In my role as Legion President I was asked to be the guest speaker at the Colborne Rotary Club meeting tonight. Here are my remarks:
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Silent the dead.
Remembering, we stand silent as they,
for words cannot esteem causes of war,
the love of native land,
all that they were,
and all they might have been.
Tomorrow, at day break, the last of 68,000 names will flash up on public buildings in London, England and six cities across Canada. They started their silent vigil a week ago, each name showing for 8 seconds from sundown to sunup. They are the names of the Canadians who gave their lives for Canada during World War 1.
As 11:00am approaches, Canadians will go to local cenotaphs as either participants or observers, others will prepare to shut down equipment, others will watch the clock as they prepare to observe a two minute wave of silence across the country. Transit systems, factories, offices, schools will come to a halt in silent remembrance of the moment when the guns fell silent 90 years ago.
A silence in which we will reflect on the horrific cost of war. A silence in which we honour the service, the sacrifice and the selflessness of the thousands of Canadians who took up arms to defend what we as Canadians hold dear – our freedom.
At the conclusion of World War One great optimism reigned. The scale and the carnage of that “Great War”, the “War to End All Wars” as it was called was so huge that few believed that anything like it could or would happen again. The world would somehow manage to halt thousands of years of warfare of varying degrees and live in peace. We could but hope. As history has shown, that has yet to happen.
In 1914, Canada was but a young nation of 7.5million people. The confederation was only 47 years old yet it would be the second time that an overseas force would be mustered to fight on behalf of Canada. The first being the South African War of 1899 to 1902. Of the 7400 sent to fight there, 224 died.
At the outbreak of world war one in August of 1914, we had a militia of 57,000. Within three weeks another 45,000 had joined up. By October 1914, the first 30,000 sailed from Canada on 33 ships bound for England. In total about 629,000 Canadians or about 8% of our population would be in service. Of those, 138,000 received physical injuries and untold thousands would be marked for life by the horrors of what they experienced and witnessed.
In many ways, WW1 is credited with Canada’s coming of age as a nation. A nation formed through peaceful means yet one that was willing to stand up and fight fiercely for what it believed to be right. The Germans had a nickname for our Highland regiments, “the Ladies From Hell” – like all of our fighting forces the image of kilted warriors determined to win the day inspired the nickname.
One of our more well known Canadian victories during the war was Vimy Ridge, the site of a piece of Canada, where an iconic memorial to Canadian sacrifice and service stands today. The Germans entrenched on this ridge had withstood every allied force thrown at it until it came under attack by the Canadians.
It is said that a Frenchman in a nearby village having been told that Vimy Ridge had been captured responded by saying “c’est impossible”. When told it was the Canadians who had taken it, his response was “ah c’est possible”. Our reputation had been established.
As our troops returned home from war they were received by a grateful nation with promises to never forget what they had endured. Yet it was a nation which expected those men and women to get on with their lives. There was no understanding of the psychological impact of the horrors they had seen – post traumatic stress wouldn’t even be coined until some 50 plus years later.
Those who struggled with that pain did so largely alone.
It was no wonder that veterans of the ‘Great War’ sought each other out, forming social and fraternal organizations. Some of those groups eventually evolved into the Royal Canadian Legion in 1926. The Legion gave the vets a safe space to be able to be with those who understood. Although, in my experience with veterans, I rather suspect it was more a silent understanding than one articulated. Few would drop their guard long enough to express the pain they felt inside.
It would be 1931 before “Armistice Day” would be set aside as a special day to honour the service and sacrifice of those who had given their lives for freedom. By 1970 it would finally be included as an official holiday called “Remembrance Day”. By then, Canada had been in two more wars and Canadians were serving and even dying on peacekeeping missions – a concept developed by a Canadian, the Right Honourable Lester B. Pearson.
