quebec, confirmed Meyer directed his troops to take no prisoners. Macdonald also gathered testimonials from residents of Authie and Buron, where a portion of the killings had taken place. Kurt Meyer was found guilty of inciting his troops to kill the Canadian prisoners. Meyer had five charges pressed against him, found guilty of three and was sentenced to death. However, he would ultimately serve life in prison. Later, his life sentence was commuted and he was released in 1954.

The Kurt Meyer Trial was historic, as it had been the first high-profile court proceeding for war crimes committed against Canadians. After the trial, Macdonald was awarded the Order of the British Empire (OBE), the Croix de Guerre (France), and the Efficiency Decoration. Macdonald returned to private practise as a lawyer in Windsor with the Wilson and Thomson firm in 1946. In 1956 Macdonald was appointed as Crown attorney for Essex County and in 1961 was called to the bench as a Judge of County and District Courts of Ontario.

Story by Taylor Blackmere, Canada Summer Jobs 2022 participant
with The Essex and Kent Scottish Regiment Association

Sources

• Duty Nobly Done, The History of The Essex and Kent Scottish Regiment by Sandy Antal and Kevin R. Shackleton, 2006 – Chapter 12
• Casual Slaughters & Accidental Judgments: Canadian War Crimes Prosecutions 1944-1948 by Patrick Brode and William A. Schabas, University of Toronto Quarterly 68
• Bruce John Stewart Macdonald: Just the Man for the Job by Taylor Coates, Nipissing University, July 2018
• Kurt Meyer on Trial: A Documentary Record by Terry Copp, P. Whitney Lackenbauer, and Chris M.V. Madsen, 2007.
• Prosecuting Kurt Meyer: The Abbaye d’Ardenne War Crimes Trial by Craig Forcese, January 14, 2020.
• Kurt Meyer, German War Criminal in Military History Library, VALOUR CANADA.
• Bruce J.S. Macdonald Fonds by Paul Leatherdale, Windsor, 1997
• Conduct unbecoming: the story of the murder of Canadian prisoners of war in Normandy by Howard Margolian of Toronto Press, 1998.