FIRST WORLD WAR VET POISONED AT ‘JAZZ’ PARTY
Many soldiers returning from 1914-18 conflict struggled with health
One of the saddest things to ever run in Vancouver newspapers was the daily casualty lists that were released during the First World War.
On June 23, 1916 there were so many casualties, it took up almost an entire page in the Vancouver World.
The first report was sent out at noon, and listed 11 men killed in action, five who “died of wounds,” eight who were missing in action, one who had been missing but had returned to duty, and 26 who had been wounded.
But that was just the first casualty list. There were four more released that day, at midnight, 2:30 a.m., 6 p.m. and 8 p.m. All told, 65 men were listed as killed in action that day, 22 who died of wounds, 55 who were missing, and 337 who were wounded. (There were some English, Scottish and Irish soldiers mixed in with the Canadian casualty list, which was large because of the recent Battle of Mont Sorrel at Ypres.)
Among the wounded was John Edward Pollard of Fernie. You can find his service record online at the Library and Archives Canada website, and it is 86 pages, most of them about his wounds on June 13, 1916 at Ypres.
“Injured by explosive shell causing compound fracture of tibia and fibula,” reads the Medical Report on an Invalid that was filed Jan. 7, 1917.
Pollard had an operation to remove the shrapnel from his left leg, but was deemed unfit for further military service and sent back to Canada. A railwayman before the war, he became a butcher when he returned from overseas. He died in Abbotsford in 1972 at the age of 76. Other soldiers never really seemed to recover from their wounds, like Eugene Piola, who turned up in a Vancouver Sun story on June 22, 1923.
“Following a ‘jazz’ party yesterday afternoon, Jean Piola, 711 Cambie Street, is believed to be dying in St. Paul’s Hospital, where physicians say he is suffering from morphia poisoning,” The Sun reported. “Piola was in possession of a large sum of money when he left his room, say the police, but this money was missing when he was found unconscious in his bed shortly after his return.”
Two people were held at police headquarters in the case, Charles Ralston and Violet Fitzgerald, “alias Violet North.”
“Police say that the woman put up a terrific struggle before submitting to arrest,” said The Sun. “Little hope for Piola’s recovery was held out at the hospital this morning.”
Today, jazz is thought of as just music, but in 1923, it was also used as a euphemism for a wild party fuelled by drugs or alcohol. On Feb. 1, 1923, for example, the Buffalo Enquirer reported that eight young women were drugged at a party staged by a businessman “whose wild jazz orgies are said to rival the licentious feats of Nero.”
Piola would recover from his morphine overdose, but his use of the drug and association with riff-raff may have stemmed from the injuries he suffered at Ypres on June 12, 1916, the day before Pollard was hurt.
Piola’s service record is even larger than Pollard’s, with 92 pages of reports of him going in and out of hospitals in England and Canada trying to deal with his pain.
The first report from the battle said he was “dangerously ill” from gunshot wounds to the chest and back. Another report said he had been hit by shrapnel. In any event, he was sent to a hospital in Bristol, England, where he had an operation on his wounded ribs.
But he continued to suffer after being sent to a convalescent home in Victoria.
In September 1918, he had another “extensive operation” for the “resection of ribs and drainage of localized cavity at back of right chest.”
Unfortunately, his health woes continued. When he was discharged from hospital on June 7, 1919, a medical note said that Piola “complains that he suffers from headaches and does not sleep very well, (and) complains of pain more or less continuously under ribs on right side, (which) becomes aggravated on walking or taking any exercise.”
Another page said Piola had gone through 10 operations to try and ease his pain. A miner before the war, he may never have been able to work after it. He died on Dec. 2, 1927, in Vancouver at only 33 years old, another soldier who “died of wounds.”