Alexander Lyon Sandy McKenzie With Jack McKenzie and Kenneth McKenzie

Transcription

1 Alexander Lyon Sandy McKenzie With Jack McKenzie and Kenneth McKenzie Sandy McKenzie was born on November 11, 1893 to Alexander and Dora McKenzie, in Finch, Ontario, a small town south of Ottawa not far from Winchester. His father, Alexander Sr., was born in Cawdor, Scotland in 1853 and came to Canada in either 1874 (1901 census) or 1881 (1911 census). In 1891 he was a retail merchant in Finch, but he seems also to have lived in Spencerville, a town about 20 km from Prescott. In 1887 he married Dora Bennett, 23, of Edwardsburgh (near Spencerville), who had been born in Ontario of Irish parents. The McKenzies had six children there: Andrew Bennett (1888 Stormont); Hector William Wallace (1889 Spencerville); Dora (1892 Spencerville); Alexander (Sandy) (1893 Finch); John L (Jack) (1896 Spencerville); and Jessie ( ). By 1901 the family had moved to Ottawa because Alexander Sr. had taken a position as a salesman for T. Lindsay Ltd. They had two more children: Donald Kenneth (1899) and Ellen (1904). Sometime before 1905 they moved to 50 Victoria Street, New Edinburgh, where the 1911 census shows him making $725 a year with a $2000 life insurance policy. T. Lindsay Ltd. was Ottawa s first department store which opened a Chicago-style four-storey building at Rideau Street and Sussex Drive to great fanfare in When Lindsay died in 1909, A. E. Rae and Co., a Montreal company, took over the business and expanded the building with a new wing and two additional storeys in McKenzie continued to work for Rae. He kept his job when Rae went into receivership in 1915 and H. J. Daly (president of the Home Bank) continued to operate the store under the Rae name until The federal government began to lease space in the building in 1917 and when the Rae store was finally closed, the government leased the whole building in 1919 and bought it in 1921 it was then known to two generations of public servants as The Daly Building. McKenzie is listed in the 1916 Might s directory only as salesman, and he probably retired in

2 The MacKay Presbyterian Church communion rolls record Alexander McKenzie Sr. as a rather irregular attendee but his wife was faithful in her attendance and was an active member of the Ladies Aid during the war. Their daughter Jessie joined by profession of faith in Sandy is not listed, but he may have been captain of the church hockey team. In 1908 another daughter Dora ( Dollie ) died in the Protestant Hospital at age 16 of spinal meningitis. Sometime before 1911 the two oldest McKenzie boys struck out for North Bay to seek their fortunes working on the Toronto and Northern Ontario Railway, Wallace as an engineer, Bennett as a fireman. Wallace McKenzie married Stella Ruth Clermont in 1912, had several children, and was described in the 1921 census describes him as an engineer earning $3000 a year. He died in 1949 in North Bay. In 1912 Andrew Bennett McKenzie married Jessie Gertrude Morrison, age 18, a farmer s daughter, in North Bay. Alexander Lyon Sandy McKenzie appears to have been a popular and athletic young man, one of the many New Edinburgh athletes who were his close neighbours. According to an obituary in the Ottawa Journal, he was well-known throughout the city and well known in sporting circles and a member of the New Edinburgh Canoe Club, hockey club and football club. He may be the S. McKenzie who is pictured as captain of the MacKay Church team in On August 17, 1915, Sandy and his younger brother, John Langsdale Jack McKenzie, born in 1896, joined a Northern Ontario regiment, the 37 th (Algonquin Rifles). It appears that Jack was working at Gore Bay, Manitoulin Island as a store clerk with Smith Bros. (the Smiths were relatives). Sandy, who was visiting them and had many friends there, signed up as well. The 37 th then assembled at the Niagara Camp for training, and there the two brothers were formally attested for the Canadian Expeditionary Force on September 7, John was assigned service no and Alex no Jack McKenzie (picture at right) was born on April 10, 1896, in Spencerville, Ontario. He was 5 5 ½ tall, dark complexion, brown eyes, dark brown hair. Sandy was 5 6 ½, dark complexion, hazel eyes, black hair, and his occupation was listed as Brakeman (possibly on the railroad that ran through New Edinburgh?). The brothers trained with the 37 th until they were sent to England aboard the SS Lapland which arrived in Liverpool on December 12, Once in England, the 37 th was broken up 2

