Bourne remembered for service in the Liberation of Holland

Among the names honoured this Remembrance Day is that of Gunner Cecil Duffin Bourne, a Kindersley man who gave his life during the liberation of Holland in the final year of the Second World War.

Bourne was born April 5, 1919, at Eston, Sask., and grew up in Kindersley, where he completed his schooling. Before enlisting, he worked as a machinist’s helper with the Canadian National Railroad.

BOURNE, Cecil Duffin Bourne

He joined the Canadian Army at Rosetown on June 25, 1941, and went overseas later that year. After training in Scotland and England with the 7th Light Anti-Aircraft Regiment attached to the 67th Light Anti-Aircraft Battery, he landed in France in July 1944.

Bourne went on to serve with the Royal Canadian Artillery, attached to the 2nd Anti-Tank Regiment (18th Battery). On Oct. 13, 1944, during an attack by German forces near the village of Hoogerheide, Holland, Gunner Bourne was killed in action. He was 25.

He is commemorated at the Bergen-op-Zoom Canadian War Cemetery in Noord-Brabant, Netherlands.

The son of Reginald Stafford and Celia Pearl Bourne of Kindersley, he was also the brother of William Richard, Inez Alice, Phyllis Margaret and Vera Audrey Bourne.

For his service, Gunner Bourne was posthumously awarded the 1939–1945 Star, the France and Germany Star, the Defence Medal, the War Medal, and the Canadian Volunteer Service Medal with Clasp.

As Kindersley gathers to honour its fallen this Remembrance Day, Gunner Bourne’s name stands among those remembered for courage and sacrifice in the cause of freedom.