Longing Admits World War I

A Home Child’s journey from London to the trenches

by Elisabeth Volland

In 1917, a Canadian soldier writes from the trenches of France to his beloved in Montréal. Through his letter, he recounts a life shaped by loss, migration, and hope — from London’s slums to Canadian farms, and finally, the battlefields of World War I.

Vorwort der Autorin

Teil einer interdisziplinären Migrationsforschung ist die Auseinandersetzung mit den Biografien von Migrant:innen, da so individuelle Lebensgeschichten in den Blick genommen werden und die komplexen Prozesse von Migration, Integration und Identitätsbildung nachvollziehbar gemacht werden können. Im Gegensatz zu rein statistischen Daten, ermöglichen biografische Erzählungen einen tiefen Einblick in persönliche Erfahrungen und den Umgang mit Herausforderungen.

Das Seminar „Writing Migrant Biographies“, geleitet von Frau Dr. Caruso, bot uns Studierenden die Möglichkeit einer interdisziplinären Auseinandersetzung mit den Home Children. In einem sowohl von der kanadischen als auch der britischen Regierung unterstützten Migrationsprogramm, wurden über 100.000 britische Kinder und Jugendliche nach Kanada zwischen den 1860er und den 1930ern überführt. Unter der Annahme, dass Halb- oder Vollwaisen, sowie Kinder aus ärmlichen Verhältnissen und aus den sogenannten „Working Houses“ in Kanada eine bessere Zukunft hätten, wurden die Home Children oftmals zu Familien in ländlichen Gegenden geschickt, um dort auszuhelfen. Trotz zahlreicher Berichte von Misshandlungen und schockierenden Lebens- und Arbeitsbedingungen mancher Kinder und Jugendlichen, hielten sowohl die kanadische als auch die britische Regierung lange Zeit an dem Migrationsprogramm fest.

Manche dieser Erfahrungen wurden von den Home Children bzw. ihren Nachkommen verschriftlicht und geben der heutigen Migrationsforschung einen Einblick in diese Phase der Migration. Es existiert jedoch auch die Gegenseite: Namen, welche in alten Schiffsregistern und Listen auftauchen, danach jedoch in Vergessenheit geraten sind. Verschiedene Dokumente, dazu zählen eingescannte Armee-Dokumente aus dem Ersten Weltkrieg, welche uns auf über 80 Seiten Informationen zum Aussehen, Verwandten, Wohnorten und alten Verletzungen geben, sowie Todesanzeigen, welche auf den Namen des Ehepartners oder der Ehepartnerin sowie die Arbeitsstelle verweisen, geben Aufschluss über das Schicksal der Home Children.

Eine Zusammenführung der Suchergebnisse kann uns ebenfalls einen Einblick in das Leben von Migrant:innen geben. Die im Folgenden dargestellten Briefe sind ein Ausschnitt aus der Hausarbeit „Longing Amidst World War I“, welche ich im Rahmen des Seminars verfasst habe. Ziel der Hausarbeit war es, eine fiktive Migrationsgeschichte zu schreiben, die jedoch auf Sekundärliteratur und Zeitzeugenberichten basiert.

Die untenstehenden Briefe sind aus der Perspektive des im Jahr 1956 gestorbenen Child Migrant Proctor Adkins geschrieben. Adkins kam im Rahmen des Migrationsprogrammes mit seinen zwei Schwestern nach Kanada. Neben den bereits genannten Schiffsregistern, durch welche ich die Namen der Schwestern sowie der Eltern erfahren habe, konnten mir die Armee-Dokumente einen Einblick in seine Zeit in Montréal geben. Daraus ergaben sich seine Arbeitsstelle und die Information, dass seine Mutter nach Montréal nachgekommen ist. Auch Adkins Todesanzeige konnte mir weitere Informationen geben, wie z.B. seine Todesursache, seine letzte Arbeitsstelle, den Namen seiner Frau und seines Sohnes. Durch das Zusammentragen all dieser Informationen ergab sich ein Gesamtbild von Proctor Adkins.

