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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Birbeck, Ivan

Ivan Birbeck was born on 26 April 1899 in Rat Portage (later renamed Kenora) in northwestern Ontario. According to William Shurtleff’s Shurtleff and Lawton Families: Genealogy and History and other sources, Ivan’s father Thomas Edson Birbeck was born in 1865 in Leeds, Yorkshire in England. At a young age he ran away from home and… Read More »

Gordon, Hugh Blair

Hugh was born  December 6, 1887 in Maybole, Ayrshire Scotland to Alexander and Mary (McLeod) Gordon.  He was the 11th of 14 children. Some of the family, including Hugh, set sail for Canada on the SS Corinthian, leaving Glasgow on August 18, 1906.   Upon arrival in Montreal, the family arrived in Keewatin, Ontario September… Read More »

Mansfield, Charles Smart

Charles Smart Mansfield was the son of Arthur Holmes Mansfield and Mabel Ida Smart. Mabel was born in Maine and Arthur in Vermont. They were married in 1893 and Charles was born in Brownville Junction, Maine on 21 May 1894. He was followed by a brother and two sisters: Paul Burrill (1895), Pauline (1898) and… Read More »

McIntee, Merrit Melton

Birth date and location: Merrit Melton McIntee was arguably one of the oldest living Canadians in recorded history, reaching 106 years of age – just 3 weeks away from his 107th birthday. Merrit was not born in Kenora and did not enlist in Kenora; however, he and his wife lived here for nineteen years, when… Read More »

Holt, Harry

Lance Corporal Harry Holt joined the British army in 1912 and served for eight years, two of them spent as a German prisoner of war. After his discharge in 1920 he immigrated to Canada. Harry was the son of Walter Holt and Eliza Riley of Manchester, Lancashire, England. Walter and Eliza were married in 1890… Read More »

Valentine, William

According to his attestation papers, William Valentine was born on 2 September 1893 although later census documents give his birth as in August of 1894. With his birth surname of Laurenson, his mother was Catherine Laurenson, daughter of Robert and Eliza  (née Perrault) Laurenson. William and his two younger siblings, Barbara born on 10 August… Read More »

Campbell, James Meiklejohn

James Meiklejohn Campbell was born on 29 January 1886 in Dunfermline, Fife in Scotland. His father Henry Campbell was from Busby in Lanarkshire while his mother Margaret Meiklejohn was from Greenock in Renfrewshire. The couple married on 6 June 1873 in Barrhead, Renfrewshire. They gave birth to daughter Janet in 1874 and son Robert in… Read More »

Morgan, James George

Throughout the war railroads were essential for evacuating the wounded and moving troops, equipment and supplies, and skilled workers were needed for their construction, maintenance and operation. Sapper James George Morgan, a CPR employee from Kenora, Ontario, enlisted with a railway unit in March 1917 and served in France and Belgium for two years. George… Read More »

Taylor, William

Private William Taylor was born in 1888 in Echt, Aberdeenshire, Scotland. He was living in northwestern Ontario when he was conscripted in the fall of 1917. He had his army medical on 12 November in Kenora, giving his address as the neighbouring town of Keewatin. His occupation was labourer, he was single and next of… Read More »

Nickle, John James

Sapper John James Nickle was the only son of Daniel Nickle (Nichol) and Jane Johnston of Ottawa, Ontario. Daniel was from Quebec and his wife was born in Ottawa. They had at least five children, all born in Ottawa: John James (b. 21 May 1878), Mary Ann, Sarah, Agnes and Rebecca. When the 1891 census… Read More »