The contributions of veterans in Nova Scotia remembered.
Researchers remember Nova Scotian First World War contribution
There are moments people will forever look back on as having changed everything. For Jacqueline Carmichael, that moment came on the Western Front at the 85th Canadian Memorial in Belgium.
The memorial, and its small L-shaped strip of land, mark the place where a storied group of Nova Scotian infantry soldiers suffered heavy losses during the Third Battle of Ypres in October 1917. It was this memorial - and the moment it remembers - that took Carmichael by surprise.
Her trip was one for research on the wider Canadian war effort, but she found herself struck by this small group and the tales of what they did for that small patch of land. And so, she wrote a book about it, amassing letters, journal entries, and other personal stories from such soldiers to bring these first-hand accounts back home.
“I hope this helps these people from 100 years ago come to life. They have things to say to us about the futility of war, about sacrifice and valour, and what it’s like to lose somebody,” she says.
STORIES THAT STRIKE HOME
The land around the memorial that shares the story of the 85th Battalion Nova Scotia Highlanders now sits encased by vegetable fields in the Belgian countryside and is wide enough to hold a person and a half, according to Carmichael. But this small piece of land, along with so many others like it, carries a great story.
This was where 600 soldiers, dubbed the Neverfails, that went into battle. Nearly 150 were killed and another 280 were wounded, and out of those who died, 85 are without their own graves.
The monument was erected by those who survived, in memory of their comrades who did not.
When Carmichael dug deeper into Nova Scotians in the First World War, she also came across the story of Pictou native George Chisholm, who wrote his last will and testament one day before dying at Vimy Ridge. In it, he asked that his belongings — a ruby ring and Gillette razor — be sent to his next of kin.
Carmichael was also struck by Stellarton soldier James Robertson, who was posthumously awarded the Victoria Cross for his bravery at Passchendaele. The rail engineer, who was known for his singing voice, volunteered to take out a German gun picking off Canadian soldiers. He succeeded and enabled his platoon’s advance, but died soon afterward while trying to rescue two soldiers.
Robertson is now among the most celebrated of Canadian soldiers, something his great-niece Lynn described to Carmichael as she interviewed her for the book.
“She said he was so humble: she believed he would have seen it as what needed to be done,” says Carmichael.
A FAMILY OVERSEAS
The 85th battalion has also gripped Robert MacLellan, who created the Cape Breton Military History Collections website, where he shares pictures and stories he’s collected on First World War participants from Cape Breton, where the battalion’s B Company originated from.
One such story is that of Officer Percival ‘Percy’ Anderson, from Baddeck, who led the 85th battalion’s B Company into its first major battle: Vimy Ridge. MacLellan says it was largely unknown until recently that this company, while never intended to see fire, captured high ground at Hill 145 and helped secure victory at Vimy.
“This company, which had never seen battle, captured that important high ground in their first-ever battle. Percy won a military cross for his bravery on that particular day,” says MacLellan.
Percy had two siblings, Archie and Blanche, who also served overseas as an officer and nurse, respectively. A photo of the trio is featured on MacLellan’s website, where he describes the family’s remarkable contributions to the First World War, as well as Percy’s death at Passchendaele.
“Once I started researching,
I realized how many people and families were affected by this war. Just about every family and community had someone overseas during the First World War, and many never came back. This website is a great way to share that and remember them,” he says.
EMOTIONAL FIRSTHAND ACCOUNTS
Annapolis Valley historian Ed Coleman says his father, Carl W. Coleman, was another Nova Scotian who served in the First World War with the Canadian Expeditionary Force.
Ed says there are no confirmed accounts of how many of the approximate 61,000 Canadians may have died due to trench conditions, but his father vividly remembered the trenches’ atrocity.
“'Disease, rats and German snipers were the worst threats,’ my father recalled when he talked about trench warfare. He said, ‘if you didn’t get sick from trench conditions and rat bites, you had to contend with snipers picking you off from behind enemy lines,’” says Ed.
The striking nature of firsthand accounts, like that of Carl, is what Carmichael says struck her most. When reading first-hand stories, she said, how youthful the soldiers and nurses were was a juxtaposition with the responsibility demanded of these young individuals.
“What stood out was how young, how very much like us, these men and women were, but how they were all the same tasked with this horrific, gruesome task,” she says.
She points to women like Prince Edward Island nurse Rena Maud McLean, daughter of Senator John McLean, who served as a nurse and died aboard the HMHS Llandovery Castle hospital ship when it was torpedoed by a German submarine in June 1918. The boat had 258 aboard and, when it sank within minutes, only a small handful survived.
“This made the world mad because it was a hospital ship that was just returning to Europe after delivering Canadian soldiers home. The image of the sinking ship became the subject of propaganda posters to keep recruiting up during the final months of the war,” says Carmichael.
It was these and other harrowing stories that Carmichael came across that spurred her on to write something to share with people today as they remember those who’ve fallen. She is hopeful that those who read them will be able to find common ground with some accounts, of people like them who found themselves within a world few have ever known.
“My hope is that reading such stories helps these people from a hundred years ago come to life enough to talk to people; that everyone can find a story to relate to. It makes history more meaningful when we personalize it this way,” she says.
STRUCK BY N.S. SOLDIERS: NEW BOOK RELEASED
Stories of Nova Scotians’ bravery are nothing new, but some are being newly shared.
Veteran journalist Jacqueline Carmichael has built these stories into a book, Heard Amid the Guns: True Stories from the Western Front, 1914-1918, which will be published ahead of Remembrance Day on Nov. 3.
Carmichael wrote the book after receiving letters written by her late grandfather, George ‘Black Jack’ Vowel, during the First World War. It prompted her to visit the 85th Canadian Memorial on the Western Front in Belgium, where she was particularly struck by stories of Nova Scotian soldiers.
“My journalistic background is full of a lot of individual stories. I’ve always found people to be the best way to dig into anything,” she says.
Her goal in writing this book was to convey the human face of war by allowing its participants to speak for themselves. Using letters, journals, and many other personal stories, she pieced together the stories of countless brave Nova Scotian men and women who gave their lives so others did not have to.
“We can talk in terms of battles, like Vimy Ridge, but these people died one person at a time. Everybody is individual, so I wanted to get as many different insights into individuals who are representative of the larger war effort,” she says.