These quiet fields of inscribed stones and tended grasses are sacred places in our communities. When you enter these quiet enclaves you walk through a sort of time capsule bringing forth those old settler families memorialized on the slabs of Canadian granite and limestone.
These slabs hold the historic legacy of the community. The information stored is of ongoing value to put names to, to remember and honour the people who broke the ground and built their life in Westmeath Township.
Old cemeteries around Ontario were being neglected and some of the oldest stones had been destroyed or had their inscriptions eroded. Volunteers undertook the huge job of photographing and indexing all the monuments. The digital pictures were taken to show the critical historical inscriptions before they were lost. These online photographs become an important record of names and dates of birth and death as well as family relationships (wife, son etc.).
These trios of slabs, mostly dating from the 1880’s, are found in the Greenwood Cemetery and memorialize some early members of the Robinson, Whitmore, Kenny, McDonough, Patterson, McGonagal and Tario families.
Find a Grave, owned by Ancestry.ca, has public volunteers submitting photographs. Below are links to the alphabetized websites of surnames and photos for Historic Westmeath Township.
The Township of Westmeath Cenotaph is situated in a manicured small park setting on Synton Street, Westmeath Village, and its beauty draws you in to pause and reflect.
It is inscribed: “Dedicated to the Memory of the Men and Women of this Township Who Helped Preserve a Free Nation. World War I 1914 – 1918, World War II 1939 – 1945, Korean War 1950 – 1953. Lest We Forget.”
The Reverse: On the monument’s reverse side, the names of the fallen are inscribed. “In Memory of Those Who Have Made the Supreme Sacrifice.” 14 men in World War I and 25 men in World War II.
On Saturday August 9th 1997, the citizens of Historic Westmeath Township gathered to remember the 39 service men killed in action during the past three wars from the Township. The Cobden Sun coverage of this special commemoration of 50 years from the end of World War II is available here in digital format thanks to the loan of the original newspaper clippings by the Upper Ottawa Valley Genealogical Group.
A Community In The Act of Remembering
In this Cobden Sun commemoration edition the names of two Gervais men were reversed. The extreme right photo in second row should read Renaud Gervais, 1920-1944, and the photo three in from right end in second row should read Harry Gervais, 1925-1945.
The photo of the 1931 Westmeath Village Public School No.2 children is particularly poignant; showing nine youngsters who would go to war and return, and three who would die in action for their country.
In 2005 at the Westmeath Public School the Grade 7/8 students in Mr. Mike Popke’s history class were tasked with interviewing and researching local men or women who served. The students interviewed either the veteran, if available, or a relative or friend of the soldier. The war stories were mounted on Bristol board and these panels were shown to the public at the 2006 100th Anniversary Celebration of the Westmeath Public School. The panels are annually posted in the Westmeath Rec Centre Hall each Remembrance Day. The panels were all scanned or transcribed and are here below.
Whitewater Service Veterans Researched
One of the current projects of Whitewater Historical Society, led by volunteer archivist Fay Bennett is to document the veterans from Whitewater Region who served in WWI & WWII. For more information on this project please email faygen@nrtco.net.
Names of Whitewater Region’s WWI & WWII men & women have been gathered from a number of sources, including the Royal Canadian Legion, War Memorial Monuments, Honour Rolls located in churches in Whitewater Region, local Women’s Institute lists and past newspaper articles. To date we have identified a total of 245 WWI veterans, including 41 casualties and 583 WWII veterans, including 60 casualties. Those included in this project include individuals born in Whitewater Region, lived here at time of enlistment, or had parents from the Whitewater Region who had moved to another location by the time the enlistee was born. It also includes some folks from Bromley Township with a rural route postal address of Cobden.
Profiles have been completed for the 41 WWI casualties and 13/60 WWII casualties. Where possible, the profile includes a brief immediate family history, a military photograph and service summary, circumstances of death, war grave information, newspaper clippings and memorials where the individual is remembered.
Davidson, Arnold Service Summary
Dickson, James Service Summary
Briscoe, Sgt. Thomas Clifford Oct 2023
Dougherty, Pte. Lyle Service Summary
Even the smallest place sacrificed its young men and women to fight, and in some cases die, overseas. Historic Westmeath Township was no exception.
