Canadian Army

“ In the case of the Canadians, the Y.M.C.A. is actually a part of the military force, and that is a remarkable thing. Six of the Canadian officers of the Association in the first contingent were at the same time officers in the Canadian Army, and were told off to the service of the Y.M.C.A., but they were none the less officers for that. In this way the Association is recognised, and the officers can go with the men right into the trenches, and do. Fine men were [16] these first six officers, four of them with the infantry brigades, one with the cavalry, and one with the artillery. ”

“ The trench raid, which came to be one of the constant factors of the war, was a Canadian invention. It was a Canadian doctor, transferred from civil practice to the front, who first showed the way to cope with trench feet, a war disease which at one time threatened to destroy the British army. The Canadian army led the way in the skilful application of machine-gun power to the necessities of attack and defence ”

“ During the late war he turned his abilities as a speaker to patriotic uses, and is credited with having recruited more men for the Canadian army than any other member of either the House of Commons or the various legislatures of this country. His efforts covered the entire province of Ontario, and in the year 1915 he individually secured the enlistment of 1,260 soldiers. Personally, he is popular with men of all shades of opinion, and is a member of the Albany Club, Toronto, the Brockville Club, and the Canadian Club, Toronto, and of the Executive of the Empire Club of Canada. ”

“ Apart from his qualities as a soldier, however, a simple and noble personality illumines his character. It is not too much to say that every officer and man under his command loves and trusts him. Not only, however, have they confidence in his military leadership, but they know that in his personality, and in his whole outlook upon humanity, he is to be respected and trusted too.
With the arrival in France of the 2nd Division, [3] and the formation of the Canadian Army Corps, a point is reached which clearly marks the end of the first phase of Canada's part in the world war. ”

“ Canada's Army has grown beyond all the expectations of the world, and glorious pages will be written, in future history, of the self-sacrifice of those true sons, many of whom have laid down their lives for the highest traditions of the British Empire.
No finer inspiration is needed for the future than the words of Corporal Joseph Kaeble, V.C., a French-Canadian, when mortally wounded in repelling a German attack—"Keep it up, boys! Don't let them get through. We must stop them!" ”

“ As an English officer, I am proud of our Canadian comrades and feel that they have brought honor to the British Army as well as themselves, and that their heroic work will thrill the Dominion from the Atlantic to the Pacific. ”

“ Here was the greatest army that had ever put out to sea at one time; an army forty per cent bigger in three months than the total force that Gen. Ian Hamilton estimated Canada could send as her whole contribution to a great war. This was Hughes' answer to Hamilton. Not only were the men Canadian—if not many of them Canadians—but their uniforms, boots, kits, rifles, horses, tents, artillery, machine gun batteries, army waggons, cook waggons, engineering outfits and munitions, were as far as possible produced in Canada. Troop trains and transport steamers were Canadian. ”

“ Within two months of the outbreak of war between Great Britain and Germany, the Dominion of Canada concentrated, armed, and sent to Europe an Expeditionary Force of 33,000 men. A voluntary army, the first complete Canadian Division ever assembled, with more than half a Reserve Division, this force was by far the greatest body of soldiers that had ever crossed the Atlantic at one time. ”

“ The Royal Canadian Regiment is the only regular unit in the Canadian Forces. It was first raised in December, 1883, for the purpose of instructing the Canadian Militia, and was called the Infantry School Corps. Since then it has been known as the Royal Regiment of Canadian Infantry, then the Royal Canadian Regiment of Infantry, and later by its present title. In 1894 H.M. Queen Victoria gave her Imperial Cypher V.R.I. as a badge. The Regiment was increased during the South African War by the raising of a 2nd and 3rd Battalion ”

“ By voluntary enlistment 430,000 men were secured and 332,000 of these have crossed the sea. In all the long span of human history there is nothing more romantic and majestic than this great gift of manhood from the new world to restore freedom in the old. Even when the bells ring for peace many of those who left Canada in the pride of youth and strength will not come back. The loss is grievous even though they were where they should have been when they fell. The casualties in the Canadian army exceed 100,000 and 30,000 sleep in France and Flanders. ”

“ It was therefore a feat that the Canadian people could well afford to be proud of, that in the great crisis they were able, through their aggressive Minister of Militia, not only to gather up these forces so quickly but that they willingly and without delay converted their industries to the manufacture of all necessary army equipment. ”

“ Thus the left division of the British army in Canada numbered fifteen thousand seven hundred and seventy effectives, or, including officers, probably eighteen thousand men, without reckoning the Canadian militia, either incorporated or sedentary. Two lieutenant-generals and five major-generals were in command. Amply provided with artillery and horses, every brigade well equipped, they came fresh from a long service in which the troops had learned to regard themselves as invincible. ”

“ The business man, with his experience in organization and executive, became a military administrator in a wonderfully short space of time. The corps commander had never been in any military school except the Canadian militia. Of the seven or eight men who served as divisional commanders, not more than three could qualify as professional soldiers before the war. Of the brigadiers and battalion commanders probably 90 per cent had never attended a military school for more than a month. Canada's army was a citizen army, commanded and administered by men without business training. ”

“ He can survey, in fact, the full range of those methods by which large bodies of men carrying rifles gradually develop into a self-sufficient army far greater in numbers than the British troops that the Duke of Wellington commanded, not so far away, on the field of Waterloo. As a stream draws into it confluent after confluent until it attains the dignity of a river, so the original Canadian Expeditionary Force, by the flow of men across the Atlantic, is becoming an army ”

