On the following morning at 9 A.M. I received another order to take a dispatch to every boy in my battalion. Of course there is always two men who go with the dispatch. The idea of that is in case one man gets wounded, the other can look after his wounds, and carry on with his orders. My partner and I started out from battalion headquarters, and going up the communication trench, found it all blown to pieces, so we decided to take to the open. On arriving at a company we delivered the dispatch and went on to the next company. It was very uneventful but it took us from 9 A.M. one day until 4 A.M. the following morning to get back. On our way back we arrived at a company in time to get a little party out to headquarters, but at the same time "Fritzie" started shelling us very heavily, so we took different routes. About fifty yards from the front line my pal got a bullet in the back, which brought him down. I dressed his wound, then carried him for a distance of about fifty or sixty yards. I then laid him down, so I could get a rest and straighten myself up, but when I picked him up again he was dead. I continued the rest of my journey alone, but before long I got hit myself in both legs. I dressed them and crawled to headquarters, delivered the dispatch, then fell into a fainting spell. When I came to I found myself in a hospital in Boulogne.
Canada's casualties in the war up to eleven days before the capture of Mons on the final morning of the conflict totalled 211,358 men.
| These classified as follows: | |
| Killed in action | 34,877 |
| Died of wounds | 15,457 |
| Wounded and presumed dead | 52,779 |
| Missing in action and known prisoners of war | 8,245 |
Canada's losses have been very great and she has fought very bravely for a just cause, the freedom of the world and everlasting peace.
WITH THE AMMUNITION TRAIN
BY FREDERICK GERALD MC AVITY, GUNNER NO. 91805, 8TH BATTERY, CANADIAN FIELD ARTILLERY
IT WAS back in 1914 when the word came to Canada for soldiers to serve for King and Country. As I was very young, not quite eighteen years of age, I thought I would like to enlist, and go to war, not really knowing what I was going into.
At that time, anyone enlisting under age had to have his parents' consent, which, I will say, was no easy matter. After having a little battle of my own, with all my relatives, I finally managed to get the signature of my parents.
We went to camp a few days later and had about two months' training at Valcartier, and then sailed for England. After training a few months in the Old Country we sailed for France the early part of February, 1915, where we first got our taste of war. I was more than surprised, because I was young, and my idea of war was sniping at each other from behind a tree or stump, but this trench warfare was a new thing. At that time I was attached to an ammunition column which fed the guns with its ammunition. Then it was a case of starving the guns, because the shortage of ammunition would only allow each gun of each battalion four rounds a day and as the soldiers call it out there, they had our "wind up" all the time.