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For King & Colony… Vol I: Canada's Grand Adventure

by Stewart Charles Summers

244 pages; quality trade paperback (softcover); catalogue #06-2382; ISBN 1-4251-0624-2; US$23.00, C$25.00, EUR18.00, £12.50

Canada's War of Independence effectively ended Canada's 'Britishness' and distinguished the Canadians as a very different people. It is fought here in the dialogue between characters set accurately in the hell of Armageddon; 1914-18.

About the Book

For King and Colony… began to take form with the discovery of the lone grave of a Canadian soldier in a churchyard in the Vale of Arden, Warwickshire; the "Heart of England". At one level, it is the story of a war which raged for four years and saw the deaths of over 66,000 Canadians, the maiming of three times that number… And changed the lives of all Canadians. Others call it the Great War, the First World War; even the War of Victoria's Grandchildren, but for Canadians it was Canada's War of Independence.

Researched as an historical work, this is fundamentally a work of fiction in which an eclectic mix of characters; Canadian, English, Irish; fight Canada's War of Independence in their personal relationships; their perceptions, and indeed, misperceptions of one another.

This leads to the story within the story; the purpose of the work. Canadians rallied to defend the Empire in its hour of need at the outset of the war, but their exposure to the incompetence, criminal mismanagement, arrogance, and duplicity of the English quickly led to the rise of Canada's nationalism… And the emergence of the finest fighting force on the Western Front; a force which overwhelmed; a force which war-loving nations could not defend against; a force known simply as "the Canadian Corps"; which fought with the sole objective of ending war.

Through the eyes of a few of the men who were there, this is the story of how that Corps came into being…

Volume I; Canada's Grand Adventure begins with the mobilisation in August 1914 of the Militia units and new volunteers which combine to become Fourth Canadian Infantry Battalion and follows them in transit from Niagara-on-the-Lake to Toronto, on to the chaos of the Valcartier Camp near Quebec, onwards again on their month-long journey across the Atlantic; to their eventual arrival at the quagmire of the Bustard Camp on the Salisbury Plain, where the rank and file behave as soldiers always behave, given the chance… As their officers struggle to prepare them for the war.

It is through the lives and fates of these men; the "Originals", and those who will follow; the "New Guys" (replacements), that the story of Canada's War of Independence is told. Some, such as Collard, Atkins, and Birchall are real people who served in that unit during the war, while others are not. By New Year, 1915 they are as ready as they will never be.

Volume II; Canada's Colonial Struggle follows Fourth Battalion across the English Channel (via the Atlantic due to the Royal Navy's inability to control what the British consider to be their own private waterway — so much for "Britannia Rules the Waves") and into the trenches of the Armentieres Sector on the Western Front.

They endure their first two months of the squalor of life "in the line", and suffer their first casualties before they and the rest of First Canadian Division are sucked into the bloody vortex of the Ypres Salient; where they are decimated holding back the onslaught of Germany's first use of gas on the battlefield… But the survivors remain.

They withdraw; begin absorbing what will become a seemingly endless stream of "New Guys"…

Volume III; Canada's National Victory sees the "Originals" and those of the "New Guys" who prove themselves to be survivors settle into the drudgery of life in the trenches in the summer of 1915 and on through the fall and winter in the Ploegsteert (Plugstreet) Sector.

New Guys come and go. Originals just go.

In the spring of 1916 a few enjoy "home leave" (i.e. to England) before they are moved once again into the Ypres Salient where, as part of the newly-formed Canadian Corps, they again stop the Germans in their tracks at Mount Sorrel before being sucked into an even more mindless, even more bloody cauldron at Courcelette on the Somme… And Regina Trench right behind it.

The war is only half-over, but Canada's National Army has emerged as the most feared force on the Western Front…

About the Author

Determinedly a civilian, but the son of an RCAF pilot and grandson of an amputee of the Great War, the author has long been fascinated by the vast, largely unappreciated contribution Canada’s military has made (and continues to make) to its national identity.

This legacy, combined with a lifetime of commuting between Canada and England — giving him a near-unique insight into the subtle yet fundamental differences between the Canadians and the English — combine in this work to present a sometimes-witty, often-tragic, controversial view of the advent of Canadian nationalism on the battlefields of Canada's War of Independence; 1914-1918.

Reviews

"For King and Colony… combines historical accuracy with a rousing cast of fictional characters to take the reader through Canada's contribution to the victory in World War One.

The reader is instantly bound to the soldiers as they proceed through their training, deployment, and sacrifice during the Second Battle of Ypres and on through the winter drudgery of the Ploegsteert sector to the Somme.

Attention to historical accuracy coupled with strong characterisation grips the reader throughout the trilogy."

Col. Brent Warne

Excerpts