Presenters and Abstracts of Papers

David Macfarlane: "The Danger Tree"

Family history and the search for the past, through the exploits of members of the Goodyear family of Newfoundland in World War I, with a reading from the book "The Danger Tree", which records their deeds.

Kevin Major: "No Man's Land"

The peaks and pitfalls of creating and writing a novel about Newfoundland soldiers fighting in World War I, though an examination of the writing of "No Man's Land", with a reading from the novel.

David R. Facey-Crowther:
"The Apotheosis of the Fallen: Newfoundland Observance of Memorial Day"

"This day will be remembered down the ages...it will shine forever like a star, its name and fame an echo and a light to all eternity." In such a manner did the St. John's "Evening Telegram" welcome the coming of peace on 11 November 1918. It was a prophetic statement that would ring true over the course of this century as Armistice Day has been observed by most states as a day of remembrance ever since. But for Newfoundland there was a second day far more important in its significance and that was July 1 or Memorial Day. On that day in 1916, the pride of Newfoundland, the Newfoundland Regiment, was virtually annihilated at the Battle of Beaumont Hamel. Few island families were untouched by the calamity. So catastrophic was the event that it remained etched into the consciousness of Newfoundlanders for much of this century. Memorial Day, the formalized act of remembrance of an island and its people, with its comforting images of just war and a noble sacrifice, served to reconcile a wartime generation to death and tragedy of an unpresedented scale. Neither the ending of World War II nor the entry of Newfoundland into the Canadian Confederation in 1949 altered the significance of July 1 to Newfoundlanders. Only in recent years, with the passing of that World War I generation, has there been a change, not so much in the significance of the event as in the images it evoked for much of this century.

Malcolm MacLeod:
"A Monument in Spirit, Not Stone: the Postwar Origins of Memorial University, 1919-1925"

Most war memorials look to the past, honouring those who have served and sacrificed. From time to time, however, the argument is made that the fittest monument of all is one oriented more to the future than the past: one which, while remembering the dead, will also serve the living.

In the years following World War I, Newfoundland debated what nature of monument to erect as the principle national tribute to the war dead. Advocates of a memorial to serve the living had a variety of proposals: a hospital, a night school for navigation, a life-saving at Cape Race or a home for veterans' widows, among others. The idea with the most support as an educational building -- non-denominational, "which will testify to our unity rather than our differences" -- to house an institution devoted to teacher training and perhaps technical or university studies.

As the debate was a stalemate, both types of monument were erected. The solemnly dignified of the National war memorial at St. John's cost about $25,000; the imposing edifice on Parade Street which housed the Normal School (from 1924) and Memorial University College (1925), $400,000. The process that saw this project emerge as Newfoundland's major Great War monument marks two milestones. It was a significant innovation in thinking about testimonies to the war dead, and shows a stronger sense of national identity overcoming religious particularism which had previously kept all educational efforts in strictly separate and segregated compartments.

Wendell Head:
"Politics and Papers: The Newfoundland Press and the First World War"

A cursory glance at the Newfoundland Press during World War I reveals content that appears to have been entirely motivated by patriotism. The rivalry and political bickering that invariably characterised the pre-war press seemed to have been set aside in the interest of the war effort. Indeed, newspapers seemed to be so patriotic, that even censorship was not required to play a significant role in determining content. A close examination of these newspapers and the political undercurrents of the day, however, exposes this appearance of unity and patriotic zeal as an illusion.

Joan Ritcey: "The Newfoundland Periodical Literature of World War I"

A librarian looks at the literature of contemporary accounts, reminiscences, fiction, poetry and history of the war in periodical articles on Newfoundland.

Gerhard Bassler: "The Enemy Within"

A review of the wartime public perceptions of so-called "enemy aliens" and their personal experience on the Newfoundland and Labrador home front. Enemy aliens included local residents, ships' crews, Moravian missionaries, and visitors associated with enemy origins or connections. Their wartime experiences ranged from false accusations of spying and sabotage to police surveillance, deportation, and social ostracism.

David Parsons: "The Spanish Lady and the Newfoundland Regiment"

The influenza epidemic of 1918 affected Newfoundland no less severely than other parts of the world. The Royal Newfoundland Regiment was less affected than the civilian population, and those who succumbed to the Flu were mainly new recruits, barely out of civilian clothing. The soldiers on active service in France and Belgium had a lower mortality than the civilians at home. This was a tragedy of all the population, but the memory was quickly forgotten even though the total mortality of the Flu was far greater than the war casualties. The memorials to the war fallen abound but there are few to Flu victims.

