Bretteville-sur-Laize Canadian War Cemetery

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The war stone in the centre of Bretteville-sur-Laize Canadian War Cemetery. The Cross of Sacrifice is visible in the background.

The Cross of Sacrifice of Bretteville-sur-Laize Canadian War Cemetery.

The Bretteville-sur-Laize Canadian War Cemetery is a Cemetery containing predominantly Canadian soldiers killed during the later stages of the Battle of Normandy in the Second World War. The Cemetery is located in and named after Bretteville-sur-Laize in the Calvados commune, near Caen and Falaise in lower Normandy.

1 History
2 Location
3 See also
4 References

[edit] History

Bretteville-sur-Laize was created as a permanent resting place for Canadian soldiers who had been temporarily interred in smaller plots close to where they fell. At the time of the cemetery's creation, France granted Canada a perpetual concession to the land occupied by the cemetery. The graves contain 2793 soldiers from the 2nd Canadian Corps, 91 of the unknown, and 79 RCAF airmen killed in the Battle of Normandy.

A large number of dead in the cemetery were killed in the battle for the Falaise Pocket in August 1944. Canadians killed earlier in the Battle of Normandy were interred in the nearby Bény-sur-Mer Canadian War Cemetery.