Die folgenden Briefe, geschrieben von Proctor an seine Verlobte Juliette während seiner Zeit an der Front im Ersten Weltkrieg, basieren auf verschiedenen Quellen. Neben den gefundenen Informationen zu Adkins, wurden auch andere Zeitzeug:innenberichte als Grundlage genutzt. Die Smith Farm in Tilbury East wurde in der Biografie von einem Jungen namens Augustus beschrieben. Sowohl das Pacific Cable Board als auch Marconi sind reale Firmen, in denen Proctor teilweise gearbeitet hat. Sekundärliteratur zu der Misshandlungen von Child Migrants in Kanada, aber auch ihre Vorbereitung auf die anstehenden Anstellungen in England haben Informationslücken gefüllt, welche sich aus der Recherche ergeben haben.

France, 13^th of March 1917

My dearest Juliette,

I’m sorry it took me so long to write again. I’m pleased you’re doing well and had a quiet and peaceful Christmas holiday with your family. With all my heart, I hope to return to Montréal soon to join the celebration this year.
This war is more dreadful, long-lasting, and vile than I imagined when I enrolled in the CEF. “Serving both of my home countries is an honourable thing to do!” That’s what I told myself one year ago. I still believe in it. But thinking about the time I am missing, the time I could spend with you instead of sitting in the trenches in France, makes me yearn for a different reality. We could plan our future together while enjoying coffee and promenading through the Mont Royal Park afterwards.

But I think I owe you something before turning my mind towards the future again. The last time we spoke in person, you asked me about my past, but I didn’t want to burden you. It’s not that I only have bad memories; still, it is not as rosy as I would like it to be. So that’s what I’m going to do in this letter. I’ll tell you something about me, my past, and my memories until we met in Montréal.
Sitting in the trenches, fighting horrible boredom, and, at the same time, facing death various times myself or experiencing my comrades’ deaths takes me back to different experiences and memories of my childhood, more often than I had imagined.

At 16, I came to Canada as a Child Migrant. Life wasn’t easy in England. My father died when I was ten, and my mother had to care for my two younger sisters and me alone. We had no family members around to help with anything, speaking of finances and looking after us children, and there was no neighbourly help we could rely on. My mother was glad to only have three children, but still, it was too much to care for all of us properly, as she had to work for most of the day.
As the oldest, I worked hard to bring some extra money home. Money my family desperately needed to pay for rent and food. But when my mom became sick, we had to live from hand to mouth as my sisters and I couldn’t make enough money. My mother decided that something had to change. She knew these living conditions weren’t suitable for her three children, especially her young daughters, who weren’t old enough to get proper jobs, or married. After a few weeks, an enquiry was made by a Reverand of the local church to prosecute my mother for neglect. She refused to enter one of the many workhouses, but her consent was obtained to get my two sisters into homes. By honest work, my mother intended and wished to live respectably to get her daughters back one day and to better support her children in the future.
She’d heard from a friend that multiple organizations cared for those children in need, fed them, gave them clothes, and eventually prepared them for housemaid work. These children were supposed to be given new and excellent opportunities, so my mother decided to give my sisters into the care of Dr. Barnardo’s Homes. You cannot imagine my sisters’ tears when my mother told them about her decision. This memory burned itself in my mind the most from all the memories I have of the four of us during our time together in London. Never will I forget our heartbreak as my sisters didn’t understand how our mother could give them away just like that. My mother made them promise to keep in touch via letters and promised them to visit as often as she could.

Only later, she found out how difficult it was to visit them. Barnardo’s tried to discourage contact by choosing occasional visiting days during the week, which made it hard for my mother to see them. I discovered they only allowed two people during visitation every three months. During my sisters’ first six months in one of the Homes for Girls, my mother could only visit them once as she had to work most of the time. Through letters, we kept in touch. My mother was assured of hearing that they were doing well. She worked harder than ever to be more financially stable to get my sisters back. I hoped to visit Margaret and Ann Phoebe more frequently because my working hours were more flexible as I worked different jobs.