Elizabeth Miller: "Arms and the Newfoundlander: Poetry of the Great War"

Newfoundlanders wrote dozens of poems on the Great War both during the event and in subsequent years attests to the impact that the war had on our people from every walk of life. This paper will look at several such poems, under the following general themes: The Call to Arms; The Days of Battle; The Woman's Voice' and Tribute and Remembrance. Poems to be referred to are from the collection "Arms and the Newfoundlander: Poetry of the Great War", ed. Elizabeth Miller (Harry Cuff Publications, 1994).

Larry Dohey: "Onward Catholic Soldiers"

An examination of the role of the Roman Catholic Church in Newfoundland in World War I, through the policies and actions of Archbishop Edward Patrick Roche and the priests of the Archdiocese of St. John's.

Anita Best: "The Vales of Kilbride"

A look through words and music of the war songs and ballads written and performed in Newfoundland during and after World War I.

Bert Riggs: "Cast in Metal, Carved in Stone"

There were many debates between various factions as to the form a memorial to Newfoundland's war dead would take. There were many that favoured an elaborate monument that would stand as a national memorial to those who had died. This group initiated a public subscription campaign to raise money for such a monument. At a cost of $25,000, this National War Memorial located in St. John's, was officially unveiled by Field Marshall Earl Douglas Haig on July 1, 1924. What did this war memorial represent, eight years after Beaumont Hamel in 1924 and what does it represent in 1998, 80 years after the end of the war?

Jason Churchill:
"No Surrender until Prussian Militarism is Smothered: The Loyal Orange Association & Newfoundland's Great War Effort."

The presentation will discuss the role of the Loyal Orange Association in Newfoundland during World War I in recruitment, fundraising activities and spreading propaganda. This will lead to a discussion of fraternal organisations and the war effort in rural Newfoundland.

Louise Dawe:
"Flights of Fancy?: The Handley Page Proposal to Ferry Aircraft across the Atlantic during World War I."

Newfoundland's remembrance of World War II would include its contribution through the use of its newly constructed airports to the success of Ferry Command. These developments had, however, first been promoted during World War I, in particular by Frederick Handley Page whose large aircraft in whose primary interest was in ensuring a market at the end of the war for the production his company specialised, through the prompromotion of civil aviation. The entry of the United States into the war in 1917, the creation of a separate air force in Great Britain and the concurrent adoption of the concept of long distance strategic bombing provided the context for the acceptance of Handley Page's proposal that the bombers necessary for this strategy be constructed in the United States and flown in stages to the Western Front. Newfoundland's role in the development of transatlantic flight had already been recognised, most recently in 1917 with Lord Morris's appointment upon his arrival in Great Britain to the Civil Aerial Transport Committee, which was then considering post-war civil aviation, and to the Board of Directors of the Handley Page Company. The decisions reached, however, led to the appointment of a member of the Reid family as the Air Ministry's representative in Newfoundland and to the development of the colony's first airfield in what was then Mount Pearl. Like other ideas on warfare which developed during World War I ferrying aircraft did contribute to Newfoundland's becoming the focal point of transatlantic flight following that conflict.

John FitzGerald:
"Dying Beyond its Means: Newfoundland's War Debts, its Loss of Self-Government, and Confederation."

When the Amulree Royal Commission recommended in 1933 that Newfoundland voluntarily suspend self-government "until such time as the country was self-supporting", the principal reason it gave for suggesting this course of action was that the country had been "living beyond its means" since 1920. Yet nowhere in the report was it acknowledged that of the $50 million of public debt Newfoundland had occurred by 1920, $36 million of this was incurred directly as a result of Newfoundland's World War I effort, or that Newfoundland was one of the few countries not to default on the payment of its war debts. This essay will discuss how the histories of Newfoundland debt and the country's participation in World War I only became an issue of contention in the economic debate of the late 1940s preceding the country's confederation with Canada.

Gale Warren:
"The Patriot Association of the Women of Newfoundland: 1914-1918."

The purpose of this paper is to examine an important but little known aspect of Newfoundland history during the First World War. During that war Newfoundland women played a key role in the country's war effort through the volunteer efforts of groups like the Women's Patriotic Association, more commonly referred to as the W.P.A. While the Association began its work modestly, with the provision of comforts for the Newfoundland servicemen overseas, it was during the four long years of the war that the W.P.A. continuously fulfilled the material and financial needs of the soldiers and that of their families here at home. By the war's end the W.P.A.'s role had expanded to include health are, child welfare and women's suffrage.

