The Lost Folder (7)

The Lost Folder (2)

Soon after discovering an old brown folder that contained my father's hand-written navy memoirs I read his notes from start to finish, hardly believing I knew nothing of the story. Surprises leapt up at me from the very first page.

     Foreward (sic)

     Many Canadian citizens do not know about the active part taken by the

     Royal Canadian Volunteer Reserve Navy in Combined Operations overseas

     during World War II. Here is a story regarding the Canadian Navy on navy 

     barges on the operations against Dieppe, N. Africa, Sicily and Italy, and

     many were at D Day also.

     As a young boy I was crazy about ships. I used to make boats by folding

     paper in a certain way and then sail them on the creek. I was born

     September 6, 1920, 12 lbs. 10 ozs. 

     I was from a family of seven, three girls and four boys. My mother needed

     a new door sill for our home so she somehow procured a lovely board from

     a lumber yard. I stole the board and Sonny Bucholtz and I hollowed it out and

     used it for the main part of our first ship, the Bluenose.

     We got old car batteries, melted the lead and molded it to fit the bottom of

     the boat as a keel. Built masts and yardarms, made sails and halyards and her

     maiden voyage at Vandenburgs swimming pool was a terrific success. She was

     painted blue and white. I always admired the real Nova Scotian Bluenose and

     have a plastic replica in my rec room today.

     Yes, Mum found out about the board and I not only got the board,

     I got the shoe brush on my bottom.

   
     In the navy if an officer says “well done”, it is nearly the same as getting a

     citation or medal. I hope that my efforts at this story may interest someone

     enough to say “dad, well done.”

     Doug Harrison V8809

My father's memoirs started to have some impact upon me in November, 2011. I mentioned them in my own column, published on the 10th of that month, and wrote that while standing at London's Victoria Park cenotaph I would "recall some of the words from a story I've begun to read entitled 'The Naval memoirs of Leading seaman Coxswain G. D. Harrison'."

I don't call my father's story a knee-slapper or tear-jerker even though it made me laugh and cry. Considering my three year's worth of reflection I call it a door-opener. I have gone from not knowing very much at all about my father's WW2 experiences to knowing a good deal.

I also call it a life-changer because his tale has urged me to visit Halifax on Canada's east coast, Vancouver Island on the west coast, and Scotland and England in the UK, all places I may never have visited without some meaningful incentive. Plans to revisit Comox and Courtenay on Vancouver Island, once home to a Combined Operations training base, have already been made for May 2015. 

I also call father's story an eye-opener, a heart-warmer, a good, honest adventure, one that took him to hostile shores in and around the Mediterranean Sea (in 1942 - 1943), just one of the many places he would never revisit after World War II was over. 

But, what's stopping me?

More to follow.

Link to Faint Footsteps, WW2 (6)

Photos by GH