A trench on the Canadian front showing „funk holes“, France

William Ivor Castle (official Canadian war photographer), Library and Archives Canada: PA-001326

15^th of March

I’m sorry I had to interrupt my writing, but we had to move quickly. I don’t want to bother you with what’s going on. So, every time I’m interrupted, I will mark the new passage of the letter, another passage of my life, with the date on which I’m writing it. (Just in case my letter doesn’t seem coherent.)
So, in the end, we relied on letters. Experiencing our father’s death together and seeing our mother’s struggles created a strong bond between us siblings, and we knew we could rely on each other. They told me what they didn’t want to tell my mother in their letters. Being the older brother who always tried to protect my little sisters, it broke my heart to read how sad they were to not live with us anymore. Of course, they also had positive experiences to write about.
For the first time in their lives, they could be children. They didn’t have to suffer from my father’s abusive behaviour that he’d sometimes showed towards us and our mother. He’d brought home some little presents for them afterwards to make up for his behaviour and after his death, they missed him dearly. But playing with new friends, wearing cleaner clothes, and having more meals were only some things they mentioned in their letters.

I was the first to know there were plans to send them away to Canada. In their Children’s Home, the focus was on teaching the young girls housekeeping skills in the hope of finding a placement for them in a good home. After the letter, we didn’t get a reply from Theodora and Ann Phoebe for at least four weeks. My mother was furious when she received Dr. Barnardo’s note that her two daughters had been shipped to Canada. But there was nothing my mother could do. She’d put her children entirely in the care of that organization. The next time my sisters managed to send a letter, they’d already arrived in Canada and lived in the institution’s Receiving Home in Hamilton. When their first letter arrived, it was full of detailed information about their journey, the Receiving Home, and how excited they were about being placed somewhere soon. Of course, they reassured us that they missed us, but for two such young girls, it was an exciting time filled with adventures.
Even though my mother missed her two daughters dearly and, as she later told me, the thought of me being away too, tore her apart on the inside. One evening, over supper, we sat down together to talk about my future. I never had the chance to receive a good education, but I was happy with the way things were. Nevertheless, always being ambitious to give her children the best opportunities, my mother gathered information herself about possible programs I could be interested in.
She’d heard from an organization, the National Children’s Home, which had a home in Hertfordshire where boys and girls were trained in farming and gardening. I remember that this was the first time I’d a real fight with my mother. I just couldn’t understand why she would send me there to train for something I never had any touch points with. Me working as a farm’s aid, I asked myself. The sole thought of it made me chuckle as I’ve never seen anything else than the London slums. After discussing it for a long time, my mother convinced me that this might be the best way to handle our situation. I could go to Canada if I proved myself worthy at the training farm and try to get in touch with my sisters again while, at the same time, learning a trade.

Ultimately, I agreed. At fourteen, I came to this strange place in Hertfordshire. Everything was tidy and green, so different from our neighbourhood in London, and the school had recently been renovated. After living in London my entire life, everything seemed so strange and clean. I cannot say that I made many friends during this time. I had difficulty adapting, but my mother expected me to do great, so I did.

16^th of March

I’ll skip this part of my journey, the training farm, and my journey on the ‘Canada’ as it would take too much space in this letter without being essential. If you want, I can tell you about it when I’m back. I’ll try to concentrate on a few things I haven’t told you about when I first came to Canada, especially my first three years.
You know that, in my heart, I belong in a big city. London has been wild, loud, hectic, and exciting. When I thought the Training Home in Hertfordshire was a culture shock, it was nothing compared to arriving in Canada. While travelling to Hamilton, where our receiving home was located, I couldn’t stop looking out of the train windows. Sometimes, you couldn’t see any villages or cities for dozens of miles. It was a strange sight compared to England, which was so crowded. One day, I want to return to London and show you everything. I think you’ll love it.
Most of my childhood and first weeks in Canada are now blurred in my mind, and I cannot recall any details. But I can still remember every moment of the first days of my placement.

