List of Nazi monuments in Canada
Canada has several monuments and memorials that, to varying degrees, commemorate people and groups accused of collaboration with Nazi forces.
Monuments and memorials include, or have previously included, a mountain and two streets named after Philippe Pétain, a statue of Draža Mihailović in Ontario, and three monuments in Ontario and Alberta connected with the Waffen-SS.
The monuments to members of the 14th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS (1st Galician) have each been vandalized. Leaders of the Canadian Ukrainian community have rejected the Nazi links to the later three memorials.
French
Mount Pétain
A mountain formerly known as Mount Pétain, but with no current official name, is located on the border of the Canadian provinces of Alberta and British Columbia. It was named in 1918 to honor the First World War hero French Marshal Philippe Pétain,[1][2] The name was retained despite the later reversal in Pétain's reputation after his having been Head of State of Vichy France and being partly responsible for the murder of 76,000 Jews.[3][4]
The name was rescinded by the governments of the two provinces in which the mountain sits in 2019 and 2021, respectively. As of July 2022, neither government had decided on a new name.[5]
Streets
Streets in Canada named for Pétain include:
- Petain Station Road, in West Chezzetcook, Nova Scotia[3][6]
- Rue Pétain, in Shawinigan, Mauricie, Québec, renamed[when?] Rue Longval by the Commission de toponymie du Québec[7]
Serbian
Draža Mihailović statue, Hamilton
There is a statue in Hamilton, Ontario of Draža Mihailović, a Yugoslav Serb general during World War II. He was the leader of the Chetniks, a royalist and Serbian nationalist movement and guerrilla force, who collaborated with the Nazis following the German invasion of Yugoslavia in 1941.[3]
Ukrainian
The International Military Tribunal's verdict at the Nuremberg Trials declared the entire Waffen-SS a "criminal organization" guilty of war crimes.[8] Monuments to members of the Ukrainian Waffen-SS have been vandalized by activists at different times as "Nazi monuments", as have monuments to members of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army. Canadian police apologized in 2020 for originally stating that the anti-Nazi vandalism of those monuments was motivated by hate.[9][10] Leaders of the Canadian Ukrainian community said the Ukrainian monuments are not related to Nazism.[11]
Roman Shukhevych statue, Edmonton
The bronze bust[12] of Nazi collaborator Roman Shukhevych was built in 1973 by Ukrainian World War II veterans on private land near the Ukrainian Youth Unity Complex in Edmonton, Alberta.[13][14][15] The statue was vandalized in 2019 when someone added the words "Nazi scum".[16] It was vandalized again in 2021 when someone added the words "Actual Nazi" in red paint.[13]
Memorial at St. Michael’s Cemetery, Edmonton
A memorial reading: For those who fought for Ukraine’s Freedom was constructed in 1976 by former Ukrainian Waffen-SS[17] in St. Michael’s Cemetery in Edmonton was vandalized by painting "Nazi monument to 14th Waffen SS". According to Friends of Simon Wiesenthal Center, such painting reflects the actual historical record of people commemorated by the monument. Jewish organizations requested the removal of the damaged memorial.[18] However, the Ukrainian Catholic Church called the vandalism "part of the decades-long Russian disinformation campaign against Ukraine and Ukrainians to create a false Nazi image of Ukrainian freedom fighters."[19] The St. Michael’s monument is dedicated to "Fighters for the Freedom of Ukraine". One of its plaques is an abbreviation for the First Division of the Ukrainian National Army.[20][21] On April 25, 1945, the Waffen-SS Galizien was officially reorganized as the First Division of the Ukrainian National Army, and swore a new oath of loyalty to the Ukrainian people.[22] Bernie Farber of the Canadian Jewish Congress writes that: "Removing this monument will require the Ukrainian-Canadian community to take a hard look at its own history."[23]
Memorial at St. Volodymyr Ukrainian Cemetery, Oakville
The granite Ukrainian Insurgent Army memorial entitled Pamiatnyk Slavy UPA (English: Monument to the Glory of the UPA) was inaugurated on May 26, 1988, in the St. Volodymyr Ukrainian Cemetery in Oakville, Ontario.[24] The memorial commemorates a World War II battle fought by the 14th Waffen Grenadier Division of the SS (1st Galician), a military branch of the Nazi Party Waffen-SS, against the Soviet Red Army.[25][26] The SS division's insignia was added to the memorial soon after inauguration.[24] The memorial was vandalized in mid-June 2022 when someone added the words "Nazi war monument".[27][28]
The memorial was also the subject of complaints from the Russian Embassy to Canada in 2017, although the criticism was dismissed by Canadian media as part of a "disinformation campaign" in the context of the Russian annexation of Crimea three years earlier.[25] Ihor Michalchyshyn, the CEO of the Ukrainian Canadian Congress, accused Russia of obfuscation.[29]
Jewish B’nai Brith organization and the Canadian Polish Congress joined forces and called for the monument's removal by releasing a joint statement saying that the presence of monuments that whitewash the Holocaust and Nazi ideology is unacceptable in Canada.[30][31]
Oakville Mayor Rob Burton stated that he would remove the monument but he cannot, because municipalities have no right to regulate private cemeteries.[32]
See also
- Monuments in the United States to Nazi collaborators
- List of Holocaust memorials and museums in Canada
- List of Holodomor memorials and monuments in Canada
- Monument of Lihula, Estonia
References
- ↑ "Mount Petain". PeakFinder.com. Retrieved 2021-01-24.
