18 Replies to “11/11/18”

  2. Can you imagine a young man of 2018, not yet 20, writing so eloquently on the day he left his hometown to go to Flanders, perhaps to die?

    Don’t feel bad if you can’t. Thanks to 100 years of progressive education, there are grown white men who can no longer even write a coherent sentence, in cursive or otherwise.

  4. Just got back from the cenotaph out here on the wind swept prairie. 11 am and I was the only one present. 6 names from 1 family.
    Yeah we’ve got it tough.

    1. Just got back from the ceremony here in Rutland, was pleased to see a crowd of at least 300 out for the ceremony.

      My Grandfather was a Lance Corporal in the Royal Canadian Dragoons.He was grievously wounded, I believe at at Mons charging fixed machine gun positions.

      When the war is over,the soldiers should take all the politicians out and execute them for doing such a lousy job that they had to go to war. Might make them work a little harder to prevent these fiascos in future.

  5. I found out a couple of days ago that my fourth cousin was drafted in April 1918 and went to Petawawa in July of that year to train as a gunner. He went to Regina first for his intake into the Expeditionary Force too. Thankfully the war ended before he was to be deployed so I’m guessing that’s what happened to this young man too – something they and their families would have thanked their lucky stars for. I still remember the many names of kids listed on the wall of Central Collegiate by the office in Regina who fought in the great war never to return. Such a horrible waste for nothing. Lest we forget it could easily happen again.

  6. “It is said that part of Admiral Jacky Fisher’s gambit in building the 18,500-ton dreadnoughts was to deflate Germany’s willingness to compete, since to follow suit would require enlargement of the newly completed Canal . . . The Kiel Canal was duly widened between 1907 and 1914 to fit the beamier dimensions of the Kaiser’s dreadnoughts.”

    Such was the importance of the Kiel Canal to German military and naval interests in the pre-WW1 period that the “enlargement” of the canal was correctly seen by Admiral Jacky Fisher as a PRELUDE TO WAR!

    “In 1908, he [Jacky Fisher] predicted that war between Britain and Germany would occur in summer 1914, which later proved exactly accurate, basing his statement on the projected completion date of the Kiel Canal, which Germany needed to move its warships safely from the Baltic to the North Sea”.

    It was all about preserving trade routes and profitability…

    WW1: “Seven thousand two hundred deaths a day, 300 an hour, five a minute; for more than four and a half years”. RIP

    Cheers

    Hans Rupprecht, Commander in Chief
    1st Saint Nicolaas Army
    Army Group ‘True North’

  8. “Totally not worth it.” … “Such a horrible waste for nothing.”

    That may be true now, but back when they did it, it wasn’t true. People who came after have been making it not worth it and will still try to make it not worth it.

    People living now and in the future have the choice to try to deserve those sacrifices. That includes me, and you. Choose.

  9. I suspect that the world may have been a better place and Europe may not be dying had the Germans not lost the first battle on the Marne in 1914. We would just have to deal with German hegemony in Europe, which we already have. The death of Western culture essentially occurred at the first Battle of the Marne, six days in Sept that changed to course of the world.

  10. my grandfather signed up for WW1 the first day I believe , he was 16, a Brit and lied about his age. he was shot through twice. and patched up and returned to the front. a hole side to side in his stomach and one through his left arm that he would show us after prompting and bothering him for awhile. it was a dumbdumb. 1/2 entry and about a 3 inch exit wound. he was a runner , a messenger , he lasted till near the end when he was gassed and finally send back to London. where he found his brothers had assumed him dead and drank away his money he had sent home and took his clothes. he applied for a pension because of his messed arm and was granted 6pence a month. told them where they could put it. grabbed my granny married her and headed for Canada , I have both his birth certificate and his immigration papers from Halifax , he swore he hated Britain . , come 1939 , he lied yet again , being about 41/42 and signed up to defend Britain again , this time as a Canadian . left my gran, my 12 year old father and his 10 and 6 year old sister for 6 more years . he was a truck driver delivering fuel to the tanks .we believe at Ortona, Normandy and in Holland , not that he told us. just going by some of the artifacts he left us. being eldest son of the eldest son , I inherited most of it , including the medals he never wore. after the second war , he didn’t talk about it , never attended church except for weddings and funerals. asked about it , he would just say , I cant believe God would let that happen twice.

    my father signed up when the Korean war started. my great grandfather appears to be in the Boer War , we have but two pictures and a name.

    my grandfather could certainly could say ” tell England I have done my duty”

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