Kenora Great War Project

 

You can also view an Alphabetical List

The People

soldier_photobar

These are the stories of Kenora participants in the First World War.

Search by name, or filter the search results using the list of options below.

Parsons, Henry Edmund

Henry Edmund Parsons was born 2 January 1887 in Rat Portage, Ontario. His parents were Alfred Joseph Parsons and Florence Nightingale Johnstone. Alfred and Florence were both born in Quebec, Alfred in Huntingdon and his wife in Sorel. They were married in Montreal in October 1883 and their first child, Beatrice, was born the following… Read More »

Locking, Albert William

The son of Annie Adelaide Jones, Albert William Dunham Jones was born on 28 January 1889 in North Somercotes, Lincolnshire, England. At the time of his birth his mother was working as a domestic servant. By the 1891 England census, Annie and Albert were listed as visitors with the William and Caroline Humberstone family in… Read More »

Genge, Horace John

Private Horace John Genge was born on 6 October 1895 in Rat Portage, Ontario. His father, George Alexander Genge, was born Syracuse, New York and his mother, Isabella Jane Jobb, in Wingham, Ontario. George and Isabella were married in Brandon, Manitoba in 1891. Their first two children were born in Brandon: Thomas (1892) and Mary… Read More »

Desilet, Joseph Octave

Joseph Octave Desilet was born on 23 July 1888 in St Theodore de Chertsy, Montcalm, Quebec, date confirmed by his baptism record. His father Israel Desilet was from Joliette in Quebec while his mother Marie Leontine Perrault was from St Theodore where the couple married on 27 July 1886. At the time of the marriage… Read More »

Hamel, George

George James Hamel was most likely born on 28 February 1883 in Lorette, Manitoba. His birth was registered in St. Boniface (now part of Winnipeg) as Georges Julien Roger. His parents were Amede Hamel and Odile Lamy. Odile was born in Quebec but different census records give Amede’s birth place as Quebec, Ontario and the… Read More »

Giving, Martin

Corporal Martin Giving was living in Kenora, Ontario when he was called up under the U.S. draft in July 1918. He served in the U.S. Army for five months. Martin was the oldest son of Ole and Anna Giving (Geving/Gjeving) of Haugen, Aitken County, Minnesota. Ole and Anna were both born in Norway and they… Read More »

Watkinson, William Reuben

Although he gave his date of birth as 23 July 1893 in Birmingham, Warwickshire, England on his attestation papers, Reuben William Watkinson was born in 1889. His mother Lydia Ashman was born in London and married his father George Watkinson, widower, in Birmingham in 1883. George, born in Birmingham, had previously married Mary Ann Fisher… Read More »

Dempster, Thomas

Thomas Dempster was one of four brothers, the sons of John and Catherine Dempster to volunteer for service during the war. John and Catherine brought their family to Canada in 1907 from Glasgow, Scotland where John was a baker. He’d found employment for himself and his older sons at the Lake of the Woods Milling… Read More »

Spence, Robert

Robert Spence was born on 3 November 1893 in Rat Portage (later renamed Kenora) in northwestern Ontario. His parents Robert Spence and Elizabeth Park Johnston were both from the Orkneys in Scotland, marrying on 21 June 1888 in Burray, South Ronaldshay. At the time Robert, a widower, was working as a fisherman. Later that year… Read More »

MacVicar, Peter

Peter MacVicar was a well known railway locomotive engineer from Kenora. His family had immigrated to Canada from Scotland in 1894 and purchased a farm near Portage la Prairie. The family included parents Donald (born in 1847) and Susan MacLeod (1848), and their children Neil (1875), George (1877), Peter (1878), Alexander (1880), John (1885), Angus… Read More »