Battalion in the Thelus sector of Vimy Ridge May 1, 1917 and moved with the entire 4th Canadian Infantry Brigade to the RIDGE line in preparation to a month of intensive training and reinforcement of the battalions in the Brigade. Interesting note on June 3 about “2 instructors from Canadian Corps Gymnastic Staff attached to... Continue Reading →
British Home Children Support Available
This blog has touched on the role that British Home Children had in the Canadian Expeditionary Force, and specifically the 18th Battalion. It is estimated that up to 10 percent of all Canadians can trace an ancestral connection with a British Home Child. One of the pleasures of hosting a Facebook Page for the 18th... Continue Reading →
100 Years Past: The “Fighting” 18th Battalion Lives!
18th Battalion Facebook member, Ed Wilson, forwarded these three photographs of re-enactors dressed as 18th Battalion soldiers visiting the Vimy Ridge battlefield. Specifically, the photographs of the soldier standing in the field is located in the approximate location of the 18th Battalion's position before the attack on their objectives at Vimy Ridge on April 9,... Continue Reading →
November 1917 Casualties
The 18th Battalion was active in the Passchendaele Sector and the number of men in the 18th that have no known grave bears witness to the terrible conditions and ferocity of the fighting in that sector. Rank Surname Forename Date of Death Reg. No. Private ABERCROMBY J 09/11/1917 123978 Private AKINS J 09/11/1917 770008 Private... Continue Reading →
War Diary Summary: May 1917
Having come off the success of the Vimy attack in early April the Battalion moved into Divisional Reserve April 16 and was then moved to a rest camp on April 26. At this camp the were rested and refitted, and though the War Diary makes no note of it, the Battalion must have been making... Continue Reading →
October 1917 Casualties
October 1917 found the 18th Battalion in the Vimy Sector engaged in working parties. A review of the War Diary for this month does not find any mention of any action in which Privage Swan was involved in that may have caused his death. His service records as of the date of this posting are... Continue Reading →
War Diary of the 18th Battalion: May 1917
CONFIDENTIAL WAR DIARY -OF- 18th CANADIAN BATTALION - 2nd CANADIAN DIVISION From 1st May to 31st May 1917 Volume 31 With appendicies 1-2 Place Date Hour Summary of Events and Information 1 a.m. Battalion in Reserve camp near NEUVILLE ST VAST. Battalion parade and company training. During the afternoon recreational exercise such as Football, Baseball... Continue Reading →
Blog Resources for Vimy Ridge
Though not exhaustive there are resources related to the 18th Battalion and its experience at Vimy Ridge. War Diary of the 18th Battalion: April 1917 War Diary Summary: April 1917 April 1917 Casualties Vimy Ridge: Instructions for the Offensive The Stress of Combat: Captain Lloyd at Vimy Ridge A Letter From a Soldier Who Served... Continue Reading →
Vimy Centennial Online Resources
With the 100th Anniversary of the Battle of Vimy Ridge the following opportunities exist to relive or commemorate this event in Canada's history. See links for dates, time(s), and details. CBC: News Special: Vimy Ridge: 100 Years On CBC TV and perhaps their live stream. Livestream: The Battle of Vimy Ridge: 100 Years Later. Veterans... Continue Reading →
Faces of April 1917
Men of the 18th Battalion who made the ultimate sacrifice.
Untold Misery Has Been the Harvest Now: The Letters of Major George Whitford Nelson
Introduction The intent of this blog post is to expand upon a series of letters diligently transcribed by the Bruce County Archives entitled Correspondence from Lieutenant Colonel George Whitford Nelson to his sister, Mrs. William Kidd, 1914-1916, A99.058.008. This resource was found during research into this soldier and offers an invaluable insight into the feelings,... Continue Reading →
A Letter From Major Nelson Aboard the S.S. Grampian
Major George Whitford Nelson, adjutant for the 18th Battalion writes from the S.S. Grampian: Mrs. W. Kidd Elsinore, Ont., Bruce Co. Canadian Pacific Railway Ocean Services R.M.S. Grampian Mid Ocean April 25, 1915 Dear Friends, I can’t very well tell you where I am but will know better when I get a chance to post... Continue Reading →
…and no battalion has a more glorious record than our good old 18th.
On April 10, 1919 two news stories about the 18th Battalion were published on page three in the Border Cities Star. One story was about the past, told of a traitor in the 18th who “surrendered” to the Germans in July 1918 while the Battalion was stationed in the Telegraph Hill area in the Arras... Continue Reading →
A Traitor in the Ranks
The war is over. Not long over but the reverberations and attitudes to people considered “others” by Canadian society appears to still be prevalent and on the minds of the general public even at wars end. At least it was important enough to make a page three story in the Border Cities Star published in... Continue Reading →
Tank Tactics and Barbed Wire: February 1918
The tank and the creation of tank doctrine in the First World War was a process that hoped to take advantage of the use of a mechanical machine to overcome the obstacles that the Western Front with its static warfare footprint of obstacles in the form of trenches, barbed wire, and more telling, the destruction... Continue Reading →
GWCA Third Lecture – Death or Deliverance: Canadian Courts Martial in the Great War
Teresa Iacobelli, PhD. specializes in Canadian military history, public history and social memory. She is the author of Death or Deliverance: Canadian Courts Martial in the Great War (Winner, 2013 C.P. Stacey Prize, Canadian Commission for Military History and the Canadian Committee on the History of the Second World War) and currently is an historian... Continue Reading →
GWCA Second Lecture – Forgotten Enemies: Great War Interments in Canada
GWCA Second Lecture - Forgotten Enemies: Great War Interments in Canada by Mary Chaktsiris. Mary Chaktsiris is affiliated with Laurier Centre for Military Strategic and Disarmament Studies and her doctoral work focused on the City of Toronto regarding recruitment, conscription, the Toronto Soldier's Insurance Plan, internment of enemy aliens, and the 1918 Toronto Riots. Lecture... Continue Reading →
September 1917 Casualties
During September 1917 622 Canadian service personnel ware listed at the Commonwealth War Graves Commission of dying. Of these military personnel five of them were members of the 18th Battalion. Surname Forename Age Date of Death Interned Reg. No. AMOR FRANK 25 13/09/1917 France 158030 DANIEL JESSE 28 11/09/1917 France 53794 LUCAS REGINALD GUY 36... Continue Reading →
GWCA First Lecture – Canada’s First World War and the Politics of The Past
GWCA First Lecture -Canada's First World War and the Politics of The Past by Jon Weier Jon Weier is a Western University of Western Ontario PHD candidate working on a dissertation National and Religious identities in the Canadian, American and British YMCAs During the First World War was the speaker for the night. An unusual... Continue Reading →
Summary of Service: Bryce, William Wilson: Service no. 770063
A recent contact by a relative allowed a more detailed examination of the service record of Private William Wilson Bryce. Below is a summary of service high-lighting the more significant aspects of his service. Private Bryce's service record only has one demerit for being absent without leave very early in his service and his experiences... Continue Reading →
History of the 18th Battalion CEF, "The Fighting Eighteenth" 