Over 600,000 men and women enlisted in the Canadian Expeditionary Force (CEF) during the First World War (1914-1918) as soldiers, nurses and chaplains. Few families weren’t touched by the loss of a loved one as a result of this “war to end all wars”. These young people fell in foreign fields and were buried overseas; 60,000 young Canadians in total. Their remains were not returned home as is the norm today for a fallen soldier.
Over 1,159,000 men and women served in the Canadian Armed Forces during the Second World War (1939-1945); 44,093 lost their lives in the various theatres of war. They also were not returned home but were buried in those far off countries and honoured by the local peoples. The sites of the Canadian overseas memorials and graves are considered Canadian soil and so in that way they have “come home”.
All the Canadian war dead are listed in the Books of Remembrance held in the Main Block Peace Tower of the Parliament Buildings, Ottawa. These records are available online: http://www.veterans.gc.ca/eng/collections/books and http://www.parl.gc.ca/About/Parliament/Publications/Memorial/Memorial-e.asp
The Commonwealth War Graves Commission ensures that 1.7 million people who died in the two world wars will never be forgotten. The CWGC Homepage http://www.cwgc.org/ offers both searches by surnames and searches by Cemeteries. The Register records details of Commonwealth war dead so that graves or names on memorials can be located.
The Reading of the Roll at the Remembrance Day Ceremony, 11th November, 2010, was very special. The story of lost medals honouring two brothers, who are named on the Westmeath Township Cenotaph adjacent to the Westmeath Recreation Centre, had recently come to light.
Carson and Warrington Foy, sons of John and Mabel Foy, had both died in WWII, just weeks apart. As fate would have it, both men died by friendly fire incidents.
On July 25, 1944, Pilot Officer Carson Foy, a tail gunner with the Royal Air Force’s 61st Squadron, was on a raid of St. Cyr near Paris, when an aircraft above them dropped its bombs too early. One bomb sheared Pilot Officer Foy’s gun turret off, and the 26 year old airman fell to his death. Carson Foy is buried at the Commonwealth War Grave at Yvelines, France.
A few weeks later on August 14, 1944, Gunner Warrington Foy, deployed with the 6th Light Anti-Aircraft Regiment, died when allied aircraft missed their intended targets and bombed their own lines. Warrington Foy is interned at the Bretteville-sur-Laize Canadian War Cemetery in Calvados, France.
A Memorial Cross medal was sent to the family for each son, but they were lost over time. In the fall of 2010, the medals were recovered from e-Bay sales site, and have been prepared for final display in the Westmeath Centre Hall.
Thanks go out to Whitewater Region Councillor Joey Trimm , who organized the medals’ return, and to Marina Pither (sister) and Lana Loxton (niece) who have donated the medals to the Hall. The medals were initially discovered by Dave Thomson of St. George, Ont. who contacted Joey Trimm.
The Memorial Cross, also known as the Silver Cross, or Mother’s Cross, is issued by Canada as a memento of personal loss and sacrifice on the part of widows and mothers of Canadian military servicemen and women who lay down their lives for their country during war. The number, rank and name of the soldier is engraved on the back. The GV1R on this WW2 period medal stands for King George the 6th.
Irvin Labow was born in Greenwood on June 18, 1918, son of Mr. and Mrs. John Labow, R.R. 2 Beachburg. Enlisting in 1940 he won his gunners Wing at Paulson, Manitoba going overseas as Sgt. Labow in 1942.
The following year he made several bombing raids over Germany at times a few “shaky do’s”, as they termed their narrow escapes. Once they we so badly shot up their bomb doors were jammed with their 2,000 lb. bomb fused to go off. They couldn’t drop it and they dared not land with it so they radioed to home base, receiving instructions to head for home and bale out when they were over English soil, facing the plane back to sea. Orders were obeyed with Irvin landing in an oat field where he walked to a farm house and telephoned his base.
Another time they were so badly shot up they were ready to bale out. It took them four hours to cross the North Sea. They made it with only enough gas left over for fifteen more minutes.
It was on March 31, 1944, he made his fatal trip. He had twenty six operational flights to his credit all over Germany and four more meant that he would be permitted to return home on furlough.
