It was the Canadian infantry that broke the backs. Either way, we were played by the same few controlling both sides. World wars were tragic when you look at the bigger picture.
My great-uncle, John Stanley Holmes served with the 38th Battalion (Ottawa) C.E.F. He was killed during The Hundred Days Offensive. According to official records: "While crossing the Cambrai-Arras Road, close to the Windmill near the village of Dury, during the advance on the Drocourt-Queant Line, September 2nd, 1918, he was hit in the body by an enemy machine gun bullet. His wounds were dressed, and he was taken to the advanced dressing station, and later evacuated to No. 14 General Hospital, Wimereux, where he succumbed to his wounds 8 days later (9/10/18)."
He was the only son, single and 25 years of age. He's buried in a British Military Cemetery in Wimille, France. Many years ago I paid the Canadian War Graves Department to get a photo of his headstone. I have a photo of him on horseback in his uniform. I have no idea where it was taken.
Not long ago I watched a YouTube video posted by British Vet Kevin Hicks titled "Uncovering stories of WWI Stretcher Bearers on the Front Lines." His YouTube channel is The History Squad. In the video he mentioned a Stretcher Bearer named Private John Francis Young, who was apparently working in the same area as my great-uncle. I wrote Kevin that I would like to think that it was Private Young who took care of my great-uncle that day.
One of the other books on a Canadian infantry during WWII I was "Terrible Victory: First Canadian Army and the Scheldt Estuary Campaign: September 13 - November 6, 1944" by Mark Zuehlke. The area of Holland that the First Canadian Army fought through included the village of Schoondijke, where my father was born. The family left Holland in 1913 and came through Ellis Island, settling in Sodus, Wayne County, NY. The First Canadian Army suffered terrible losses during that offensive.
Back in 2006, I flew overseas with my oldest son into Brussels. Then we took the train to Brugge. The next day we picked up a rental car, and drove the 50 miles into Holland to visit the village of Schoondijke. We stayed at the main hotel/restaurant that sits right on the round-about in the middle of the village. The owner had an enlarged photograph of the village hung in the entryway. It showed the devastation that Schoondijke experienced from Allied bombing. The village was almost completely destroyed. About the only thing that survived was the old Mill that sits on the left side of the road, heading into Schoondijke. That Mill was there when my father was just a boy, and during the war, the De Hulster family that owned it, hid downed allied pilots, and helped them make connections to escape the area.