“ Except for fishing patrols and insignificant cruisers, Canada has no marine force, absolutely none, though she can requisition the big merchant liners which she subsidizes. Canada has an excellent military school in Kingston and a course of instruction at Quebec, but the majority of graduates from these centers go into service in the British army simply because there is no scope for them in their own land. At Esquimalt off Victoria, British Columbia, and at Halifax, Nova Scotia, before the outbreak of the present war, were Imperial naval stations ”

“ Over four hundred thousand men, out of a population of about eight millions, actually crossed the ocean. Four divisions fought as such in France. Railway troops worked with every British Army, and forestry battalions did almost all the work of that nature required to supply the needs of both French and British forces on the western front. The casualties among Canadian troops were quite equal to those sustained by the more numerous armies of the United States, because of the greater duration of Canadian service. ”

“ Lawrence upon the enemy’s capital, leaving Lake Champlain to Colonel Haviland, whilst General Murray with the disposable portion of the garrison of Quebec, was to push up the St. Lawrence. On September 6th, the splendid army landed at Montreal, and invested it in form. On the 8th, the Marquis of Vaudreuil, who commanded in Montreal, signed the capitulation, and the whole of Canada became a British province. French troops were conveyed to France in British ships, and the Canadian militia allowed to return peaceably to their homes. ”

“ In Germany, they say—once an army man always an army man; for though the pay is ridiculously small, social prestige and recognition are so great that the army is the most desirable vocation. Canada's teachers in the schools among foreigners are doing for the Dominion what the German army has aimed to do for the empire. Do the Canadian teachers receive the same recognition? ”

“ It was fondly imagined that any Canadian who could shoot straight and who had a week's training could take his place in the ranks and would be just as good a soldier as a regular of the King's first Army. No sooner was a man in uniform than everybody began asking him the question "When are you going to the Front?" assuming that was a [44] question he could settle himself, and that he would be anything but in the way and a nuisance at the Front, owing to his lack of discipline and training. The public in this way made the men's and officers' lives very miserable. ”

“ Even the deluge of gas—the first used in the war—gained them less benefit than they expected. That battle of Ypres was decidedly a Canadian victory.
Captain F. A. C. Scrimger, of the Canadian Army Medical Corps, was attached at the time to the 14th (Royal Montreal) Battalion. On April 22nd he was in charge of an advanced dressing station situated in an old farm building near the battered city of Ypres. The house was surrounded by a moat over which there was only one road; and that afternoon, during the heavy fighting, the [Pg 10] German artillery found the lonely house and began to shell it. ”

“ The Canadian arsenals are well supplied, and nearly eight thousand regular troops occupy the various garrisons. Quebec, with its strong fortifications and imposing citadel, may bid defiance to any force that could be brought against it from the States; important works have been erected upon the island of Montreal; Kingston and its adjacent forts would require a large army and corresponding naval force to subdue it; Toronto would give the invaders some trouble. Defensive works exist along the frontier of Lower Canada. ”

“ John, New Brunswick, that 32,000 Canadian volunteers "left for the front a day or two ago." It was understood that the troops had sailed from Quebec in twenty armed transports, convoyed by a fleet of British warships, which had been collected at convenient ports for the purpose.
There were two army divisions in the force that sailed, each comprising three brigades of infantry (12,000 men) , 27 guns, 500 cavalry, and 2, staff, signallers, medical corps and supermimaries. ”

“ Every officer was on his metal and worked hard to bring his men to perfection in spite of mud and rain and all sorts of difficulties worse than we ever encountered in Flanders.
Comparisons are odious, but experience has shown that the Canadian officer, on the whole, is equal to any officer in the British army. His Majesty graciously ordered that we were to be classed as "regular Imperial officers." We had to line up to that standard.
The present war is altogether unlike previous experiences in the British army. "Forget South Africa" became a byword. ”

“ John Bull is not enamoured of the tender mercies of canallers and loafers, and the French Canadian peasantry and small farmers are innocent of the desire to imitate the heroes of Poissardism.
No person in public life can judge better of the feelings of the people as a mass, in Canada, than those who have commanded large bodies of the militia. Put the query to any officer in the army who has had such a charge, and the universal answer will be: "The militia of Canada are loyal to Britain, without vapouring or boasting of that loyalty ”

“ It is far, indeed, from my intention to discredit either the zeal or the efficiency of these volunteers, who have, I hope, greatly increased in number since the date of your despatch; but they constitute a force which cannot suffice for Canada in the event of war. They might form an admirable small contingent; but what would be required, would be a large army. [211] They might form a force stronger than is necessary in time of peace to secure internal tranquillity, but would be inadequate to repel external attack in time of war. ”

“ Indeed, properly to enforce the true spirit and meaning of Canada's great arming, one cannot insist too strongly on the wonderful fact that by a supreme effort of organisation, men who had, in the main, passed their lives in peaceful pursuits, were forged into an army fitted to face with honour and success the highly trained hordes of a nation steeped for centuries in the traditions of militarism. ”

“ Within a week Canada had sprung to arms; within three weeks 35,000 men were marshalled on Valcartier Plain, which had been transformed, as if by magic, into a great military camp; within six weeks from the outbreak of war a Canadian Division, fully organised and equipped in every branch of the service, with a surplus of guns and ammunition nearly sufficient for another Division, and with a detail of reinforcements amounting to 10,000 men, was ready to proceed overseas. ”

“ The small army in Canada could be massed together, with its artillery and transport, in a very short time, and directed with precision to any one point, though it is a series of detachments on garrison duty rather than a corps d’armée, and it has neither cavalry nor baggage animals. With all the liberal (if not occasionally extravagant) [96] outlay, and the cost of transporting it, the force in a few weeks would be far less expensive than an American corps of the same strength; and it is no disparagement to the latter to say they would be less efficient than the British. ”