Honeymoon was tour of battle sites
On her honeymoon, Sharon McKenna went to Vimy Ridge. Her husband, Leo, wanted her to see the places in northern France where he had fought during the First World War.
“The war had been such a major part of his life experience, really shaped who he became as a man, and he wanted me to see the battle sites,” McKenna, a 77-yearold Kelowna woman, said Wednesday.
Unlike some other veterans, her husband never offered entertaining stories of his time in the military, which included both the First and Second World Wars, McKenna said.
“For him, war was filth. It was blood. And it was gas,” she said. “He spoke to students as often as he could about that, so they would never have any misconceptions about war.”
Born in Charlottetown, McKenna fought with the No. 5 Siege Battery near Vimy, and at the major battles of Armentieres, Ypres, and Flanders. He was poisoned by mustard gas and had respiratory problems all his life.
After the war, he became a doctor, specializing in general surgery. Based in England during the Second World War, he operated on many injured soldiers, airmen, and sailors.
From 1946 until he retired in 1964, McKenna worked at Shaughnessy Hospital in Vancouver, his practice focused on war veterans.
After his first wife died, Leo married Sharon in 1970. He was 73, she was a 30-yearold nurse.
“I’d got to know Leo and his wife quite well when she was in hospital,” McKenna said. “Six months after she passed away, Leo phoned me and said he was tired of eating pork and beans from a tin.
“I thought, ‘My life could be about to make a big change,’” she said. “And I’m so glad it did. Leo was a wonderful, kind, compassionate man, very debonair. There was no topic that didn’t interest him.”
McKenna admits to being surprised at first when her new husband suggested their honeymoon be to Vimy and other First World War battlefield sites. “I thought, ‘Wow, that’s not very romantic,’” she said.
But the thousands of soldiers’ graves had a profound impact on her, she says.
The couple moved to Kelowna in 1970, and Leo enjoyed his retirement until he died in 1987 at age 99.
Sharon got a doctorate, and taught nursing at Okanagan College, then lived with her son in Kentucky from 1995 until returning in 2005 to Kelowna.
McKenna says she’ll watch the ceremony commemorating the 100th anniversary of the Battle of Vimy Ridge on Sunday.
And as she does, she’ll be mindful of the way the event looms large in the national consciousness as a coming of age moment when Canadian troops fought together for the first time under their own flag.
“In a way,” she says, “every Canadian can say, ‘Je suis Vimy.”
For him, war was filth. It was blood. And it was gas. He spoke to students as often as he could about that, so they would never have any misconceptions about war. Sharon McKenna