WAR BRIDES
The stories of the women who left everything behind to follow the men they loved
WAR BRIDES
The stories of the women who left everything behind to follow the men they loved
MELYNDA JARRATT
Copyright © Melynda Jarratt, 2009
Originally published by Tempus Publishing Limited in 2007.
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise (except for brief passages for purposes of review) without the prior permission of Dundurn Press. Permission to photocopy should be requested from Access Copyright.
Project Editor: Michael Carroll
Copy Editor: Jason Karp
Printer: Webcom
Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Jarratt, Melynda
War brides : the stories of the women who left everything behind to follow the men they loved / by Melynda Jarratt.
ISBN 978-1-55488-386-8
1.War brides--Canada--Biography. 2. War brides--Great Britain--Biography. 3. Women immigrants--Canada-Biography. I. Title.
D810.W7J39 2009 940.53082 C2009-900302-3
1 2 3 4 5 13 12 11 10 09
We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council for our publishing program. We also acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program and The Association for the Export of Canadian Books, and the Government of Ontario through the Ontario Book Publishers Tax Credit program, and the Ontario Media Development Corporation.
Care has been taken to trace the ownership of copyright material used in this book. The author and the publisher welcome any information enabling them to rectify any references or credits in subsequent editions.
J. Kirk Howard, President
Printed and bound in Canada.
Cover Images:
Left: Isobel ‘Zoe’ (Blair) Boone and son, Gordon, in Rowena, New Brunswick, 1950.
Top: RMS Mauretania arriving at Halifax, Nova Scotia on 24 August 1946.
Right: John and Morfydd (Morgan) Gibson of the Black Watch Regiment on their wedding day, 6 September 1944. Bottom foreground: Rose and pen copyright © iStockphoto.com.
Bottom background: Letter from Private Marshall Boone of the Carleton York Regiment to his fiancée, Zoe Blair, when he was a prisoner of war in Germany.
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This book is dedicated to my War Bride friends Doris (Field) Lloyd and Zoe (Blair) Boone and to my mother Lucy (Hennessy) Jarratt
Contents
Preface: The Battle of Love by Melynda Jarratt
3 Ontario
4 Western Canada
5 Military Service
6 War Widows
7 War Fiancées
8 Children of War Brides
9 Canadian War Brides of the First World War
APPENDICES
Table I Résumé of Marriages and Births of known marriages and births for servicemen married while serving outside Canada to 31 December 1946
Table II Marriages and Births by Branch of Service
Table III Immigration to Canada by War Brides and Their Children 1942–1948
Table IV Canadian Wives Bureau Flow Chart
Bibliography
Notes
Index
1 Betty Hillman
2 Jean Paul and baby Christine
3 Mary and Al Gero’s wedding day
4 Addison and Elizabeth MacDonald’s wedding day
5 Mildred and Harold Sowers’ wedding day
6 Mary Sheppard’s medals
7 Conrad and Joan Landry on their wedding day
8 Rose and Horace Boulay on their wedding day
9 Henrietta Pronovost
10 Joyce and Bob Bezeau on their wedding day
11 John and Morfydd Gibson on their wedding day
12 Margaret Bristow Eaton and her two children on arrival in Chatham
13 Wilson and Martha Stauffer on their wedding day
14 Les and Rita Buckrell on their wedding day
15 Margaret Bell and her husband on a swing at his family’s farm
16 Norman and Gwen Hall
17 Elizabeth Wasnidge on her wedding day
18 Margot and Ted Carmichael
19 Doris Barr’s immigration ID
20 Doris Barr’s Canadian