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June 5, 2009
Exclusive: A Canadian Reminder of Fading Values
June 6th marks the 65th anniversary of the D-Day invasion of Normandy. President Barack Obama will take part in ceremonies commemorating the landings that led to the liberation of France and Northwest Europe from Nazi occupation. The president will be coming to France after a stop in Germany to visit the Buchenwald concentration camp, an enduring testament to the fact that there truly is evil in the world that must be combated.
D-Day was an Allied operation, involving British and Canadian troops as well as American soldiers. June 7th is Canadian Armed Forces Day, so it is appropriate to say a few words about our neighbor to the north who not only fought alongside us in World War II, but still do so today in Afghanistan. Indeed, if one looks at an Afghan map of where the dozens of national military contingencies are deployed, it is the old British Empire (U.S., UK, Canada and Australia) that is doing the real work along the Pakistan border, just as it did in the hedgerows of France, the mountains of Italy, and the jungles of Asia in 1944.
The Canadian 3rd Infantry Division landed at JunoBeach on June 6, 1944. It lost 340 men killed that day, with another 574 wounded. Historian John Keegan, in his classic book Six Armies in Normandy, wrote, “At the end of the day, its forward elements stood deeper into France than those of any other division. The opposition the Canadians faced was stronger than that of any other beach save Omaha. That was an accomplishment in which the whole nation could take considerable pride.”
The Canadians had been to France before, distinguishing themselves during World War I. In tribute to their valor, British Prime Minister David Lloyd George called the Canadians the “shock troops of the Empire.” There was something about the young, frontier spirit of Canadians, shared by Americans and Australians, which produced troops that were particularly tough and resourceful. The question today is whether that spirit still exists on a scale grand enough to can carry our societies forward during the new century.
One of the units fighting in Afghanistan is Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry. The regiment has a very unique origin. It was raised privately in 1914 by Andrew Hamilton Gault, known as the richest man in Montreal. Gault was an industrialist and an adventurer. As a young man, he had joined the militia and served with the 2nd Canadian Mounted Rifles during the Boer War in South Africa. When World War I broke out, he was a Captain in the Royal Highlanders of Canada militia regiment. He was eager to get into the fight.
Given his vast wealth, social standing and political connections, by today’s standards he would be thought mad to leave his luxury estate to go to war. But as his biographer Jeffery Williams explained, “Hamilton Gault was a typical officer of the Militia. He belonged to it because he believed that every gentleman had a military obligation to his country and he enjoyed the society of men who held that view. He did not consider that the commitment of an officer was limited to his person but extended to his purse and possessions as well. …Gault counted himself fortunate in being wealthy because it meant that he could do more.”
Tell that to the executives at AIG and CitiBank!
Gault used his wealth to recruit and equip a volunteer battalion which he donated to the Canadian government. Princess Patricia Ramsay gave her name to the unit and made its first flag by hand. She was the daughter of the Duke of Connaught, a member of the British royal family and Governor-General of Canada. In ten days, over 3,000 men had applied for service in the PPCLI, known affectionately ever since as the “Patricias.” Gault picked 1,000 for the initial ranks. Most were veterans of the British Army who had moved to Canada, but there were also athletes, cowboys and factory workers. The Edmonton Pipe Band joined up to “play the regiment to France and back.” Gault, aged 33, took the rank of Major, second in command, giving the top spot to a professional British colonel with more combat experience. Leading a reconnaissance party, Gault nevertheless became the first Canadian to set foot in a trench on the Western Front in early 1915. He was upset that the Patricias had not taken part in the opening battles of the war, but they would see plenty of action.
Gault was wounded in 1915, and was nearly killed in 1916 during a German attack. His left leg was shattered and had to be amputated, but not until he had spent the day in command of the PPCLI, rallying the outnumbered Canadians to hold their ground. The loss of blood almost proved fatal, and he refused pain killers that would have knocked him out. He could have honorably gone back to Canada given the severity of his injuries, but he was determined to go back to the front. And he did in 1917, limping along on a wooden leg until he could bring the rest of the Patricias home with him.
When the PPCLI needed replacements, having suffered heavy casualties, it turned to a source that again sounds odd by today’s standards. It sent its recruiters to Canada’s universities where six companies of volunteers were quickly found. Not just undergraduates, but graduate students and professors signed up. The Patricias may well have been the best educated unit on the Western Front.
The PPCLI fought in World War II (as did Lt. Col. Hamilton Gault, who came out of retirement to serve in an administrative post) and in the Korean War. The Patricias did not land on D-Day, as they were already fighting as part of the 1st Canadian Infantry Division in Italy. They shipped to France in March, 1945 for the final drive into Germany.
Between the wars, Gault lived in England and served as a Conservative Member of Parliament where he joined Winton Churchill in warning of the rising Nazi threat. A patriotic businessman loyal to the British Empire, he supported “imperial preference” in trade, a policy to encourage economic integration within the empire by protecting its production centers with tariffs against foreign imports. As he said in his maiden speech to the House of Commons in 1924, “Let us not forget that the beginnings of our maritime supremacy were created within the protective scaffolding of our navigation laws.” After this policy was fully adopted during the Great Depression, industrial output increased within the empire, providing capabilities that would be needed when war came again.
In 1954, retired Brigadier General Gault met for his final reunion with his beloved Patricias. Lady Patricia Ramsay was there, as were others from the volunteers of 1914 and of the wars since. Biographer Williams describes the event, “when the Founder, on two sticks but with grin unchanged, stumped through the door. Someone shouted, ‘It’s Hammie.’ In an instant, all were on their feet and cheering, united once more under the sway of his remarkable personality.” Heroes like Gault are uncommon in any age, but seem particularly rare today. So when we think of Canada, our neighbor and ally, we should remember our common Anglo-American roots, and give out own cheer to the Patricias and the other Canadian units that still fight at our side in Afghanistan.
FamilySecurityMatters.org Contributing Editor William R. Hawkins is a consultant specializing in international economic and national security issues.
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