In World War 2, another 1million plus Canadians joined up to fight against Hitler’s attempt to march across Europe. About 45,000 would give their lives in that struggle with another 53,000 receiving physical wounds. Korea saw another 26,000 Canadians volunteer to serve, 1,600 wounded and 516 killed. Another 125,000 Canadians have served on peacekeeping missions since 1948 with 115 killed. It is estimated about 136,000 Canadians have served on NATO missions between 1952 to 1994 and 780 killed.
Currently Canada is part of the NATO mission in Afghanistan, having entered that war in 2001, not long after 9/11. As a member of NATO we had a duty to respond to an attack on another NATO member and then agreed to remain as part of the international force trying to stabilize the country. While we currently have 2,600 Canadians deployed there at a time, that deployment rotates every six months. Thus in reality several thousand of our forces have served there, many more than once. To date, we have lost 96 Canadians.
We’ll never know the number who continued to struggle with the horrors long after they returned home. We’ll never know what could have been had they not experienced the carnage of war. On the other hand, do we know what that same carnage inspired others to do? In small ways, I have seen some of the inspiration, and the pain, over the 30 years I’ve been associated with the Legion.
One of the most poignant glimpses into the pain that some vets carried came from a man who had seen some heavy fighting on the beaches of Normandy. I’m told he had received battlefield commissions due to enemy action killing others ahead of him in the chain of command. Eventually he would rise to the rank of Major.
I knew him as a nice person, who drank heavily and at times was pretty irreverent, to put it mildly. One day while sitting in the branch with him he looked at me and quietly said “young Patti, you’ll never know the men I sent to their deaths” and he lapsed back into silence.
He was right, I will never know the men he sent to their deaths or even having to make those choices myself. But, in that fleeting moment, I learned some of the pain and inner struggle that the man carried in his heart. Some battles never end.
Another time I listened and watched as another veteran, another heavy drinker, came almost to tears as he briefly described accompanying his commanding officer to one of the death camps after it had been liberated towards the end of the war.
Yet another was known for ‘resting his eyes’ in the branch after numerous drinks. He would be left to sit quietly ‘resting his eyes’ rather than being sent out to drive home. This same man would jump into action the minute a member of the Ladies Auxiliary walked in to the room and asked for some help mashing potatoes or something that needed some muscle. Straight as a dye and sober as a judge he’d head to the kitchen.
I came to learn that while we often looked down our noses at ‘drunken vets’, it was often the only way those vets could blunt the raw edges of their painful memories. At the same time over the years, I often watched in awe as these same men and others, who had fought for this country, worked almost unto death to serve the Legion and their communities.
The official Legion letterhead carries a footer that reads “They served til death, why not we?” Many of the veterans I have served alongside of in the Legion have lived that line. They were inspiring to know.
Last Remembrance Day, the Branch welcomed Comrade Wally Smith as our guest speaker. Comrade Wally is one of the very dedicated Legionnaires I’ve been aware of from the time I first became actively involved. He has served at every level in the Legion up to and including Dominion Chairman. Wally served in Italy during the war and has fought hard on behalf of veterans and their spouses. He also enjoyed reaching out to young people to try to instill the importance of remembrance in them.
He was a man who never seemed to age. It was like his volunteer service kept him young. We were shocked this past summer to receive word that Wally had returned from speaking to a group of young people about the importance of remembrance and had suffered a fatal heart attack. Legionnaires from across the country turned out for his services.
I’m not without veterans in my own family tree. My maternal grandfather served in the navy in both World War 1 & 2, active service in the 1st and as a training officer stationed in Halifax during the 2nd. In WW2 both of my mother’s brothers served, both of my mother’s sisters married veterans and since my dad served, my mother also married a veteran. My dad’s brother served and was among those wounded. My late husband was a Korea War veteran and was among the wounded there.
Of the eight in my family who served, only two remain alive today, my uncles Ken and Tom. In total about 200,000 veterans are believed to be still alive, only one of those from WW1.
