Item 7 - Letters and diaries, 1914-1920

McGill graduate Harold Featherstonhaugh became an architect renowned for such Montreal landmarks as the Church of St. Peter and St. Paul and the Birks building which now houses the McGill Faculty of Religious Studies. He was a lieutenant in the Artillery Field Regiment before World War I; he then served in the 39th Battery during the war and was awarded the Military Cross in 1917. Earlier, he had worked with Edward and William Sutherland Maxwell, then in 1923 after the war, he became a partner in an architectural firm with J.C. McDougall; in 1934 he began working on his own until 1955.

Captain Errol Hall, was born in Montmorency Falls, Quebec. Listing his occupation as “bank clerk,” he left for France in 1916 as a lieutenant in the 87th Battalion of the Canadian Grenadier Guards and was severely wounded that November in the fighting at the Somme. He then served as aide-de-camp to General James Harold Elmsley (GOC) and later went to Siberia as a captain with the Canadian Siberian Force. There he was appointed secretary to the High Commissioner of Britain. Shortly after the war, he joined the 65th Irish-Canadian Rangers.

Born in St. John, New Brunswick, civil engineer Thomas Sydney Morrissey studied engineering at the Royal Military College in Kingston, Ontario, before enlisting in 1914. He was awarded Companion of the Distinguished Service Order in June 1916. Later the same year he married Beatrice Hilda Coristine, daughter of a prominent Montreal businessman. In 1918-1919, as a lieutenant–colonel, he was sent with 55 men to Omsk in Siberia in support of British battalions there. After returning to Canada, he eventually became Vice President and general manager of the Combustion Engineering Corporation at the Canadian headquarters in Montreal. The family lived in the Westmount neighborhood just blocks from the homes of his father, who was in the insurance business, and sister, the painter Darrell Clara Morissey, a member of the Beaver Hall group of artists.

Flying ace Raymond Collinshaw was born in Nanaimo, BC, to Welsh immigrant parents and at the age of 15 went to sea. Starting as a cabin boy with Canadian Fisheries, he later participated in the mission which arrived too late to rescue find the doomed Arctic Stefansson expedition; he worked seven years on ships, attaining the position of first officer. As World War I began, he trained for the Royal Naval Air Service in Toronto and in England, qualifying as a pilot in 1916. He became a fighter pilot, and in the course of the war achieved the highest score in the RNAS, and second highest score of any Canadian pilot. Nicknamed “Collie,” he was leader of his Black Squadron, so named because the pilots had painted their planes black – his own plane was “Black Maria.” In 1919, he was sent with the 47th squadron to help White Russian forces against the Bolsheviks (a fiasco); he later commanded the No. 84 squadron in Egypt and Persia and then Wing No. 5 in the Second Italo-Abyssinian War. He was named an Officer of the Order of the British Empire in 1921. At the start of World War II, he was promoted to Air Commodore in the RAF, commanding the No. 204 “Egypt Group” (later known as the Desert Air Force), the assignment of which he was proudest, as his outnumbered pilots bested their Italian adversaries. In 1941, he was involuntarily retired, possibly due to health problems, but he returned to his wife and two daughters in Canada, took up a second career in the mining industry, and lived to 92.

James D. McClintock, born in Ormstown, Quebec, was a salesman when he enlisted with the Canadian Expeditionary Force in Winnipeg in 1914. He was a lieutenant with the 27th Battalion when he was killed at Vimy Ridge in 1917.

Eric O. McMurtry, born in Montreal, was a grandson of wealthy businessman and politician Alexander Walker Ogilvie. After graduating from the Royal Military College in Kingston, Ontario, he enlisted as an officer with the infantry in the Royal Expeditionary Force but later transferred to the Flying Corps attached to the 23rd Battalion. He had the rank of major when he was shot down and killed while piloting a B-29 bomber on patrol near Houdain in France.

Brian Peck made the first airmail delivery from Montreal to Toronto in June 1918 while he was in instructor at an RAF training base. After enlisting in the Canadian Field Artillery with the 5th Battery, 2nd Brigade, he had been awarded both the British War Medal and the Victory Medal in 1915 and that same year was commissioned as a captain in the RAF. In 1919 following the war, he married Muriel Alys Gill in Llanlarnlach, Wales.

Talented in sports, especially skiing, Lee Strathy graduated from McGill University with a Bachelor of Science in 1914 and received his certification in 1915 as lieutenant in the Canadian Officer Training Corps. He was appointed to the 26th Battery, but at the time that he was wounded on the front, he was with the 7th Battery of the 2nd Brigade of Canadian Field Artillery. He received the Military Cross for “conspicuous gallantry in action.” In 1920, according to the McGill News, he was connected with the staff of Canadian General Electric Company in Peterborough, Ontario.

Wilfrid Notman was the grandson of William Notman, founder of the famous Montreal photographic studio in which his father, William McFarlane Notman, was a partner. He enlisted in the Canadian Field Artillery in 1914, citing “clerk” as his occupation. Lieutenant Notman was sent overseas with the 3rd Canadian Division of the Light Trench Mortar Battery. He was killed in action during the Battle of Ypres in 1916 and awarded the Memorial Cross.

Walter C. Hyde, born in Beaconsfield on Montreal Island, studied to be an architect like his father. He graduated from the McGill University School of Architecture in 1915 before enlisting in the military, citing “architect” as his occupation. Before actually beginning that occupation, he had a distinguished military career as commander of the 68th Battery of the Canadian Field Artillery in Operation Syren, the 1918 northern Russia Expeditionary Force that aided the British in their objective of taking the Siberian ports of Murmansk and Archangel. These forces were withdrawn in 1919 and he was assigned to the US for instructional service, having received the Distinguished Service Order and the Order of St. Stanislas with swords, second class. During the interwar period, in addition to architectural work, he continued to serve as non-permanent active commander of the 2nd Montreal Regiment of the Royal Canadian Artillery. At the start of World War II, he became commandant at Canadian Forces Base Petawawa before being appointed Brigadier commander of the Royal Canadian Artillery 4th Division; he was recalled in 1944 to the Pacific Command in Vancouver.

Dr. Bellender Hutcheson, a graduate of Northwestern University’s Feinberg Medical School, was born in Mt. Carmel, Illinois, but renounced his American citizenship in order to fight in the Canadian Army at the outbreak of World War I. He joined the 97th Battalion that was later attached to the 75th, attaining the rank of captain; he was demobilized in 1919. He received both the Victoria Cross and the Military Cross at Buckingham Palace; these honours were for “conspicuous gallantry” and devotion to duty under heavy fire on two occasions: a) when he attended wounded including enemy wounded left behind, and b) when he rushed out in front of the Canadian lines in full view of the enemy to attend to a wounded sergeant. After the war he returned to the US, resumed his practice, reclaimed his US citizenship and married his sweetheart. In 2016, the mayor of his hometown, Mt. Carmel, proclaimed December 16 Captain Bellender S. Hutcheson Day.

William B. Howell was born in England and educated there and in Montreal, where he received his M.D.,C.M. from McGill University in 1896. He practiced in Montreal, and during the First World War he worked overseas with the Field Ambulance Service. In 1918, he was appointed as the first full-time anesthetist to the Royal Victoria Hospital. Howell retired to England in 1937, where he pursued his avocation in literature and history. He was the author of a history of medicine in Canada (1933) and of a biography of Dr. F.J. Shepherd.