Grey Bruce Boomers Fall 2021

y Stephanie McMullen
HEALTH & WELLNESS HISTORY
experience and often sent them home to loved ones in
Canada. Whether ‘sweetheart souvenirs’ for wives and
girlfriends, tourist keepsakes, or battlefield relics, these
mementos were a physical tie to the sights and realities of
soldiers’ new lives in Europe.
France and Belgium quickly discovered an insatiable
market with ‘souveniring’ as Canadians earned a
reputation as keepsake hunters. These pursuits emptied
soldiers’ pocketbooks and sometimes even caused them to
enter dangerous territory. Often, groups of friends would
go exploring for souvenirs in towns and villages, and even
on the frontline. German soldiers would try to play off
this desire by calling out ‘souvenir’ when captured and
offering up personal items for the taking.
While these were ordinary people, they were called
upon to do extraordinary things. Grey County men and
women proved their bravery every day, and sometimes
were officially recognized for it. While heroic acts might
be rewarded with medals and promotions, life at the
frontline was too often nasty, short and brutish. For every
Victoria Cross recipient, like young Tommy Holmes of
Owen Sound, there were many more young men like
Herbert Bryan Watson, from Walter’s Falls, who never
returned home and left families to mourn them forever.
The First World War ushered in a new era of modern
warfare. Thousands of young Canadians enlisted,
dreaming of the “glorious battles” of the British Empire
of their fathers’ and grandfathers’ generations. Instead,
they found gas, flames, tanks and anonymous death in
the mud of northwestern Europe. Nothing in their young
lives prepared them for the horror that awaited them,
and amidst the madness of the battlefield, these men and
women clung tenaciously to their humanity in whatever
ways they could. The soldiers of the First World War
were not professionals, but instead regular people who
answered their country’s call. Their experiences changed
them, and they changed the world. Here are some of
their stories.
FALL 2021 • 9