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An exhibition commemorating Canadian soldiers who served and were killed during the First World War was unveiled Saturday in northern Toronto, in anticipation of Remembrance Day marking the centenary of the 1918 Armistice.
The exhibition "The Remembrances and Propaganda of the First World War" contains hundreds of artifacts and images from distant battlefields that capture the suffering of the bloody conflict that devastated the world. Western Europe for more than four years, killing more than 600,000 Canadians.
"These are touching, wonderful and important," said John Kennedy, a former professor of psychology at the University of Toronto, about the photographs, letters and newspaper clippings exhibited at the Don Heights Unitarian Congregation in Toronto. North York.
"They show you the magnitude, the scope, the destruction of this war."
John Kennedy, on the right, says he found this trunk filled with war materials in his attic. (CBC)
A few years ago, Kennedy claims to have found a metal trunk filled with war materials in the attic of a house he had just moved into. He later learned that its contents belonged to a former owner, Jeanne Compondou, who had collected German propaganda material and photos of the First World War.
The artifacts were exposed on Saturday.
Kennedy hopes that they will offer important lessons to Torontonians on how to avoid future conflicts and keep the peace.
"How can we correct the divisions that occur?" he asked: "That's what we need to learn from what happened in 1914".
"He was an inspiration"
Sheila White's grandfather, Honorary Captain William (Andrew) White, was the first Black Officer and Chaplain of the Canadian Expeditionary Force when he enlisted in the 2nd Construction Battalion in 1917, according to the Maritime Museum of the Atlantic.
The separate battalion was entirely composed of black men who had volunteered to participate in war work. The 500 soldiers in the unit were unarmed and never witnessed any fighting.
"He started lobbying for black men to serve when the army was separated and they did not want blacks to be involved," said Sheila, who has never met her grandfather . He died of cancer before his birth.
Sermons and memorabilia from the First World War of Honourary Captain William (Andrew) White are on display at the exhibition. He was the first black officer to serve in the Canadian Expeditionary Force. (CBC)
But she said White's legacy, which defends the rights of black men to serve in the war, lasts through the archives that he has preserved, including sermons.
"It has been a source of inspiration not only to the black community of Canada, but to the whole country," Sheila said.
White's memories of the war are among those exhibited at the small free exhibition organized by the Unitarian congregation of Don Heights.
"It was a chaplain who had warned a racial riot between white and black soldiers in France in 1917 and he had brought a message about race relations," she said.
Upon returning from the war, White continued to preach and promote humanitarian and fraternal ideas in Nova Scotia, Sheila said.
The exhibition will be open every weekend until the end of the month.
