English

Les soldats de Buckingham et la Grande Guerre.

Ce site est voue a la memoire des veterans de la guerre 1914-1918 ayant une association avec la ville de Buckingham (Quebec, Canada), victimes ou survivants (notez que le mot "association" est soigneusement choisit: il peut s'agir du lieu de naissance, residence, residence du "plus proche parent", sepulture ou memorial). Il ne se veut pas militariste, ne fait pas l'appologie de la guerre, mais vise a faire redecouvrir une page d'histoire minimise par le temps et surtout commemorer le souvenir de concitoyens qui ont participe a une guerre eprouvante et horrible. Ils furent parfois tues, souvent blesses et on peut croire qu'un nombre encore plus grand furent blesses dans leurs ames. Si cela ne suffisait pas, il faut penser que ces veterans de la "derniere des dernieres", durent se resigner a voir leurs propres enfants partir pour la Deuxieme Guerre Mondiale: on ne peut qu'imaginer leurs angoisses a la pensee que leurs fils, et filles, auraient a subir les memes horreurs qu'ils avaient connu 20 ans auparavant.

En consequence, ces veterans meritent bien que leur nom occupe une ligne dans l'histoire de leur ville. C'est ce que ce site, tres imparfait a bien des egards, tente de faire.

Il presente donc une liste de veterans, forcement incomplete, de plus de 300 noms. Dans la majorite des cas, des liens internet menent a leurs attestation sur le site des Archives Nationales.  Une section est voue aux victimes: des recherches ont permit d'etablir l'identite complete de la plus part de celles-ci, de meme que les circonstances de leur deces. L'internaute y trouvera egalement des notes biographiques sur les victimes et certains autres veterans. Finalement une liste de soldats decores pour leurs actions.

Au fil de mes recherches, j'ai appris a ma grande surprise qu'il n'y a pratiquement pas un site de bataille majeure du Corps Expeditionaire Canadien ou au moins un buckinois ne soit tombe: Vimy, Mont Sorrel, Arras, Ypres, Passchendaele, la Scarpe, Cambrai, la Somme (tranchees Regina, Kenora, Desire).

Il va de soit que toute personne pouvant contribuer informations, copies de document, photographies, est priee de communiquer avec moi.

Beaucoup de materiel neuf sera ajoute aus cours des semaines prochaines: lettres, extrait de lettres, soldats, infirmieres, aviateurs. Entre temps, il est possible qu'il y ait des incoherences entre les pages.

Buckingham's soldiers of the Great War.

This site is dedicated to the memory of the great war soldiers having a connection to the town of Buckingham (Quebec, Canada), victims or survivors (note that the word "connection" was carefully chosen, it may be the place of birth, residence, residence of the "next of kind", burial or memorial). It is not a militaristic site, it does not make the apology of war, but rather aims at a rediscovery of a page of local history that has been nearly erased by time. But mostly, it tries to commemorate local fellow citizen that participated in a trying and horrible war. They where sometime killed, often wounded and one could believe that many more where wounded in their souls. If that was not enough, we must realize that those veterans, having endured the most horrible war, saw their sons and daughters leave for World War Two. We can only imagine their anguish at the thought of their children having to endure the same horrors that they did 20 years earlier.

In view of this, they more than deserve that their names became a line in the history of their village. That is what this site, imperfect in too many ways, tries to do.

So it present a list of veterans, necessarily incomplete, of over 300 names. In most case, internet links are provided to their attestation form on the National Archives site.  Additionally a section is dedicated to the victims: research as enabled us to establish the complete identity of most of them and the circumstances of their death. The reader will also find some biographic notes on the victims and a few other veterans. Finally a list of soldiers that where awarded decorations for their actions.

In the process of researching this, I was much surprised to discover that there is hardly one major Canadian Expeditionary Corp battleground that isn't "Buckingham's forever": Vimy, Mont Sorrel, Arras, Ypres, Passchendaele, the Scarpe, Cambrai, the Somme (Regina, Kenora and Desire trenches).

To the english reader, I apologize for the yet incomplete translations, mainly in the "Biographical Notes" section. As my research on a particular veteran is finalized (and so the text), it get translated.

It goes without saying that I would be much obliged to anyone who could contribute information, copies of documents, photographs and invite them to contact me.

A lot of new material will be added in the next few weeks: letters, part of letters, soldiers, nurses, aviators. In the mean time, there may be inconsistencies between pages.