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Despite the fact that Canada was in the war
from the beginning, our country has not
memorialized the stories of the war with the
same fervour as their allied counterparts.

his year marks the 75th anniversary of the end

of World War Il; it is considered one of the most
notable moments in human history. The United
States, Britain, France, and even Germany have
made documentaries and autobiographies to tell the
story of the men who came home—and the men who
were lost forever. However, there is a blind spot in
Canada. This country has fought in some of the most
important battles in the war like the Battle of Ortona
in the Italian Campaign; despite this, and the fact
that Canada was in the war from the beginning, our
country has not memorialized the stories of the war
with the same fervour as their allied counterparts.
Historian Tim Cook, author of The Fight for History:
75 Years of Forgetting, Remembering, and Remaking
Canada's Second World War, also notes this lack of
memorialization.

One of the people whose story has not been
told is my grandfather, James Watson Sr. Recently,
my family discovered a storage bin that was filled
with items from my grandfather's military past.

With these artifacts and the internet, | have pieced
together what my grandfather's service was and what
his contribution may have been in Canada’s often

 

forgotten conflict.

James Watson Sr. was born in Montreal in 1917,
and as he grew up through the roaring ‘20s and
the great depression, he found his way into sports,
having a passion for hockey and baseball—which
gave him the chance to play for the Baltimore
Orioles triple A baseball team in 1934. In 1939,
when he was only 22 years old, the world found itself
going back to war. From a Naval Training and Active
Service form, | discovered that he began training for
the Navy on September 17, 1940 and entered into
active service by November of the same year. From
this point, he served on the HMCS Hochelaga which
was based in Montreal and supplied help to corvette
ships. One of those ships was the HMCS Drumheller
which is where Watson would find himself serving for
the majority of the war.

The Drumheller'’s role was to escort other ships
safely along the Atlantic corridor between the
Newfoundland town of Avalon and the Irish town of
Londonderry. From this point, it’s hard to tell how
long he was on the ship—as the Active Service sheet
is a bit illegible—but he could have been on it until
October 30, 1944. This time would have included a

 

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