Kenora Great War Project

 

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The People

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

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Johnston, David Daniel

Corporal David Daniel Johnston was married and the father of five children when he enlisted in the spring of 1915. He served overseas for three years and returned home shortly after the Armistice. David was the youngest son of Henry Johnston and Elizabeth McConnell of Whytewold, Manitoba. Henry was a farmer and he and his… Read More »

Whitaker, Roy Wesley James

Roy Wesley James Whitaker was born in April 1897 in Rat Portage (Kenora), Ontario. His birth was registered as 02 April but the 1901 census and his military service files have the date as 12 April.   His parents were William and Elizabeth Jane (Macfie) Whitaker.   Siblings included Alice, Vera, Beryle and Gerald.  William… Read More »

Skinner, Arthur

Arthur Skinner was born on 23 June 1874 in Malborough, Wiltshire, England. His father William Skinner, a tailor, was from Penzance, Cornwall while his mother Susan was from Lynn, Norfolk. The 1871 census found the family living in Wantage, Berkshire and in 1881 in Malborough. Known children born to the family were William (abt 1865… Read More »

Collings, Walter Frederick

Walter Frederick Collings was born on 04 November 1890 in London, England. His parents were William Collings (a foreman in mineral water works) and Ann Sarah Bennett. Siblings included William (born 1878), John (born 1876), Edward (born 1886) and Charles (born c. 1889). Walter’s father, William, had died by 1901 and the family was living… Read More »

Chivers, Patrick

Patrick Chivers was born on 17 January 1897 at home at 40 Wilkies Lane in Liff and Benvie in the district of St Peter on the outskirts of the city of Dundee in Scotland. At the time of his birth and up until his enlistment, the spelling of the surname was Shivers. His father Patrick… Read More »

Hutchinson, Thomas

Although Thomas Hutchinson gave his date of birth on his attestation papers as 18 August 1884 in Rosedale Abbey, Yorkshire, England, his birth was registered during the third quarter of 1883. His mother was Emma Hutchinson, born in 1866 in Rosedale Abbey, and had been working as a servant for the Read family in Muscoates… Read More »

Blunderfield, Edgar Russell

Edgar Russell Blunderfield was born on 19 March 1899 in Winnipeg, Manitoba. His parents were George Edgar Blunderfield and Ella May Gossell, the couple marrying on 7 July 1897 in Winnipeg. In the early years George worked as a butcher but latterly as a building contractor. Children born to the couple were Gertrude May (1898),… Read More »

Cousins, Joseph

Joseph Cousins was born on 28 March 1881 in Leith, Midlothian in Scotland, a port on the northern outskirts of Edinburgh. His father Joseph Cousins was from Edinburgh while his mother Annie Stewart was from Bathgate, a community about 30 kilometres west of Edinburgh. The couple married on 26 September 1876 in Bathgate. Over the… Read More »

Budreau, Frederick

Although he gave his birth place as Kenora on his attestation papers, Frederick Budreau was likely born in the nearby village of Norman on 19 March 1894. His father Joseph Ebenezer Budreau, the son of French Canadians, was born in Fond du Lac, Wisconsin, while his mother Mary Forest Hackett was born in Pennsylvania. Mary’s… Read More »

Webber, Aubrey Michael

Private Aubrey Michael Webber enlisted in August 1915 and served in Canada, the UK and France. He became very ill with tuberculosis and he was invalided to Canada in the spring of 1918 to continue his recovery. Aubrey was the son of Samuel George Webber and Harriet Mason of Boston, Lincolnshire, England. Samuel and Harriet… Read More »