Dad's Navy Days: January 1944 - Heading West (24)

Navy Boys Head West by Train

["Some Navy boys return to Canada in December 1943"]

"After a few weeks of ferrying supplies from near Messina
(Sicily) to Reggio (Italy), they returned to Africa and again
to England in October: some were well-laden with side
arms... This group returned to Canada, landing at Halifax
December 6, 1943 after two years of overseas service."
("DAD, WELL DONE" Doug Harrison)

[January, 1944, Navy boys are set to board a train]

According to my father's navy records, during his 52-day leave in Canada (after two years overseas service) he was attached to Stadacona, Halifax from November 28, 1943 to January 14, 1944. It would not surprise me, therefore, because it was the way of the Navy (wrote my father), that he had to return east to Halifax before he was put on a train west to Vancouver Island for his last two years of service with the Royal Canadian Navy Volunteer Reserve and Combined Operations. Navy boys were always on the train. Whether in England or Scotland they were always heading off somewhere by train. So, why should life be any different once they were back home?

["Father's Navy records reveal he travelled a great deal"]

About taking trains in Canada, W. R. Sinclair (LT, RCNVR) writes the following:

     I pause here to note that all my trips in Canada

     while I was in the Navy were made by train. If

     there were any commercial flights by air* they 

     were certainly not used by navy personnel

     travelling to assignments or on leave. I found

     travelling by train as a young naval officer a lot

     of fun. And it was certainly a wonderful way to

     learn how vast a country we live in. (page 21,

     St. Nazaire to Singapore, The Canadian Amph-

     ibious War 1941 - 1945 Volume 1

     *Trans. Canada Airlines commenced the Van-

     couver to Montreal service April 1, 1941, and 

     scheduled flights to other centres later in 1941.

["Buryl McIntyre (back), Chuck Rose (middle), Doug Harrison"] 

Dressed to the nines in long coats and silk scarves, my father and some favourite buddies posed (about 70 years ago today) outside a train station at some point during their trip to their next assignment at Courtenay and Comox on Vancouver Island. It is not important to me whether they left from Halifax, Hamilton (home of HMCS Star, where some of them signed up for duty about two-and-a-third years earlier) or Union Station in Toronto. Important is that Dad wrote two lengthy and informative accounts of his last tour of duty.

"It was heaven," he begins.

More to follow.

More of Dad's Navy Days: December 1943 - Christmas in Norwich (23)