Diary a voice from WWI

Antipodean Andy · Aug 13, 2008

Diary a voice from First World War

Arthur Knight will drive more than 1,000 kilometres this week from Victoria to Calgary, all for the peace of mind of knowing his father's diary is in its rightful place.

Knight will walk into the Military Museums Friday morning and turn over an important piece of history not documented in textbooks. He will share the voice of a soldier who fought in the First World War.

"I value the diary tremendously, but I'm scared stiff it's going to get lost," said Knight.

Knight, 82, has held onto his father's diary for years, flipping through the pages and reading the horrific accounts of German troops murdering prisoners, lonely nights in the trenches of France and the loss of close friends.

Knight's father, Abel Brereton Knight, was born in England in 1883.

He ran away from home twice to join the army.

His parents protested the first time but let him go the second time.

Abel served with the British army during the Boer War before being shipped to India, where he worked as a teacher for 12 years. Considered the "black sheep" of the family after falling in love with a maid when he returned to England, his parents sent him to Canada as a "remittance man" and paid him to never return.

From there he joined the newly formed Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry and was shipped to France almost immediately to serve under the Canadian flag for the first time.

"My father was very proud to be operating under the flag," said Knight from Victoria.

"He would talk about that a lot when I was a child."

Abel's entries over a six-month period are short and to the point. He wrote nearly every day.

"We're hiding behind breastworks a few yards behind the firing line. German airmen are very busy. They suspect our presence here but can't locate us. Whiz Bang day and night. One poor fellow's leg blown off last night," he writes on April 29, 1914.

His diary continues until May 3, when he inhaled chlorine gas after one of the hand grenades he was burying exploded, cutting through his arms and permanently blinding him.

"My father would show me the wounds," said Knight.

"It was as if you had scooped out a spoonful of flesh here and there on each arm and it had healed into a white splotch."

Abel has also been credited with forming the Overseas Veterans League to fight for benefits for returning soldiers. It would eventually become the No. 1 Branch of the Royal Canadian Legion in Calgary.

"This is about hearing the voice of a man who served in the trenches and spoke from the heart," said Sgt. Bruce Graham, archivist for the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry Regimental Museum.

"To have that kind of information is so important."

The Military Museums hold the second-largest collection of First World War archives in Canada behind the National Archives of Canada, said Graham.
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liverpool annie · Dec 4, 2008

Antipodean Andy said: ↑

Diary a voice from First World War
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All I can say is ... wow ..... !!

Military is in sad shape, but not the peace movement

National Post
Aug 21, 2008
Re: The New Peace Movement, J. L. Granatstein, Aug. 20.

I have just returned from donating the First World War diary of my father, Corporal Abel Brereton Knight, to the Princess Patricia's Canadian Light Infantry museum in Calgary where I spoke with a returned veteran of Afghanistan. I must refute J. L. Granatstein's high opinion of the quality of the Canadian Forces.

My father, a blinded and gassed veteran of Ypres and one of the 35 soldiers able to return to Canada out of the 5,000 that went to that front, explained to me that the officers of the Boer War were totally incompetent (they purchased their commissions). Also, the junior officers from the Boer War were senior officers in the First World War. My father saw both groups and was shocked. The army officers of the Second World War had to be replaced by Eaton's executives, who ran the show until 1945.

At the completion of the Second World War, Canada had the third-largest navy, an air force second to none and an army that took honours at D-Day and Dieppe. My three brothers and I all served and witnessed this. My last ship, HMCS Crusader, was the finest naval vessel on which I ever served and the navy does not have its equal today. The Canadian fighter pilots were second to none. We were the North Atlantic escorts. We were the very best.

But we haven't got it any more. Today, we borrow planes from Poland and the United States and we do not have the ships necessary to take our troops to the battle areas.

I am not proud anymore.

Arthur Knight, Victoria
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http://www.nationalpost.com/m/story.html?id=740727&s=Related Topics&is=Arthur Knight&it=Person

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