Dad and uncle Ken were part of the Italian campaign. They are among those affectionately known as the D-Day Dodgers. The term originates with Lady Nancy Astor, an American born, British socialite who became the first woman to take a seat in the British House of Commons. She and Winston Churchill had a few memorable acidic exchanges like:
Lady Astor: “If you were my husband, I’d poison your tea.”
Churchill: “Madam, if you were my wife, I’d drink it!”
or
Lady Astor: “Mr. Churchill, you are drunk!”
Churchill: “Yes, and you, Madam, are ugly but tomorrow I shall be sober and you will still be ugly.”
Reportedly she received a letter from a British soldier who was bitter about the sense that many fighting in the hard fought Italian campaign were being treated as though they were avoiding the real fight in Europe. He was said to have signed the letter with the sarcastic sign off “D-Day Dodger”. Failing to note the sarcasm of the term, Lady Astor used it publicly leaving the troops in Italy feeling rather slighted.
A song called “D-Day Dodgers”, set to the tune Lili Marlene, was sung with gusto in the last months of the war, and at post-war reunions. There were many variations on verses and even the chorus, but the song generally and sarcastically referred to how easy their life in Italy was (with one verse very notably advising Lady Astor that “your bloody big mouth is far too wide”).
The term D-Day actually means “Disembarkation Day”, something the guys fighting in Italy had originally done some eleven months before Normandy invasion became known as D-Day.
My uncle Ken landed just ahead of dad. In moving up the west coast of Italy, his unit came under attack in a fierce firefight that saw most of his outfit killed and Ken wounded, most notably, a bullet through his left arm. About 12 hours later, dad’s outfit came into the area and dad realized it was Ken’s unit that had been hit hard. Word got to him that Ken was at a nearby aid station and he was given permission to go see him.
Back in Canada, Ken’s new bride, Gert, who he had married the day before reporting for training for overseas deployment had moved in with my grandparents and they were all trying hard not to worry too much about their sons and husband serving overseas.
At my aunt’s funeral last week, my cousin noted that my aunt had a bit of trouble keeping those worries under control when a letter arrived from Ken with a bullet hole through it. It got even more nerve wracking when the cable arrived “Ken May shot, details to follow”.
You’d think with that many veterans in my family that there would have been some discussion about the war as I grew up. That we’d have been taught the importance of remembrance at an early age. That wasn’t so.
The war was mentioned only in passing and the rare reference that at least one of my uncles made was to ‘when I came back from that business….’. I was a teenager before I even knew that my father had fought in the war. I found his medals in a drawer while putting laundry away.
It was like they were determined to forget their service to this country. It was later I learned that for whatever reason, it was my mother who was largely determined that my father wouldn’t bring it up. If she knew why she was like this, she never shared it. It would be several years before dad would take those medals out, polish them up and put them on. By then I was deeply involved in the Legion and maybe he had finally learned that Canadians did give a damn about what he had done. It became a bond that dad & I shared until his death in July 2006.
It was in being a Legion member that I’ve come to a deeper understanding of what it is to be Canadian. An understanding of the struggle and sacrifice that Canadians have undertaken on my behalf. It was from our veterans that I learned the absolute respect that must be rendered to the symbols of our country, most notably the flag as the most recognizable symbol of the country they fought for. Even though it is not the same flag they served under.
Most importantly, I learned from our veterans that there is no such thing as “I did my bit” when it comes to service. We give of our time, our talents and our energy because our community needs our service as much as the country needed theirs during war. If we don’t look after our aging veterans and the communities they live in then we’ve dropped the torch of service, sacrifice and selflessness they have handed to us.
Tomorrow morning, as the clock approaches 11am the names of 26 Canadians killed in Afghanistan in the last year will ring out in Victoria Square. Then we will fall silent for two minutes.
It is in sharing the silence with those whose voices have been forever stilled in combat that we individually and collectively are asked to renew our commitment to safeguarding our freedoms and serving our communities.
Remembering them may we ever pray: Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet, lest we forget, lest we forget