3 and on February 3, 1916 (another document says December 1915) they were transferred to the 17 th Reserve Battalion at Shorncliffe. Along with most of the men of the 37 th, the brothers were then assigned to the 13 th Canadian Infantry (Quebec Regiment) in the 3 rd Brigade of the 1 st Division. This was a Highland unit made up mostly of Montreal s Royal Highlanders which was being rebuilt after losing almost half its strength in the Second Battle of Ypres and being again destroyed in the subsequent battles of the Ypres Salient in When the McKenzie brothers joined the 13 th on April 8, 1916 it was in Divisional Reserve just south of Poperinghe. It had been in the line in front of Hill 60 and had then moved to the rear at Dickebusch Huts where it had been shelled and sustained casualties. In the words of the historian of the 13 th Battalion: Much water had flowed beneath the bridges since [1915], but the Salient was the Salient still a place of deservedly evil reputation, where hurricane bombardments swept out of a cloudless sky, where bloody encounters were the rule rather than the exception and where death was ever present, or just around the corner. Jack McKenzie s war lasted a matter of days. The Battalion enjoyed its few days of time in reserve, playing football, cleaning clothes, visiting estaminets, showing off their pipe bands, taking musketry practice and other forms of training and drill, attending shows and concerts, and being mustered for Sunday services. Then on April 15 it moved forward to a line called the bluff, formed by earth excavated in the digging of the Ypres canal a confused set of trenches which did not connect properly with a front line straddling the canal. Sniping and shelling immediately welcomed the Canadians to this part of the line. During April 16 th there was artillery activity on both sides, says the Battalion s history. In the morning the enemy fired about thirty rounds of high explosives into a trench on No. 3 Coy s front, smashing in the parapet, burying a machine gun and causing several casualties, while later in the day an automatic trench thrower projected a series of bombs into Hedge Row, a trench held by No. 4 Coy. Here, however, the damage was slight. Casualties for the day totalled 3 killed and 6 wounded. Jack McKenzie was one of these casualties, hit by a piece of shrapnel from a trench mortar bomb which tore through his face above the eye to the bridge of his nose and also entered his arm. On April 17 he was admitted to the No. 6 British Red Cross Hospital at Étaples. On April 25 he was evacuated to England where he would spend the rest of the war. Sandy McKenzie remained with the Battalion through another week of heavy shelling and bitter skirmishing in the craters in front of Mount Sorrel, in which the Battalion lost nine officers and 164 men killed, wounded, missing, or taken prisoner before it was relieved on April 23. During its next tour at the front, in May, it suffered heavy bombing, sniping, and shelling as the men worked to rebuild their damaged defences. Not least of their concerns was the impact of the mud and filth of the trenches, with water, rats, and unburied bodies posing a real threat of infection and disease. During their time at the rear a great deal of attention had to be paid to restoring the men s feet, as many had suffered trench foot and other ailments from standing in water and mud. Sandy McKenzie became a casualty on May 28, 1916, when he was admitted to the 2 nd Canadian Field Ambulance with an infected finger (not a trivial matter in the days before antibiotics). He did not rejoin his unit until June 12 and he may or may not have participated in the battle of Mount Sorrel on June 13 when the Battalion suffered yet more losses in a successful counterattack. 3