Robert Hong: "The Myth of the Mercantile Homefront"

This exploratory paper will examine the character and conduct of Newfoundland's merchants during World War I in an attempt to understand their perspective. It is argued that their actions during the period from 1914 to 1919 has been largely misinterpreted through a widespread perpetuation of a negative stereotype which predicates a merchant class wholly at odds with the concerns of the majority of the population. As little is known about the extent of their concerns and motivations over a wide range of Newfoundland's history, the culturally-accepted image of an entrenched mercantile elite has tended to become a convenient scapegoat on which to attach the sins and ills of Newfoundland's sorry economic past. Commonly perceived as a monolithically conservative institution, "Water Street" has generally been scorned as either self-serving, parasitic, secretive, myopic, or simply indifferent to the fate of the Newfoundland economy and its people -- altogether exploitative in both deed and word. Crudely deterministic, this all-pervasive myth has tended only to obscure their probable role. This paper will attempt to separate myth from reality by examining some of the issues related to the homefront and the economy, including the progress of the fisheries, wartime inflation and profiteering. While this exploratory paper holds few definitive answers, it is suggested that the merchant's perspective is a necessary component leading towards a wider understanding of Newfoundland's economy during both the war and interwar politics.

Daniel MacKenzie
"Her Place Amongst Her Sister Dominions: Newfoundland and Wartime Diplomacy"

In 1919, Newfoundland failed to obtain separate international representation during the Paris Peace Conference. As the rest of the British self-governing empire advanced beyond the fields of war torn Europe and earned their rightful seats in the international arena, Newfoundland remained an anomoly within the empire. This paper examines Newfoundland's political participation in the councils of empire throughout the Great War. It recognizes Newfoundland's willingness to maintain an active diplomatic personality during the conflict, but notes the colony's apparent ambivilence to foreign affairs during the immediate post war period. The reasons for this sudden collapse stem from the combined impacts of devestating postwar social and econimic problems and an international manoever designed to prevent Newfoundland from taking its rightful chair at Versailles. In consequence, Newfoundland's international status was severely subordinated, it position within the self-governing empire undermined, and its capacity to engage in further conferences jeopardized. The factors resulting in this collapse and the impact they had on the island's post war status will be the subject of this discussion.

Margot Duley:
"Grandmothers of a Colony, Mothers of a Nation: The Women's Patriotic Association and its Aftermath"

World War I had a profound impact upon women's organisations in Newfoundland. During the war women's work, largely of a traditional kind and under the auspices of the Women's Patriotic Association, received widespread public recognition and praise. In the aftermath of the conflict new women's groups emerged with a degree of self-assertion previously unknown in Newfoundland history. These included the Women's Franchise League, NONIA, the Girl Guides, the Child Welfare Association and the Ladies Orange Benevolent Association. All articulated a vision of the continuing value of women's work, derived from the war experience, but with a significant ideological shift from imperial defense to improving and building the Dominion of Newfoundland.

Mary Philpott:
"Fancy You Fancying Me: Voices of Newfoundland Nurses Overseas in the Great War"

Newfoundland women, both trained professional nurses and untrained volunteer nurses, were part of the Newfoundland war effort in Europe. This paper examines their lives before, during and after the war. It will provide both a personal and statistical analysis of these women, and will focus on the training they received, their educational, social, economic and religious backgrounds, their war service, and their future prospects once the war was over.

Terry Bishop-Stirling:
"The Great War and Newfoundland Social Welfare Policy"

In the wake of welfare reforms following the Second World War, liberal historians identified war as a great catalyst to progress in government social policy. Projecting backwards they proposed a direct relationship between major twentieth century conflicts and the reforms identified with the "coming of the welfare state." In contrast, S. J. R. Noel's classic work "Politics in Newfoundland" argued that Newfoundland political leaders deliberately fought any expansion of government responsibilities during the war years. He sees the creation of the Newfoundland Patriotic Association, for example, as "a bizarre abdication of responsibility."

Did the war lead to an expanded role for the state in Newfoundland? An examination of social policy during and after the war does not support the view that war necessarily leads to a more active government role in social services. While the government did assume responsibility for war veterans, this was done belatedly and did not result in significant gains for the civilian population. The increased spending on welfare in the 1920s was due to the burden of continued and increasing economic weaknesses (partly due to the burden of war debts) rather than to any general changes in attitudes or policy.

Dean Oliver: "The Armistice and the end of the War"

The Armistice of 1918 arrived with a bang on the streets of Ottawa and Vancouver, but with a whimper in the trenches and gun pits of France and Belgium. As Canadians at home cheered and sang in the streets to ring in victory, their soldiers abroad dug in cautiously around Mons, a few falling to German machine-guns even as news of the Armistice filtered down from rear area headquarters to front line battalions. Some men drank at the news, others cried or gave thanks. Most, exhausted by the previous day's marching, fighting, and spade work, consolidated their positions and hoped desperately that the guns had stopped for good. They had. But what now?

This essay offers a snapshot of life in the Canadian Corps on 10-11 November 1918, and of the events surrounding Canada's Armistice at home and abroad. There are no lessons here, only stories.

