The limestone obelisk and revamped ampitheatre at Hill 70 Memorial Park in Loos-en-Gohelle, France. [hill70.ca]

Hill 70: On the eve of the important WW I battle, a look at Hill 70 Memorial Park

STORY BY RICHARD FOOT

It was in 2007, while touring Canada’s First World War battlefields with his family, that Mark Hutchings first set foot on Hill 70.

In startling contrast to the stunning memorial and grounds he had seen at Vimy Ridge, there was nothing to mark one of Canada’s most significant actions of the war except a nearby cemetery holding the graves of some of the 1,877 troops who died capturing Hill 70 in 1917.

“We went straight up the hill, and I stopped and said, ‘Hill 70, this is the highest feature—this must be it,’” recalled Hutchings. “And there was nothing there.”

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Former military medic Jessica Miller resigned from the Women Veterans Council in early January 2026. [Courtesy Jessica Miller]

Jessica Miller on the Women Veterans Council resignations

STORY BY ALEX BOWERS

Retired sergeant Jessica Miller believed in the cause, believed in the potential of the Women Veterans Council when it was launched on Jan. 29, 2025.

The body, explained the former military medic, was “based off one of the 42 recommendations in the Invisible No More report” from the previous year, a study undertaken by the standing committee on veterans affairs of the experiences, challenges and systemic barriers faced by women—past and present—in the Canadian Armed Forces. Miller had faith that change could finally be possible, and that serving on the council could help deliver it.

Not so, the now-ex-member says.

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