‘LAST DITCH STAND’
Family fights for hero’s due
As the Canadian War Museum adds another Canadian Victoria Cross to its collection, the family of Lt.-Col. David Currie is staging a last stand battle to keep the Second World War hero’s VC in Canada.
Currie’s VC, the Commonwealth’s highest award for valour in the face of the enemy, was sold to a foreign buyer for $550,000 at a London auction in September. The war museum bid unsuccessfully on the medal, one of only 12 VCs awarded to Canadians serving in a Canadian unit during the Second World War and the only Canadian VC from the fighting on D -Day and in Normandy.
The museum was successful, however, in acquiring the First World War Victoria Cross won by Lt.-Col. Harcus Strachan of the Fort Garry Horse. The museum announced this week it had purchased Strachan’s medal, which he was awarded for an action on the Western Front on Nov. 20, 1917.
The medal was bought with funds from the museum’s National Collection Fund, the Department of Canadian Heritage’s Movable Cultural Property Program and the support of two private donors — Brian Hastings and Robert Williams, both of whom serve as honorary colonels of the Fort Garry Horse.
The museum wouldn’t say how much it paid for the medal, which becomes the 36th VC in the museum’s collection.
Strachan was awarded his VC for leading a calvary charge through machine-gun fire to take a German gun position and capture 15 prisoners. Strachan died in May 1982 at 97.
“Medals such as this allow us to share the extraordinary exploits of Canadians in a highly personal way,” Mélanie Joly, minister of Canadian Heritage, said in a statement.
“We are very pleased that the Strachan Victoria Cross Medal Set has been acquired by the War Museum, making it accessible to Canadians for generations to come.”
Currie’s VC, meanwhile, remains in a safety deposit box at a Kemptville bank while its new owner applies for an export permit. Since it is considered to be “of outstanding cultural significance,” the new owner needs approval from the Canadian Cultural Property Review Board to take it out of Canada. The board is set to review the sale in January and can set a period of between two and six months for a Canadian buyer to come forward with a “fair cash offer” to its new foreign owner.
Currie’s widow sold his medal to a private collector in Canada after his death in 1986. The collector put it up for auction this year.
In a letter to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, the Currie family pleads for the medal to stay in Canada. Currie’s widow, Isabel, is 105 and lives in an Ottawa nursing home. His son David lives in B.C., as does his granddaughter, Brenda. His grandson, also named David Currie, lives in Hamilton.
“The government still has one last opportunity to purchase the medals from the new owner at a fair and acceptable price,” the family’s letter says. “In the military I guess this would be called ‘a last ditch stand.’ Please take this stand to ensure that we do not lose yet another piece of Canada’s history.”
After the war, Currie served as sergeant-at-arms in the House of Commons.
Meanwhile, another Canadian VC will go up for auction in London on Dec. 5. Cpl. Colin Barron was awarded his VC during the fighting in Passchendaele in November 1917. It is expected to sell for $250,000.