Laura Brandon: "Maurice Cullen and the Canadian War Memorials"

One of the first artists sent from Canada to the Western Front was Newfoundland-born Maurice Cullen. The Canadian War Museum has custody of 33 paintings from this period of his career. This illustrated lecture looks at the programme known as the Canadian War Memorials, and Cullen's contribution to it. (Note: this lecture will take place at the Art gallery of Newfoundland and Labrador, in the St. John's Arts and Culture Centre, on Friday, November 13, 1998 beginning at 1:00 p.m. For further information contact Caroline Stone: telephone 709-737-2427; e-mail cstone@morgan.ucs.mun.ca; fax 709-737-2007.)

Edward Hollett: "Newfoundland defence policy 1890-1914"

While Newfoundland's participation in the imperial war effort may have been constitutionally unaviodable, the shape and character of its participation was determined by the Government of Newfoundland.

The withdrawal of the imperial garrison in November 1870 left the Newfoundland government with responsibility for local defence. Lacking sufficient resources, a strategic imperative, or a national inclination, the Newfoundland government left its defence in the hands of Britain.

Naval competition with Germany beginning in the 1890s led to increased pressure from Britain for defence support from its colonies and dominions. A series of domestic and international events through the turn of the century led to the formation of the Newfoundland division of the Royal Naval Reserve and later, to a local defence scheme built on the paramilitary, religious boys' brigades.

The creation of the Newfoundland Regiment in August/September 1914 was the activation of a defence plan by the Newfoundland government which had existed in outline since the 1890s and which had been actively supported from 1909 onward. Far from being an extra-constitutional and highly irregular body, the Patriotic Association was a political device for managing the administration of the war effort while the overall direction of the effort was left fiormly in the hands of the elected government under Sir Edward Morris.

This paper briefly summarises the existing interpretations of Newfoundland's participation in the Great War and proposes a revised view consistent with primary sources and more recent scholarship on Newfoundland's international role at the turn of the century and the higher direction of the British war effort.

Patricia O'Brien:
"Their Benign and Patriotic Influences: The Newfoundland Patriotic Association and the Administration of the War Effort, 1914-1917"

When war broke out in August 1914 the Newfoundland government responded by offering to raise troops for overseas service on land and on sea. To achieve this it had to overcome a number of obstacles, not the least of which was the need to win the support of two oppostion parties. The Newfoundland Patriotic Association was the chosen instrument, its membership carefully weighed and balanced so as to reflect the three denominations and three political parties without whose support the incipient war effort would surely fail. It was overwhelmingly St. John's-based.

Guided by the seen hand of the governor, the self-regarding Sir Walter Davidson, and the largely unseen hand of the prime minister, the wily Edward P. Morris, for nearly three years the NPA managed to contain the political threat to the war effort, while at the same time maintaining the Newfoundland Regiment as a separate fighting unit. But its unquestioning assumption that the people of rural Newfoundland shared its interests and world view, its mishandling of regimental affairs at home, and the perceived failure of key members to deal fairly with tonnage and supply problems pitted St. John's against the outports, Catholics against Protestants, and the poor against the rich.

The conviction grew that the government should no longer be allowed to hide behind the voluntary efforts of a select group of unaccountable men in managing the war effort. This, together with legitimate fears that the Regiment would cease to exist as a fighting unit, led to the creation of a national government in July 1917. Unexpectedly, politics then burst upon the scene as never before.

Douglas Dunsmore: "Sounds of War"

This presentation will examine specific protest music of Vaughan Williams, Benjamin Britten and R. Murray Schafer. We will see how they try to sound the alarm, help the suffering to endure loss, reflect in horror at the carnage and try to warn us away from the folly of repeating such tragic mistakes in the future.

Bernard Ransom:
"Newfoundland's Donkey's - Some preliminary thoughts on battalion leadership in the Newfoundland Regiment"

Other presenters:

Paul O'Neill on St. John's during the war.
Marie Wood on how Australians remember World War I.
Douglas Dunsmore on the masses and requiems of the war.
Stuart Pierson on the war on film.
Serge Bernier on War and Commeration.
Nelson Sherren on Newfoundland preparing for war.
Daniel Wheeldon on the Commonwealth War Graves Commission.
Georgina Howell on genealogy and military ancestors.
Wallace Ryan on military history and the graphic novel.
Jessie Chisholm & Alexander Dalziel on achival sources related to the war.
Andrew Porter & David Panton on the Beaumont Hamel Memorial Site in France.
Tony Murphy & Wayne Sturge present a video on the Newfoundland Regiment.
Booth Memorial High School Students dramatic presentation in commemoration of Rembrance Day.

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