23^rd of March

The only belonging I could take was a metal-clad cedar trunk, which I still use today. Many Home Children got one when being sent away for a placement.

With it, I stepped onto the Smith farm in Tilbury East, my first and, luckily, only placement. Mr Richard Smith welcomed me with a sombre smile, but I could see the grief in those kind-hearted eyes. The shadow of despair that hung over him, a sadness that seemed impossible to escape, was something I only knew too well from my mother. It was the same look she tried to hide from us children when my father died.

Only a few days after arriving on the farm, I realised what this gaze, with which he greeted me on my first day, meant. This hint of recognition, which, in fact, was the resemblance between me and William, his son. William tragically died in a farm accident more than ten years ago. I was there to replace him as a farm’s aid. Mr. Smith and his wife had no other children, and losing their only son took a hard toll on them. They would’ve never been able to keep up with the farm on their own.
Never will I forget my first interaction with his wife, Martha Smith. It was on the evening after my arrival. Richard had just showed me the farm, explaining the tasks he expected me to do. After this long day, I was excited to eat. When I was called into the kitchen to come and get my dinner, Mrs Smith stood next to the oven, and the cold glance she cast my way was a mixture of resentment and pain. I was taken aback by it.

I simply couldn’t understand why someone I’ve never met could be so resentful at first sight. I can only try to explain her reaction. I believe I was an unwelcome reminder of her son’s absence, and I could not help but feel like an intruder. While on their farm, I resolved to do everything I could to prove my worth.

Unfortunately, I never succeeded; it was never enough for her. These three years made me crave my mother’s love, which she always gave freely. I never imagined I’d miss my home, mother, sisters, and everything I knew for 15 years that much.

Adapting to my new tasks, people, and environment was challenging. I worked hard all day and was glad to sleep in the evening. Because of that, it wasn’t easy for me to stay in contact with my sisters and my mother. Theodora and Ann had different placements in the Montréal region as housemaids in respectable households. We exchanged letters as frequently as possible, but keeping in touch with them was difficult. My mother and I kept in touch the best we could; her letters were about her now lonely life in London and updates about my sisters.

The work I was supposed to do was demanding. Having been trained in England for most of the tasks, I could settle into life on the farm efficiently. But don’t be fooled. It was still hard not to have my family, or any familiar faces around, and to live in this new country with strange people. The routine of caring for the animals, tending the land, mending fences, and helping Mrs Smith with the household became my challenge and refuge. At the end of my time on the farm, I could no longer stand the sight of tomatoes and onions. These were the only things we cultivated. Tomatoes, onions, and more tomatoes and onions, as there was a canning farm nearby for which we produced all that.

Even though Mrs. Smith (I was never allowed to call her by her first name) became kinder over the three years, she expected me to always work hard. My education was in abeyance as I worked at least nine hours a day. But I was treated better than I expected. I was given enough food and a comfortable bed to sleep in, and they bought me clothes that kept me warm on cold winter days, as I did not bring any from England, where temperatures were rarely so low. But Mrs Smith insisted on paying for them with my earnings. I did not receive any of that money before I turned eighteen; even then, there was not much left.

A boy ploughing at Dr. Barnardo’s Industrial Farm, Russell, Manitoba, ca. 1900

Library and Archives Canada / PA-117285

28^th of March

While sometimes struggling with loneliness as there was no one my age around, Mr. Smith, whom I was later allowed to call Richard, emerged as a guiding light. I soon began to enjoy his excellent storytelling. In my first months, he barely spoke about his son. Instead, he told me about his own life.

He came from the United States to Canada in the early 1870s as a young man. Together with his older cousin Jacob and wife Isabella, the three started farming in a family effort. The first years were difficult, and they soon realized they needed more help. That was when one of my predecessors came into the picture, Augustus Bridle. He might seem unimportant, and you might wonder why I am telling you this now. But let me explain.

