August 17, 1917 - Canadian Troops Fight in Battle of Hill 70 in France

On August 17, 1917, you'd find Canadian troops two days into the brutal Battle of Hill 70 near Lens, France — already repelling relentless German counter-attacks after seizing the strategic 70-metre rise on August 15. Lieutenant-General Arthur Currie's forces had captured the hill in roughly 20 minutes, but holding it was another matter entirely. Germany launched 21 counter-attacks over ten days, and Canada's story of how they stopped every single one runs deeper than you'd expect.

Key Takeaways

• The Battle of Hill 70 began August 15, 1917, with Canadian Corps under Lt-Gen Arthur Currie seizing the strategic height near Lens, France.
• Currie chose Hill 70 over a costly direct assault on Lens, denying Germans vital observation over the Douai Plain.
• By August 17, Canadians were actively repelling German counter-attacks, eventually defeating all 21 launched between August 15–25.
• Canadian forces suffered approximately 9,198 casualties during the ten-day operation while inflicting an estimated 20,000–30,000 German casualties.
• Hill 70 marked the first major battle commanded by a Canadian officer, establishing Currie's reputation for tactical innovation.

What Was the Battle of Hill 70?

The Battle of Hill 70 was a 10-day engagement fought from August 15–25, 1917, near Lens, France, where the Canadian Corps under Lieutenant-General Arthur Currie seized a strategic height to weaken Germany's grip on the region and prevent reinforcements from reaching the Ypres Salient.

You'd understand its origins significance when you consider Currie's deliberate shift away from a costly urban assault on Lens itself. Instead, he targeted Hill 70, rising 70 metres above sea level, forcing Germany into costly counter-attacks rather than dictating the fight.

Canadians repelled 21 German counter-attacks, inflicting roughly 30,000 enemy casualties. The battle's memorial legacy endures as proof of Canadian tactical ingenuity, turning a defensive stand into one of the war's most effective attritional victories. The engagement also saw the introduction of German Yellow Cross shell, a new chemical weapon that caused significant casualties among Allied troops.

The assault began at 4:25 am on 15 August 1917, with ten battalions from the Canadian 1st and 2nd Divisions advancing and securing their initial objectives in 20 minutes, demonstrating the effectiveness of meticulous preparation and rehearsal on replica terrain behind British lines.

Why Currie Chose Hill 70 Over Lens

When Arthur Currie surveyed his options in the summer of 1917, he saw Lens for what it was: a fortified killing ground. German defenders had transformed the city into a maze of camouflaged positions that artillery couldn't effectively smash. A frontal assault would've been suicidal.

Hill 70 offered a smarter solution. Seizing it gave you artillery dominance over Lens and the Douai Plain, stripping Germans of their observation over British rear areas. Currie recognized that holding the hill made Lens untenable for the enemy, forcing costly counter-attacks you could defeat on favorable ground. The operation launched on August 15, 1917 saw Canadians seize most objectives on Hill 70's slopes shortly after the attack began.

Despite political pressure to assault Lens directly and divert Germans from Passchendaele, Currie persuaded General Horne, Field Marshal Haig, and General Byng that Hill 70 was the superior objective. His reasoning won out. When Canadian forces did eventually probe Lens in August 1917, the urban fighting proved brutally costly, with 9,198 casualties suffered by the Canadian Expeditionary Force between 15–25 August alone. Much like joint security operations conducted in later conflicts, the campaign relied on coordinated force elements working in tandem to clear and hold ground against a deeply entrenched enemy.

How the Canadian Attack on Hill 70 Unfolded on August 15

Before the first Canadian soldier stepped into no man's land, Currie's staff had already stacked the deck. Trench raids south of Lens threw the Germans off, while the 4th Division staged a diversion directly in front of Lens itself.