4 By this time the 13 th was a full-fledged Scottish regiment with strong ties to the Black Watch in Scotland and the other kilted regiments from Canada. The men wore kilts with long socks and puttees during all but the worst of the winter months when they were allowed trues or trousers. The kilts were frequently wet or coated with mud and must have been cold in the damp of the trenches, but they were a source of pride to these regiments and no one complained. After a period in reserve the 13 th endured two further stints in the front line at Sanctuary Wood in June and July, with heavy shelling, raiding, and constant death, in what was by now becoming a shambles of a front line where thousands of men on both sides were sacrificed for little gain in what was becoming a side-show to the main theatres of war further south. In August 1916, the 13 th marched south to join the Battle of the Somme. Shortly after its arrival the Battalion was thrown into battle prematurely in support of an Australian attack on Pozières Ridge. Two Companies were rushed forward to plug gaps in the line and were exposed to heavy fighting and shelling in a series of desperate struggles that lasted all day, with the Germans at various times getting behind the Canadians or between them and the Australians. Units were cut off and had to fight it out without food or water. As the Battalion s historian summed up the action on September 4: Taking it all in all, the Battalion s first experience on the Somme had been a hard one. Thrown into a fight before they had any real conception of the area, with their flanks in the air, and under a strange command [Australian], the men of Nos. 1 and 2 Companies had acquitted themselves in a highly creditable manner, while their comrades in the other companies, many of them in their first engagement, had behaved with the coolness and reliability of seasoned veterans. Casualties had, of course, been severe. amongst the rank and file 60 men were killed, 247 were wounded and 16 were missing, a heavy list, considering that the Battalion had been employed in what ranked merely as a minor phase of that great engagement. It is not known whether Sandy was in one of the first two companies, or which one, but in this battle he suffered a severe shrapnel wound to the left buttock. After treatment at No. 22 General Hospital at Camiers he was evacuated to England and entered Graylingwell War Hospital in Chichester on September 15. A medical admission report read: The wound at present is a deep long wound in the buttock drained by two large tubes that have their exit about 6 below. The wound has evidently been excised. He complains of pain in the gastric region, back and legs on arrival and wound is in very septic condition. Sandy McKenzie endured several weeks of low spiking fever and painful recovery in a series of hospitals. By November 6 the wound was healing well, though still discharging, and by the end of the year it had properly healed. On January 23, 1917, he was discharged from Woodcote Park Hospital in Epsom to a Canadian Casualty Assembly Centre at Shoreham where wounded soldiers were assessed for return to duty. From there he passed through convalescent units where soldiers recovered their strength, and then to the 20 th Reserve Battalion in Shoreham which he joined on March 15. On May 18, 1917, he was back in France with the 13 th Battalion. He had missed the bloody battles of Thiepval Ridge in September and Regina Trench in October 1916, in which the kilted highlanders had advanced with pipes playing into heavy fire through mud and rain, had been utterly slaughtered and forced to retreat, and had lost 13 of 17 officers and 288 of 360 men who 4

5 had gone into the battle. He also missed Vimy Ridge and Fresnoy, in which the Battalion was engaged in reserve/support capacities and suffered relatively light casualties. However, he was probably present at Hill 70 on August 15, After weeks of preparation and rehearsal, the 13 th was again in the vanguard of the attack and captured all its objectives with heavy losses, then dug in and the following day inflicted heavy losses on the Germans who repeatedly counterattacked. In this battle the 13 th captured 1500 Germans but lost 40% of its strength. The Battalion then retired to the rear to regroup and enjoy rest, games, baths, and training. On August 28, 1917 Sandy McKenzie s long experience, courage, leadership (and survival) was recognized when he was made a Lance Corporal. The 13 th spent some more time in the front lines in September, then in October was marched to the Ypres Salient. Fortunately for McKenzie, it played only a supporting role in the battle of Passchendaele. Nonetheless as support troops digging trenches, repairing lines constantly caving in under the rain, and burying the thousands of men who had been killed, the men endured the muddy quagmire in sodden kilts that were coated with layers of mud. They moved forward to hold captured positions and then on November 8 they were pulled back and sent to Arras for the winter, where they could at long last bathe, get new clothes, put on trousers, and finally rid themselves of the mud, and the memories, of Flanders. On December 31 Sandy McKenzie was made Corporal. On February 6, 1918 he was granted 14 days leave in England, from which he returned to the front on February 22. During March and April the 13 th moved constantly as the major German offensive struck deep into France, but he did not see action. On March 20 McKenzie had his pay stopped to make up for lost property an offense that does not seem to have been too serious since he was appointed Lance Sergeant on May 5, 1918 and then Sergeant on May 20, Once again settled in Arras, the men of the 13 th played sports, trained, and were, in many cases, sick with the influenza that within three months would mutate into the deadly Spanish Flu. Sandy went on a musketry course on July 15 as the 13 th as the Canadian Expeditionary Force began to prepare for the great assault that would begin the Hundred Days and lead to the end of the war. In early August the Battalion was moved several times from Arras to various points in the front line in order to deceive the Germans, and it moved into its final position at Amiens only hours before the attack began. The heavy guns opened up at 0420 on August 8, For the first time, at least according to the plan, tanks, artillery, machine guns, and aircraft were coordinated with the infantry. The 3 rd Brigade s attack formation and would bear the brunt of the attack and the 13 th would be in the centre. Following the bombardment companies of the 13 th moved forward under the now familiar rolling barrage. But all did not go according to plan. The Battalion suffered thirty casualties from unregistered guns whose shells fell short. It was hampered by mist and smoke that made coordination with tanks difficult. It had to take heavily entrenched machine guns with a shortage of bombs. In this assault the 13 th displayed many acts of individual bravery and sacrifice and won a Victoria Cross while suffering heavy losses. When it was relieved the Battalion had advanced the line 5000 yards, one-quarter of the total Canadian advance in one of our great Canadian victories of the war. The men of the 13 th once again moved to the rear to bury their dead, rest, and regroup while other units of the CEF pressed home the Allied attack against the retreating Germans. They were then 5