During his training period he had taken several courses, attaining a little higher office after each one. When he was killed he was Flying Officer I. Labow. Only 22 years old when he enlisted, he was listed as missing on March 31st 1944.
He was awarded his Operational Wings posthumously. It is in the form of a gold pin and was sent to his mother a year later. They were also sent a photograph of his grave. It is in a British cemetery in Germany.
In my years at the Cobden Sun, so many people let me into their lives to tell their stories. Among these was Harold Johnson, and one of the most poignant of these stories was his story of the loss of a beloved childhood friend, schoolmate, and comrade, Irvin Labow. When family members of the two posted their pictures, it triggered for me the wish to share the story here by copying a Big Bend Banter (my weekly column) for May 29, 2002. The preamble is a bit lengthy but sets the context for those not familiar with the story.
It was a week ago yesterday (Tuesday) when we returned from our three-week whirlwind trip around Holland, England, and Germany. Except for six nights (three in Amsterdam, one each in Brussels and Munich, and one in the sleeping car from southern Germany to Amsterdam where we caught our flight home), we were with friends and relatives, and were pampered every step of the way. Among the things that had been laid on were a sumptuous buffet breakfast in the Westin Hotel Bellevue in Dresden, where one of our young cousins was just finishing and apprenticeship as a chef; the Wagner opera Siegfried (all five hours of it) in the opera house in Chemnitz, a five-hour boat ride in a friend’s boat on Lake Constance, lots of peeks inside centuries-old churches, many wonderful walks through forest trails, and a family get-together at which the Better Half could, in a small way, avenge himself for the many occasions over the past 40-odd years when he was plunged into the midst of a gaggle of Reiche connections without any backup from his side of the family.
We are still digesting the many impressions we gathered during our time in a world which, paradoxically, is much the same as ours in many ways, but in others very different. Then there are photos off the 17 rolls of film (four 36 exposure, the rest 20s), not to mention two hours of video.
Many of the impressions will, I’m sure, find their way into this column over the next few weeks. But today I’ll focus on just one event: our visit to the grave of Beachburg native J. Irvin Labow in the Durnbach Commonwealth War Cemetery in Southern Germany.
Flying Officer Labow was an air gunner with 408 Squadron, Royal Canadian Air Force (RCAF), when he died on March 31, 1944 at the age of 25. He was a brother of the late Ivan Labow of Beachburg and the uncle of Jim Labow, who is a member of the Whitewater Region council, as well as of Arthur Labow, Ruth St. Amour, and Mary Labow. The gate to the Durnbach Commonwealth War Cemetery
However, I first became aware of Irvin Labow’s story from Harold Johnson of Cobden, who is an active member of the Legion branch here. I’ve had many conversations with Harold over the years, and in a least one of them he told me the story of the night he last saw his neighbour, school chum, and war buddy, Irvin. Harold was a ground crew member of the RCAF, and it was he who waved the flashlight to direct the plane carrying Irvin off the runway on the evening of March 31, 1944. As the plane taxied past Harold, he briefly shone the flashlight on his face so that his friend would see him and know that it was he who was sending the plane on its way and wishing him well. Harold’s face was the last face from home that Irvin would see. The plane never returned, and the fate neither of the plane nor its occupants was known – at least not for a long time.
Then, just a couple of years ago, when I ran into Harold, he was delighted because a nephew of his had done some research on the Internet and had found a record of his friend’s fate. John Irvin Labow had indeed died on the night of March 31, 1944, and was buried in the Durnbach Cemetery.
“I don’t know much about Germany, but does that name mean anything to you?” asked Harold. It sure did. Durnbach is only about five miles from where my parents-in-law lived for the last 20-some years of their lives. We visited them in Bad Wiessee a number of times, and during some of those visits passed the war cemetery either by bus in riding in a car with someone, usually Ben’s uncle, who also lived in that community.
In the jam-packed schedule that developed for our recent holiday, we didn’t initially think we could find time for a side trip to the cemetery. But in April, when the Queen Mother died, Harold was prompted to write a short poem entitled Chums, talking of his memories and his loneliness, a feeling common to so many who have suffered war losses. It was then that I thought that we should really try to go to the cemetery during this trip. It’s not only war that cuts lives short, and there are no guarantees that “some other time” will come. When I mentioned it, the Better Half was immediately on board. I think the same thought had been working on him, even before I brought it up.
