After losing his brother Albert at the Battle of Cambrai, Sergeant Hugh Cairns was itching to get some revenge. One of his comrades later recalled, “he said he’d get 50 Germans for that. I don’t think he ever planned to come back after Abbie got killed.” He wasn’t kidding.
As part of a larger Canadian force, Cairns’s platoon was sent to seize the town of Valenciennes from the Germans. As they were advancing, the men came under machine gun fire from an abandoned house. Cairns single-handedly rushed into the building and killed the five Germans inside. A few moments later, his platoon encountered an even stronger enemy post. Cairns once again grabbed his Lewis machine gun and advanced on the German position, firing from the hip. Cairns took out 12 German soldiers, with the other 18 swiftly surrendering. As an army chaplain later wrote: “He simply did not know what fear was and his skill with a machine gun could not be surpassed.” The next German position had artillery as well as machine guns, manned by over 50 soldiers. It was probably here that an officer politely suggested that Cairns should take a couple of men this time. Cairns led five soldiers to outflank the Germans, while the rest of the platoon kept them busy. After a few casualties, the enemy surrendered to Cairns and his group. A total of 50 men, seven machine guns, three artillery guns, and a trench mortar were captured.
Sergeant Cairns was later shot and killed while capturing a group of 60 enemy soldiers. Despite suffering bullet wounds in his stomach and hand, Cairns opened fire, killing or wounding about 30 of the enemy before finally succumbing to his injuries.
In the end, Canadian forces managed to capture Valenciennes in a single day, suffering 80 dead and 300 wounded to the Germans’ 800 dead and 1,300 captured. Hugh Cairns earned a posthumous Victoria Cross and became the first non-commissioned officer to have a French street named after him. #stayzero #zerofoxtrot #ww1 #canada