6 moved by stages to the Arras front to prepare for their role in the next Canadian set-piece battle: an attack on the heavily-fortified Hindenburg Line, the key to German defences in northern France. It is a tribute to the professionalism the Canadian Corps had now achieved that it could take on such a task with two weeks of planning and preparation instead of the months that had gone into Vimy Ridge. The Canadians commenced the attack on August 27 and pushed the Germans back to the Drocourt-Quéant Line, a heavily fortified entrenchment bristling with machine guns that would have to be knocked out one at a time, with grenades, rifles, and bayonets. Then it was the task of the 13 th to attack and break this Line, which they did on September 1, with 250 casualties. The number of officers who were killed or wounded in all these battles was so great that the role of NCOs like McKenzie was crucial in keeping attacks together and holding off counter-attacks. More Military Medals were won to add to the 43 awarded for Amiens. The Canadian advance was now rolling forward at breathtaking speed, with little time to regroup, repair, and refit between battles and less time to plan each new one. The 13 th replaced its losses with new drafts of men from the 5 th Division which was broken up in England, as well as the first inflow of conscript soldiers from Canada. At a drumhead church service the men learned that two of their number had been awarded the Victoria Cross. Then they began to prepare for what would be the high point of the war for General Currie and the Canadian Corps., the crossing of the Canal du Nord. This was the last remaining hinge in the German defensive position. If it fell there was little left between the Canal and the crucial city of Cambrai which was key to the German position in northern France. The Germans had flooded the land around the canal so that it was marshy and impassible. Four battalions, 2100 men, of the Third Brigade would have to cross at a narrow point where it was fordable, vulnerable to artillery and machine gun fire, then fan out on the other side to widen the bridgehead and allow the hundred thousand men of the Canadian Corps to pour through and engage the Germans on an everbroader and deeper front. Other Allied generals questioned whether this was too risky if the Canadian Corps were caught in the open they would be annihilated but Currie stuck to his plan. Besides his experienced troops he had coordinated artillery, air cover, machine guns, and tanks, and an engineering corps ready to build bridges over the canal to allow tanks and artillery to move forward to support the Canadian advance. The 14 th, a sister battalion, was on the left of the crucial crossing. Once across the canal, its assignment was to make a left hook to take the town of Sains-les Marquion and then advance almost parallel to the Sains-les-Marquion British Cemetery 6