I know that Richard’s perspective might be highly subjective and that his view on things might vary from anything the said Augustus would say. After leaving the Smith’s farm, Augustus became a teacher and reached for more. I do not know many Child Migrants started an academic career, but Augustus succeeded. While sitting in front of the fire after a long day’s work, I got the impression that Richard was proud of teaching Augustus hard work and discipline, which he apparently solely learned by working on the farm. According to him, it would always pay off. Don’t get me wrong. I’ll always be thankful for my time on the Smith’s farm. It wasn’t easy, but I was never treated too poorly and compared to other stories I heard from Home Children later in my life, I could be thankful.
Nevertheless, I never believed that Richard was the only one responsible for Augustus’s success. There is much more to success than this, like personal effort and motivation. Being thankful for Richard’s company and stories, I had to keep these thoughts to myself.

But to return to what I wanted to tell you about Augustus was when I first thought about my life after working on the farm. Where do I see myself in the following years? What do I want to achieve? How was I going to reunite with my family? I don’t want to sound tawdry, but meeting such a wonderful woman like you was also part of what I imagined back then.

Even though I’ve never met Augustus, he became my role model. His example showed me that even when you grow up like I did in England, you always have a chance to turn your life around. I am glad that Richard told me about Augustus. It seemed to open him up a bit, and when he warmed up with me, his stories were soon filled with memories of William.

Even though I thought time would never pass during those first months, the three years passed in a blur. When Home Children turn eighteen, they can leave their placement and start their own life. In the summer of 1913, I stood on the edge of the Smith farm after working the whole day and could not help but reflect on my journey. Being set to leave the next day, I realized that the fields and the landscape that had once seemed foreign had, over the years, become my home and the Smiths, in their own way, my family.

My conversations with Richard had deepened over time, evolving from mere instructions to discussions about life. He became a friend and a mentor. My reading skills were below average, but he taught me how to read correctly with the few books he owned. Even after leaving the farm, I continued exchanging letters with him and bought as many books as possible.

People say, “Time heals all wounds”. That might be true for some, but certainly not for Mrs Smith. She became a bitter woman over the years, and even though she had begrudgingly accepted my presence, I am sorry for the new farm aid they got when I left. I can only hope she was kinder to him than she was to me.

1^st of April

My time on the farm has been a tapestry of experiences, determination, and threads of hard work. As I stood there on the edge of the farm, gazing at the fields, I realized that the Smiths and their farm had become much more than just a place to work. Like my time in London, working in Montréal, meeting you, and now serving in the army, the farm had become a chapter in my story that still shapes me as a more compassionate and stronger person.

From then on, I’m unsure how much you know about my story. After leaving the Smiths at 18 and only having the little money I’d earned, I decided to take the journey to Montréal. I did not know what the future would hold for me, so I wanted to go looking for my sisters and be near them. Besides the information about their daily life and the families they´d to serve, my sister’s letters included various descriptions of the city and its beauty. Ann’s detailed images of the town, the frozen lakes in winter on which they would ice-skate if they had some free time, and the summer months’ beauties convinced me not only to come to Montréal to be nearer my sisters, but to start my future in that city.
I didn’t own much when I arrived. I brought only a few pieces of clothing, some money and one or two things from England in a trunk with me. My life has always been eventful and chaotic. When my father died, we sold nearly all the items of value we owned. I didn’t have much in my last years in England, so having this one thing, this solid wooden trunk, but something I could call my own, meant the world to me.

On the farm, I had a lot of time to think about my professional future. Coming from a big, chaotic, crowded city like London and having worked on a remote farm for years made me long for the city again. I knew my opportunities were limited because I’ve only had little education. I started working in construction sites and warehouses. Being a labourer is a bone job, like working on a farm, but it was my only opportunity to make enough money to pay rent. I rented a tiny one-room apartment, just about as much as I had hoped. It offered enough room for my mother too. After arriving in Montréal, I researched assistance programmes that helped British children like me to bring over relatives from England. I finally found a goal for the year: Saving up enough money to bring my mother to Montréal so our family could, one day, be reunited. My mother, who’d never heard of those schemes before, was excited about this possibility when I wrote to her. Her reply letter seemed to have become damp from her fallen teardrops. But one of the problems was that my job didn’t bring in enough money. With the money my mother and I earned in our jobs, saving enough would take at least two years.