So, after we left the relatives on our way to friends in the Stuttgart area, we paused for a one-day stopover in Munich and from there took a local train to Gmund as we had done so often over the years. Gmund is even closer to Durnbach than Bad Wiessee. I had booked us into a bed and breakfast – again at an address found on the Internet. We arrived late in the afternoon. The tourist season isn’t in full swing yet, and we found there weren’t any bus connections that would take us to the cemetery that day – even though there’s a bus stop right at the cemetery.
It was a beautiful day, so, rather than risking putting our pilgrimage off until the morning, we took a taxi. Armed with a printout from the Debt of Honour register in the Commonwealth War Graves Commission Internet site, we entered the unlocked gate and, in about five minutes, found grave 6.D.14.
I had clipped Harold’s poem out of the Sun and put it in a plastic bag along with a printout of the poem that starts out They shall not grow old … that is recited at Remembrance Day services and left the sealed plastic bag on the grave. I don’t know what they do with things like that – probably the caretaker picks them up and put them in the garbage the next time he comes around. But somehow it seemed like a good thing to do.
Each grave has its own stone, and there are flowers planted inside a cement border that runs along each row of graves. There are also some graves containing the remains of unidentified war casualties, as well as a memorial commemorating 23 servicemen of the army of undivided India who died while prisoners of war and who were cremated in accordance with their religion.
Inside the gate there’s a little iron door in the masonry wall that says Book of Remembrance. In it are listed all of the names of the almost 3,000 airmen buried there from all over the Commonwealth. So, if you go there and don’t know exactly where the grave is, you can find it just by looking in the book. There is also a guest book, which I signed.
As we returned to the waiting taxi, I commented on the beauty of the place.
“But it still doesn’t change anything,” said the Better Half, echoing the feelings in Harold’s poem. And even though the flowers in that peaceful place weren’t poppies, and the birds singing in the forests around the cemetery that day weren’t larks, I have never understood more clearly the words of John McRae’s In Flanders Fields.
It’s a good thing that we have poets, whether they lived in the battlefields of the last century, or whether they live in our villages today. I wonder how many of them – and how many other unrealized talents – lie buried in Durnbach Cemetery, as well as in other war cemeteries around the world.
23 Years Ago
Elmer Stephan Kenny was born near Beachburg in Westmeath Township, son of Mr. and Mrs. James Kenny, on July 1st, 1921.
He enlisted in 1943 and went overseas with the Irish Regiment of Canada in August, 1944, where he was stationed in England, Italy, Belgium and Holland.
Killed in action in Otterloo, Holland, he was buried there in a small graveyard and his grave is marked with a small wooden cross. Later he was moved to Canadian Cemetery Grossbeek.
Robert Kenny, Beachburg, has been advised by the Geographical Branch, Dept. of Mines and Technical Surveys that his brother the late Private Elmer Stephan Kenny has been honoured posthumously. The name Kenny has been approved for a lake in Freeman Township, District of Muskoka. Included in the letter was an aerial map showing Lake Kenny situated approximately 10 miles south of MacTier between Lake Joseph and Georgian Bay.
Representatives of the Government of the Netherlands have been in touch with Robt. Kenny, notifying that he is eligible for a trip to that country, as next of kin of his brother. Several relatives of soldiers made this trip in 1962 and the most elderly were taken first.
From Laurentian View Tweedsmuir
9,000 Fallen Soldiers Etched into the Sand on Normandy Beach to Commemorate Peace Day on September 25, 2013.
Normandy Beach – a FANTASTIC visual reminder of the staggering loss!
“A few weekends ago, British artists Jamie Wardley and Andy Moss, accompanied by numerous volunteers, took to the beaches of Normandy with rakes and stencils in hand to etch 9,000 silhouettes representing fallen people into the sand. Titled The Fallen 9000, the piece is meant as a stark visual reminder of the civillians, Germans and allied forces who died during the D-Day beach landings at Arromanches on June 6th, 1944 during WWII. The original team consisted of 60 volunteers, but as word spread nearly 500 additional local residents arrived to help with the temporary installation that lasted only a few hours before being washed away by the tide.”
“As iron sharpens iron, so one man sharpens another.”
~ Proverbs 27:17