As a CBC war correspondent, Peter Stursberg covered the first full-scale action of the Canadian troops in the Second World War, the landing in Sicily on 10 July 1943. He was the only Canadian correspondent to enter both Axis capitals, Rome and Berlin, with the Western Allies. Stursberg also reported on the Italian campaign, the invasion of Southern France, the crossing of the Rhine, and the liberation of Holland and Norway.
The Sound of War
is a highly personal account from a journalist who was on the front line, observing the men in battle. It is also an insider’s story of what war was like on a day-to-day basis, in London, Algiers, Sicily, Italy, and northwestern Europe.
Stursberg, whose voice from the war became well known in Canada, also participated in another historic event. The establishment and organization of the CBC’s overseas news reporting during the war formed the foundation for the creation of a national news service. Radio, with its immediacy and impact, became a significant medium for the carrying of war information to the home front; its more dramatic coverage challenged that of the print news. Stursberg explains how the CBC’s approach to broadcasting from the front outdid that of its rivals in radio, the BBC and the American networks.