7 canal to their Red Line positions. The 13 th would then pass through and advance on the heavily fortified town of Marquion against what was expected to be heavy resistance. The attack began with a heavy barrage at dawn on September 27, Under a steady drizzle with clouds of gas forcing them to wear respirators, the 14 th attacked, driving forward through heavy counterfire and destroying suicidal machine gun crews fighting to the last bullet. By 10 a.m., with heavy losses, they achieved their objectives. Then it was the turn of the 13 th, which had crossed the canal and now passed through the 14 th to attack the German positions around Marquion Village. Speed was of the essence. The men encountered obstacles of wire, were forced into narrow positions against heavy fire, and did not get the tank support they were promised. But still they had to attack. Company after company pressed forward, taking heavy losses. But the men pressed on through the village and its suburbs to their Green Line positions before giving way to the next attacking wave that passed through them. When the 13 th was relieved later in the day it had taken many prisoners and moved the front line forward, but once again with heavy losses. We do not know what Company Sandy McKenzie was in, but according to the Circumstances of Death Register: While attacking an enemy machine gun post near Marquion he was hit by a machine gun bullet and killed. McKenzie was one of 33 other ranks killed that day. For his bravery Sandy won the Military Medal. He was 24. The attack continued for two more days, taking Bourlon Wood and village, where Erland Perney had disappeared the previous year supporting a failed British assault, and pressing on past Cambrai. The Armistice, though they could not know it, was only six weeks away, and the Canadians were scoring remarkable victories. But the heavy price is evident in a visit to the many military cemeteries along the line of attack. The Canadians have suffered terrible losses during the last three days, wrote one man on September 29. Every time I look around for a familiar face, I find they are gone. The news reached McKenzie s family in Ottawa on October 10. Meanwhile Jack McKenzie had spent many months in England convalescing from his facial wound. On 27 April he was admitted to hospital in Folkestone, and on May 6 he was transferred to another centre in Epsom as OP/S casualty, then on May 30 to a long-term recovery centre in Epsom, from which he was released on June 5. Jack had lost almost all the sight in his right eye. He had a large scar from the outer angle of Right eye across face + over nose. There was damage to the eyeball itself and although his wounds healed within a month he was never again able to see clearly from that eye. For the rest of the war he was attached to Reserve battalions and Canadian Army Service Corps units in England as a clerk for pay, discipline, clothing, etc. with the rank of Sergeant. He was also attached to the YMCA which ran canteens, libraries, stores selling goods from Canada, and other facilities where soldiers far from home could meet, sing, and write letters home. He may well have been able to visit with his brother during Sandy s lengthy convalescence from September 1916 to May On December 17, 1918, he was moved to the base at Kinmel, Wales, awaiting transfer to Canada. He sailed for Halifax on the Olympic January 17, 1919, thereby 7

8 missing the riots at Kinmel. After a short service at home, and leave, he was discharged on February 10, He was 22. His discharge certificate shows that he had a tattoo mark on his right forearm (Scotland). A medical board ruled that he had 30% disability and could return to his previous occupation with some limitations. He was given a last pay of $ which represented accumulated pay plus clothing and post-discharge pay. Presumably he was entitled to a pension as well. Jack went back to Gore Bay on Manitoulin Island and married 20-year-old Evelyn Purvis on November 12, Their wedding trip included visits to family in North Bay, Ottawa, and Spencerville. They settled down to raise a family (they would have six children). Jack McKenzie became a prominent local businessman and both were active in their church and in community groups. She died in He died in 1989, best known for his keen interest in the sport of curling and the community curling rink. His love of curling was even more obvious when he made a trip last winter at the age of 88 years to throw a curling stone in the new Gore Bay Curling Rink. He is buried in Gore Bay. Kenneth McKenzie, the youngest brother, did not turn eighteen until October 28, 1917 and there probably was little enthusiasm for him to go off to the war that had killed one brother and severely injured another. Furthermore, according to his medical examination he had hammered toes on both feet. This is a condition caused by heredity, arthritis, or ill-fitting shoes that causes the middle toes to bend upward in an inverted V. At its worst it can lead to painful swelling, bunions, discomfort putting on shoes, and awkward walking certainly young Kenneth would not have been among the athletes of New Edinburgh. Today such a condition would be treated surgically but this was an expensive and perhaps risky operation at that time. He would surely have been rejected for service earlier in the war but his condition was no impediment to his being conscripted under the Military Service Act on November 9, 1918, a few days after his nineteenth birthday indeed, his paperwork was not completed until two days after the Armistice. Why proceed with conscripting him? Because there was still a need for soldiers to serve in expeditionary force which was being assembled in the fall of 1918 to serve in Siberia. He was 5 6 ½ fair hair and complexion, blue eyes, a general labourer. He was given service number and was classed as a sapper. Three days earlier, two other men from MacKay, also just passing their 19 th birthdays, were conscripted for Siberia: Samuel Kelly and Arthur Reginald Johnson. These men left for Siberia early in Kenneth assigned $15 a month pay to his mother (at one point their address is given as Box 388 Arnprior but it is not clear when or why). Fortunately they saw little action. The men left Siberia in April and were back in Canada in early May. Kenneth returned to Ottawa, had work done on his teeth courtesy the military, and on May 14 he was discharged, with no medals or honours, little military experience, and a small gratuity, but with an adventure he would remember and with his life. Their stories are told in Appendix A to the biography of Irwin Kelly. 8

