Always remembered
Annual Pictou service pays tribute to Black Battalion
Their contributions to the Canadian effort in The First World War are not forgotten in Pictou.
Every year, a service is held in the Shiretown to honour and remember the No. 2 Construction Battalion, a group of black men who had to struggle just to be accepted by the Canadian military.
They came to Pictou from across Canada and parts of the U.S. in 1916, though about half of them were born and raised in Nova Scotia. It was the first – and it would be the last – segregated black unit in the Canadian army.
“Their fight to serve opened doors across Canada, the United States, the Caribbean,” said Tony Ince, Liberal MLA for Cole Harbour-Portland Valley and Minister of African Nova Scotian Affairs.
“They were men I’m proud to call Nova Scotians,” he added.
“They stood up and demanded for the right to defend their nation. They exemplified the traits of courage and conviction.”
After they were sent overseas, the No. 2 Construction Battalion repaired roads, built trenches for the troops, constructed a small gauge railway to move logs to a sawmill, and maintained the water supply at a military campy in France.
They toiled 10 hours a day, six days a week.
Guest speaker Paul A. Smith, Lt-Commander with the Canadian navy, commands the HMS Summerside.
“Men like the No. 2 Construction Battalion paved the way for all of us,” Smith said.
“They showed it wasn’t just a white man’s war.”
Pictou Mayor Jim Ryan also spoke at the service on Saturday morning. Though the members of the No. 2 Construction Battalion only lived in Pictou for a few months while they underwent training, Ryan said whenever he walks by the memorial placed near the deCoste Entertainment Centre, he feels they are – and always will be – remembered as true Pictonians.
“They are an important part of our history.”