On the ground, in the air during war, Goodfellow was ‘One Lucky Devil’
Sampson J. Goodfellow enlisted not once, but twice, during the First World War.
In 1916, the 23-year-old man joined up along with most of his class at Toronto Technical School.
As a truck driver and mechanic in the Canadian Expeditionary Force, he transported ammunition and other supplies to places including the Somme, Vimy Ridge and Passchendaele.
Then, wanting a change, he joined the Royal Flying Corps, serving as a night navigator on a Handley Page bomber.
Goodfellow was shot down in August 1918 and became a prisoner of war in Karlsruhe, Germany. With Armistice Day on Nov. 11 marking the end of the war, Goodfellow was sent to neutral territory in Switzerland before returning home.
“When he came out (of the war), the medical doctor talked to him and said ‘you should have been dead several times over.’ That’s one reason the book is called One Lucky Devil,” said Edward Willett, who never met the man, but recently published his memoirs.
Goodfellow was the grandfather of Willett’s wife, Margaret Anne Hodges.
He was born in Scotland and moved to Toronto as a nine-yearold. His Regina roots were planted in 1911, when, as an 18-year-old, he came here to work as a machinist.
“He was in Regina when the tornado hit; he was on Cornwall Street and the house he was in was blown off its foundation,” said Willett.
“He was an early Saskatchewan Roughrider who played for the Regina Rugby Club ... He was actually asked to try out for the Argonauts when he moved back to Toronto but he decided not to, to focus on his schooling.”
He wanted to be an engineer. During the war, Goodfellow spent two years under fire, first as a truck driver. He wrote about bombs falling while he was dropping ammunition at Passchendaele.
“He took shelter behind the pile of shells, which to me doesn’t seem like the best place to take shelter,” said Willett.
“And when he got back to his truck, a bomb had exploded right in front of it and destroyed the radiator and also shredded the seat with shrapnel that he would have been sitting in if he’d stayed in the truck.
So that was another example of where he was lucky.”
After about five missions as part of the Flying Corps’ Independent Air Force, he was shot down.
“He had a fairly eventful First World War career and also a little different, in that he served both on the ground and in the air,” said Willett.
He also found a wife. Anne Owen Ridgway — better known as Nancy — came from Stoke-on-trent, England. The couple ultimately moved to Regina, buying a house in The Crescents in 1939, which is now home to Willett and Hodges.
Goodfellow’s memoirs were among the finds when the couple moved in about 12 years ago.
Willett finds it “a fascinating little glimpse of both a different time and kind of a different mindset, too. The past is a different country, it’s sometimes said.”
Goodfellow had a career as an engineer, machinist and metalworker, while both he and Nancy were “pillars of the community in many ways,” said Willett.
A fascinating little glimpse of both a different time and kind of a different mindset, too.
She was one of the early members of the Regina Musical Club. They were both part of the Regina Little Theatre, and his name graces the organization’s annual volunteer award, commonly known as “the Sammy.”
He was president of the Regina Symphony Orchestra and on the committee that established the Centre of the Arts (now known as the Conexus Arts Centre).
Almost four decades ago, Goodfellow Road in Argyle Park was named in his honour.
The couple endowed scholarships at the University of Regina, where Sam received an early doctor of laws degree in 1978. He died the next year.
Their only daughter, Alice Goodfellow, Willett’s mother-in-law, became a pediatrician.
One Lucky Devil is available for sale at Chapters for $19.95, as well as online at Amazon or through Shadow paw Press. Willett will read from the book during Lest We Forget: Songs from the War Years, a concert taking place Monday, Nov. 12, 7:30 p.m. at the Artesian.