9 Dora McKenzie received Sandy McKenzie s Memorial Cross as well as his other medals and Alex Sr. received his decorations and his certificate of service. On August 25, 1921, her husband Alexander McKenzie Sr. died at age 68 of Bright s disease at his home on 50 Victoria Street. Dora left New Edinburgh shortly after to live with her youngest daughter Ellen, a clerk, at 148 Belmont Avenue in Old Ottawa South. Ellen (or Eilleen, Ellean, Sheila, nicknamed Babe) had joined MacKay by profession of faith in 1920 and in 1925 married Donald Murray Delahey, a clerk, who had come from Renfrew County. The wedding took place at Knox Church, and though Ellen was no longer residing in New Edinburgh, she continued to be listed on the communion rolls as Mrs. Delahey (after 1925) until she was struck off in The Delaheys moved to Montreal at some point in the late 1920s, and travelled frequently, especially to the Bahamas, where Ellen died in Meanwhile, following his return from Sineria, Kenneth had moved to Hamilton where he worked as a clerk. Jessie was married in 1928 to George Francis Dalton, a Catholic civil servant aged 37, lived in the Glebe, and died in At some point in the 1930s Dora moved to Hamilton to live with her son Kenneth and died at his home at 584 Main Street in She is buried at Spencerville with her husband and daughter Dora, and Sandy is also memorialized on their tombstone. Alexander Lyon McKenzie is buried in Sains-les-Marquion British Cemetery. This is near the village whose capture was of such crucial importance in the crossing of the Canal du Nord. It is about 12 kilometres north-west of Cambrai and 2 kilometres south of the road leading from Arras to Cambrai, which was the main axis of the Canadian advance in the Hundred Days. Along this road are two major Canadian war memorials and many small cemeteries including Tigris Lane, where Irwin Kelly is buried, some with names like Quebec, Ontario, and Dominion, which were opened after each major battle to accommodate those (mostly Canadians) killed in the rapid Allied advance along this road toward Cambrai and ultimately Mons. Sains-les- Marquion was captured by the Canadians on September 27, 1918, in the battle in which McKenzie was killed. 9

10 The cemetery is located at one corner of a crossroads on the outskirts of the village, with the Great Cross outside the cemetery at one corner of the intersection. There are a few houses at the crossroads and more straggle along the road leading into town. The cemetery is surrounded by a low stone wall which encloses it from the surrounding roads and fields, and the main entrance is a gate half-way along the south wall off the main road. There is no Stone of Remembrance. On the other three sides is an expanse of open fields of sugar beets, with windmills turning lazily in the sky, which contrasts with the village at one corner and the enclosed cemetery. The cemetery contains the graves of 185 Canadians who fell between September 27 and the middle of October, As in many of the other cemeteries hastily created along this line of advance, they appear to have been buried two to a grave, as evidenced by the close proximity of the headstones (and in fact a few headstones also have two names on them). The cemetery was enlarged after the Armistice when 69 British and one Australian bodies were brought in from surrounding battlefields and from Marquion churchyard. These British soldiers fell in the battle of Arras in April and May 1917 (when the Canadians were fighting further north on the Vimy front). The British captured this terrain but failed in the fall to take Cambrai. The Germans retook the village in their spring offensive of 1918, until the Canadians took it back. 10

11 Sandy McKenzie was among the first to be buried there. His stone is along the back wall of the cemetery (Ref I.A.2 on map above in a row of men who fell on September 27, and the three rows in front of his all have men who died on that or the following day. His stone bears the inscription, placed there by the family, Safe in the arms of Jesus. 11