Everything changed when I met Darby Proctor Coats in a pub in Old Montréal. You know how charismatic he is. It wasn’t hard for me to start a conversation with him. We soon bonded over all the similarities we shared! Not only do we share the same uncommon first name, ‘Proctor,’ but we are also nearly the same age; we arrived in Canada only a year apart, both from England. Having this common ground, we connected over a pint of Pale Ale, and he told me his story. After arriving in Canada in 1911, he got his first job with the Pacific Cable Board but soon decided to work in the ‘wireless’ technology section at Marconi’s. He was ambitious to embark on a career as a marine radio operator and enlisted for military service a year before I did. I haven’t heard from him since, but I hope to see him again when I return from this war.

He worked in the company’s headquarters then but knew about well-paid jobs at the manufacturing plant on Delormier Avenue. After meeting in the pub, we stayed in contact, and eventually, I got a job as a clerk in the factory. It wasn’t the most exciting job, but I was paid enough to send money to my mother. It was much easier to contact her after leaving the farm, and she told me she planned to come to Montréal in the summer of 1914.

I hadn’t met many people in my first months in Montréal as I was too fixated on working and starting my new, free life away from the farm. Darby, however, sometimes took me with him when he went out in the afternoon and evening to meet with work colleagues and friends to whom he introduced me.

And that’s where my past ends. During one of those meetups with his colleagues, I met you, my future, and instantly fell in love.

7^th of April

I hope you can put the dismembered pieces of this letter in order and can understand me a little better. The dichotomy of stressed boredom in this horrible trench is getting to me.

I cannot give you more information on my situation than this, as we must be careful with what we write. But I tried to write whenever we had a break from combat, helping wounded soldiers and transporting the fallen ones. I will stop here to not worry you more for me than you probably already do. The excitement of, hopefully, being home soon when this war is over gives me strength on awful days. Every time I walk or rather crawl through the trenches, I hope to see your beautiful face soon and hope against all odds that I may run into you when I turn a corner. Did you know that I still have your photograph with me after all this time? It is one of my most precious belongings and helps me in hours of total darkness and fear. I just wanted to thank you for it once again.

And now, I will return to my, our story.

After joining the war, I soon learned that hope and faith go hand in hand.
I have faith in my fellow soldiers and the knowledge that we help, support, and save each other.
Faith in the army and that what we do is right.
Faith in ourselves.

But I’ve also learned that faith in God is equally important. I never, indeed, was a genuine believer. Seeing the most horrific things humans can do to each other made me realize that I cannot only hope that God exists, I must believe that he does. He must. I need to think that this war happens for a reason, and I need faith in God to survive. I attended a church service two days ago when the fighting stopped for a few hours. I was surprised by this as I have never been much of a churchgoer. During my time on the farm, I was forced to attend church with the Smiths every Sunday, but I never believed in God until now.
I hope God’s mysterious ways can bring us back together soon to have more conversations over coffee or dinner. Our past, our present, and, hopefully, our future. Don’t worry about me too much; I’ll be home soon.

A fellow soldier gave me an old bible copy, and I want to end this letter, in the hope that you receive it, with the following bible verse:
“No man hath seen God at any time.
If we love one another, God dwelleth in us,
And his love is perfected in us.” (1 John 4:12)

I love you.
Yours forever and only,
Proctor

Elisabeth Volland

Elisabeth Volland studiert Deutsch, Englisch und Arbeitslehre für das Lehramt an Gymnasien sowie Haupt- und Realschule. Ihr Forschungsschwerpunkt umfasst die US-amerikanische Migrationsgeschichte.

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