- ↑ "Mount Petain". Bivouac.com. Retrieved 2021-01-24.
- ↑ 3.0 3.1 3.2 Golinkin, Lev. "Nazi collaborator monuments around the world". The Forward. Retrieved 2021-04-12.
- ↑ "Mount Pétain". BC Geographical Names. Retrieved 2021-01-24.
- ↑ "Canadian mountain no longer named for Nazi collaborator thanks to father and son". CBC Radio. July 5, 2022. Retrieved July 6, 2022.
- ↑ "Halifax Area Railway Heritage Sites – Nova Scotia Railway Heritage Society".
- ↑ "Rue Pétain - Shawinigan (Ville)". Commission de toponymie du Québec.
- ↑ "Waffen-SS". jewishvirtuallibrary.org. Retrieved 4 October 2018.
- ↑ Carter, Adam (17 July 2020). "Police apologize for saying anti-Nazi vandalism was 'hate motivated'". Canada Broadcasting Corporation. Retrieved 18 July 2020.
- ↑ Pugliese, David (17 July 2020). "Graffiti on monument commemorating Nazi SS division being investigated as a hate crime by police". Ottawa Citizen. Retrieved 17 July 2020.
- ↑ Holt, Faygie (2021-08-16). "Canadian Jewish group renews campaign to remove World War II-era monuments". JNS.org. Retrieved 2022-11-21.
- ↑ "Canadian monument to controversial Ukrainian national hero ignites debate". RCI | English. 2018-08-13. Retrieved 2022-11-20.
- ↑ 13.0 13.1 "Alberta journalist charged with mischief in vandalism of controversial statue". CBC. 25 Oct 2022.
- ↑ "Group resumes decades-old fight to remove statue of Ukrainian Nazi collaborator outside Edmonton cultural centre". edmontonjournal. Retrieved 2022-11-20.
- ↑ "Ukrainian monuments vandalized, group calls for their removal over historical record". Edmonton. 2021-08-13. Retrieved 2022-11-20.
- ↑ Noakes, Taylor (7 Nov 2022). "Canada Has a Nazi Monument Problem". jacobin.com. Retrieved 2022-11-20.
- ↑ Rudling, Per A. "Multiculturalism, memory, and ritualization: Ukrainian nationalist monuments in Edmonton, Alberta". Nationalities Papers. 39 (5): 733–768. doi:10.1080/00905992.2011.599375. ISSN 0090-5992.
- ↑ Lung, Raylene. "Jewish groups call for removal of vandalized Ukrainian WWII memorial". CBC News. Unknown parameter
|url-status=ignored (help) - ↑ "Ukrainian monuments vandalized, group calls for their removal over historical record". Edmonton. 2021-08-13. Retrieved 2022-11-21.
- ↑ Kinney, Duncan (August 10, 2021). "Nazi collaborator monuments in Edmonton defaced with red paint and words "Actual Nazi" and "Nazi Monument"". The Progress Report. Retrieved 2022-11-25.
- ↑ Hajke Wolf-Dietrich The Ukrainian Division "Galicia" Toronto, 1970 p. 17
- ↑ Rudling, Per Anders (July–September 2012). "'They Defended Ukraine': The 14. Waffen-Grenadier-Division der SS (Galizische Nr. 1) Revisited". Journal of Slavic Military Studies. 25 (3): 339–359. doi:10.1080/13518046.2012.705633. Unknown parameter
|s2cid=ignored (help) - ↑ Farber, Bernie (2020-07-22). "Bernie Farber: Canada's monument to Nazi soldiers". National Post. Retrieved 2022-11-21.
- ↑ 24.0 24.1 Rudling, Per Anders (3 July 2020). "Long-Distance Nationalism: Ukrainian Monuments and Historical Memory in Multicultural Canada". In Marschall, Sabine. Public Memory in the Context of Transnational Migration and Displacement (PDF). pp. 105–108. ISBN 978-3-030-41329-3. Search this book on
- ↑ 25.0 25.1 Samphir, Harrison (26 July 2020). "Why is a monument commemorating a Nazi SS division still standing outside Toronto?". Canadian Dimension.
- ↑ Golinkin, Lev (2020-07-21). "Canada's Nazi Monuments". ISSN 0027-8378. Retrieved 2022-11-21.
- ↑ Pugliese, David (17 July 2020). "Graffiti on monument commemorating Nazi SS division being investigated as a hate crime by police". ottawacitizen. Retrieved 2022-11-20.
- ↑ "Canada police investigate vandalism of monument to Nazi troops as hate crime". the Guardian. 2020-07-17. Retrieved 2022-11-21.
- ↑ Smith, Marie-Danielle (2017-12-23). "Ukrainian-Canadian community urged to confront WWII past amid controversy over monuments". National Post. Retrieved 2022-11-21.
- ↑ "B'nai Brith Taking Action Against Nazi Glorification". Alberta Jewish News. 2020-07-28.
- ↑ "Canadian Jewish and Polish Groups Join Forces to Demand Removal of SS Monument at Ontario Cemetery". Algemeiner.com. Retrieved 2022-11-22.
- ↑ "'Disgusted': Oakville cemetery facing calls to remove what's being called a Nazi monument". InsideHalton.com. Retrieved 2022-11-25.
External links
- Owen Schalk, Why isn’t Canadian media condemning Nazi collaborator Roman Shukhevych?, Canadian Dimension, November 3, 2022.
- Harrison Samphir, How did a monument to a Nazi SS division end up being erected in Canada?, The Georgia Straight, 25 July 2020.
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