Photo finds its way back home

March 2017

“My cousin went to a garage sale in Regina and picked up this post card. He sent it to me because he thought I might appreciate it,” said Mabel Silver, a long-time resident of Westfort. Mabel wanted to share the photo with Bayview readers in the hopes that people might recognize some of the members of the Fort William Girls Pipe Band featured in the photo.

“I was so impressed with how many girls were in the band,” said Mabel. She was also inspired by the inscription on the flip side of the post card. The card read "Welcome Home! Sons and Daughters of Canada. Welcome Home!"

Fort William has been a “A House By the Side of the Road” to thousands of the nation’s warriors on their way to the ramparts of Freedom.

Here, “where East meets West and West meets East,” we have said farewell to you and your comrades in arms proudfully but ever conscious of the sacrifices and the pain of conflict which would be yours to endure.

And now, upon your return, Fort William greets you with a heartfelt welcome tempered only by the marks of strain and combat which you bear, and the silent ranks of your unreturning comrades.

May this printed token from the people of Fort William remain among your souvenirs, an ever living reminder that time shall not erase our gratitude to you our defenders and deliverers in mankind’s strife unto Victory.

Mabel said the words on the card were meaningful to her because the troupe trains used to pass her house many times a day. As an eight-year old she remembers waving to the troupes as they passed through Fort William along the CP Rail track. “We lived at the corner of Sprague and Amelia Streets and the trains would come by a lot. My mom used to curse them because the trains smoked up her laundry that she had
out on the line!” remembers Mabel.

As a child Mabel said she’d wave enthusiastically and the soldiers would wave back. “I realize now that they were probably making such a fuss over us because they were missing their own kids so much.”

Mabel, who will turn 84 on Good Friday (and was born on Good Friday), is pleased that the card has found a home back in Westfort among her souvenirs. Who knows, it could have been handed to a soldier in Fort William as he made his way back home to his children in Regina so many years earlier.

Nancy Angus is a freelance writer and regular contributor to Bayview. Contact her at nangus@shaw.ca

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