At 4:25 a.m. on August 15, the Royal Engineers kicked things off by firing drums of burning oil into German positions. Artillery coordination proved decisive — a creeping barrage advanced in 91-meter increments, and smoke deployment thickened the cover across the front. Infantry followed closely, with some soldiers leaving their trenches early to stay ahead of the German counter-barrage. In the weeks before the assault, preparatory shelling had destroyed 40 of 102 German batteries, significantly degrading the enemy's ability to respond to the attack.

Hill 70 was captured on the first day of the assault, after which artillery observers played a critical role in directing concentrated fire against the roughly 20 German counterattacks that followed. The success of the defense relied heavily on coordinated simultaneous strikes to overwhelm enemy attempts to retake the position before Canadian forces could consolidate their hold on the hill.

The Tactics That Made Hill 70 a Canadian Victory

Canada's success on August 15 didn't happen by accident — it was the product of layered, interlocking tactics that Currie and his staff had engineered well before the first shot fired.

Feint tactics kept the Germans guessing. The 4th Division's diversionary push toward Lens pulled enemy attention away from Hill 70, while nightly battalion-strength raids and gas warfare — including 3,500 gas drums discharged along the front — masked the real preparations.

Artillery knocked out 40 German batteries before the assault began.

Once Canadian infantry crested the hill, 128 Vickers guns and overlapping rifle and artillery zones shredded German counterattacks. Predicted fire techniques turned every enemy advance into a casualty event.

You couldn't find a gap in the defense — Currie had deliberately closed every one. The assault itself launched on 15 August at 4:25 am, with infantry advancing behind a creeping barrage supported by an initial gas and smoke screen.

The Germans launched 21 counterattacks against Canadian positions following the initial assault, each broken apart by the interlocking defensive systems Currie had so carefully constructed. Much like the Cold War tensions that shaped major military decisions of later decades, the broader geopolitical pressures of the First World War era drove commanders to pursue decisive, rapid victories that could shift momentum before outside forces intervened.

How Canada Held Hill 70 Against 21 German Counter-Attacks

By 9:00 a.m. on August 15, the Germans had already launched their first counter-attack — and over the next three days, they'd launch 20 more. Understanding counter attack psychology, Canadian commanders preemptively shelled German assembly areas, disrupting momentum before attacks even began.

Germans hit hard — mustard gas, flamethrowers, false flare signals, dispersed infiltration tactics. Supply fatigue compounded the Canadian struggle; you'd have fought for days without adequate rations or water. Yet defensive lines held.

Lewis guns pinned advancing infantry. Rifles, bombs, and bayonets filled gaps when ammunition ran low. Predicted fire techniques combined small-arms and artillery into devastating killing zones.

All 21 counter-attacks failed. Five German divisions suffered up to 25,000 casualties. Hill 70 remained Canadian — permanently securing the dominant ground above Lens. This battle marked the first major action fought by the Canadian Corps under a Canadian commander, Lieutenant General Arthur Currie. The nearly 10,000 Canadian casualties sustained between August 15–25 reflect the brutal cost of holding that ground against relentless German pressure.

What Did Hill 70 Actually Cost Canada and Germany?

The ten days of fighting at Hill 70 carried a brutal price for both sides. Canada absorbed between 9,000 and 10,000 casualties from August 15–25, with the First Canadian Division alone suffering 881 dead and over 3,000 total losses. Medical logistics buckled under the strain, as gas casualties complicated treatment and artillerymen struggled with fogged respirators during mustard gas attacks.

Germany paid far more dearly. Estimates place German losses between 20,000 and 30,000 killed, wounded, or captured, with five to seven divisions effectively shattered. Nearly 1,500 prisoners fell into Allied hands on the first two days alone.

The civilian impact extended beyond the battlefield—the $3 million shelling campaign, equivalent to roughly $62 million today, reshaped the surrounding landscape permanently, leaving communities near Lens scarred long after the guns fell silent. Among the individual acts of valor recognized during the fighting, six Victoria Cross awards were presented to Canadian soldiers over the ten days of combat at Hill 70 and Lens.