I have always been an avid reader in the area of World War I; not entirely sure why. Perhaps it was the vast carnage and sheer waste of humanity that called for a search for reasons why. Perhaps because it was the last gasp of a huge number of incompetent and useless royal families (although some survived). Perhaps it was the stupidity of the officers in charge matched against the selfless and foolish sacrifice of the lower ranks. Perhaps because, like so many other wars, it was such a clear example of the dangers of the last war’s strategy being used with the next war’s technology, that led to cavalry charges against machine guns.

No matter the reason, I do know that the first book on the topic that seized my interest was The Guns of August, by Barbara W. Tuchman (why are women consistently the best tellers of history?) and the most recent, most comprehensive book (so far) was Tim Cook’s excellent two volume study: At the Sharp End and Shock Troops.

I am also(from time to time, when the demon takes me) an amateur genealogist, compiling my own family’s tree. In the course of this pursuit, I ran up against a personal story that illustrates all the brutal irony of the War to end all Wars.

My father’s mother, whose family had emigrated to Leamington, Ontario from Northern Ireland in the early part of the 19^th century, married a nineteen-year-old “tobacco hand” by the wonderful name of Elmer England (even though his parents were from the United States) in the spring of 1914. And then the war broke out in August. For whatever the reason – and reasons for enlistment are always myriad and personal (my father enlisted in the RCAF in 1941 to get out of Leamington) – Elmer enlisted with the Canadian Over-Seas Expeditionary Force on the 24^th of November 1915. I have the attestation papers in front of me filled in by an unknown hand and signed by Elmer with a signature that suggests a laborious process that might have been at the limit of his calligraphical skills. Elmer was a newly married twenty-year-old, 5’ 9” tall with light hair and grey eyes and he passed the medical. No picture of him has survived. Perhaps one was never taken.

Elmer became a private in the 99^th Battalion (Essex) commanded by Lt.-Col. T.B. Welch which was raised in the Windsor, Ontario area. He was trained and embarked for Great Britain on 31 May, 1916 on the SS. Olympia. At that time his daughter Iva May was exactly two weeks old. He arrived in England on June 8,1916 and after further training at West Sandling was transferred to the 35^th Reserve Battalion on July 6. On Aug. 8 he was moved to France to join the 19^th Battalion in preparation for the Canadian part of the battle of the Somme.

Now the 19^th (The Argylls) was already a battle-hardened part of the 4th Infantry Brigade(all from Ontario), which became, in turn, part of the Canadian Second Division of the Expeditionary Force. They saw action at St. Eloi (a disaster) and Mount Sorrel at Ypres (where they debuted the “daytime raid”). After this (24 August,1916) they were pulled from the line at Ypres and marched south to the Somme. It was during this transition that Elmer joined their ranks, still not having seen any action.

I won’t get into the details of the battle of the Somme – it’s a record of a stupid waste of 620,000 allied casualties and 450,000 German casualties. Nothing was achieved except death and injury. In September of 1916 (Iva May was 4 months old) the Canadians became part of the Somme battle at the town of Courcelette. Elmer was about to finish training and become part of World War I.  6:20 a.m. September 15, 1916 was jump off day for the assault. The 19^th was assigned their task which was to follow closely behind the attack troops and “mop up” remaining German resistance and then “consolidate positions”. They went over the top at 6:04 am and by 8:04 am they had reached their first objectives. That is the last news anyone ever had of Elmer England.

In the reports of the Battalion he is listed as “missing”, then that is crossed out and replaced by K. in A.  (Oct. 5). Then he is “reported as K. in A. and now missing” (Oct. 9). Then “missing” (Oct 18) and finally, on Nov. 7, “previously reported missing, now for official purposes, presumed to have died on or since 15-9-16.” He was deemed not to have served for long enough to deserve a medal and no remains were ever found to bury so that his only battlefield memorial is his name engraved on the Memorial on Vimy Ridge – one of the few beautiful creations to emerge from that ugliest of ugly wars.

Because he died so soon after going over the top, because no one seems to have witnessed what happened to him, because there were no remains recovered and because the assault was launched under heavy German artillery bombardment it is likely that he suffered a common end: blown to nothingness by an explosive artillery shell. He might not have even had time to notice a first ever military event taking place right next to him – for it was with this assault that tanks were used in battle for the very first time.

So, for Elmer England, the actual fighting part of the war lasted somewhere between 10 seconds and an hour and then he was utterly gone leaving a wife and child. Who would eventually be my grandmother and aunt (or, half aunt) Iva May. A very quick end for a man who left his family to fight for an adopted country for whatever reason seemed to make sense to him. And another wasted life in the idiocy that is war.

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