April 7, 1921
What was happening a century ago this week from the front page of the Cowichan Leader.
April 7, 1921
Almost the entire front page of the April, 1921 edition of The Leader is dedicated to WAR MEMORIAL GIFT WEEK, the fundraising drive to erect a Cenotaph in Duncan and a memorial on Mount Prevost. Two and a-half years after Armistice, the Cowichan Electoral District War Memorial Committee was determined to honour the Valley’s war dead.
The left side of the page lists the names proposed for the downtown Cross of Remembrance—115 dead, 45 Missing, Died of Wounds or Died. Thinks of that for a moment: 159 fathers, sons, brothers, husbands, friends, co-workers, and one woman, ‘Miss Dorothy Twist,’—from the Cowichan Valley alone. What an indictment of war—which was repeated just 25 years later.
Two columns on the right side of the page list the names of donors—and their contributions, from 50 cents to $100 for individuals, $160 from the Municipality of North Cowichan, and $100 each from the City of Duncan, the Cowichan Chapter of the IODE, Cowichan Merchants Ltd., and The Leader, for a total of $1692.00.
From the start the committee had had to struggle with two opposing viewpoints. There were those who wanted any memorial to be in a “utilitarian form” such as a tuberculosis ward for King’s Daughters’ Hospital, and those who favoured a traditional, more military form of memorial such as a Cenotaph.
The proposed lighthouse memorial on Mount Prevost was completely out of the box, intended as “not merely a reminder to nearly all who live in the district, but a beacon to be seen from Vancouver and far out at sea, reminding the outer world of the deeds of our men”.
(Now you know why I’ve been arguing until I’m blue in the face that the light in the Mount Prevost memorial, trashed 40 years ago by vandals, be returned. What in heavens name does it take to get North Cowichan Council to get off its backside and do this? The original light was fired by acetylene gas that needed refuelling and maintenance but today’s solar technology means a light could be returned to the tower that would be self-sustaining. All it needs is to be installed in such a way as to deter vandalism. As ever, it’s never really a matter of cost practicability but of political will. And Al Siebring, mayor, who saw to the monument’s repainting years ago, of all the people not to work actively towards this goal...)
As the memorial committee put it in 1921, “Those, whom it is planned to honour, did not stand on the manner of their going, did not argue on the methods of their service. Their duty was decided for them. They followed the path to the end.”
The committee hoped to raise $2500 in total. In deference to those who could only give modest sums, anonymity was assured if requested. If every man, woman and child in the Cowichan Valley gave something—even 5 cents—the job would be done. As, of course, it was, and we have the Cenotaph in Charles Hoey Park and the lighthouse, neglected though it be, on Mount Prevost.
In a poignant poem, THE LAMENT OF THE HILLS, F.A.B mourned:
Gaunt Mount Prevost, whose rugged crest looms thro’ the lowering cloud,
Calls to Tzouhalem’s craggy ridge, its plaintive quest aloud:
‘Where are the youth whose joyous feet, our breezy uplands roamed,
‘Who stalked the deer, thro’ mist and rain, with hound the gullies combed...?’
All of which left just enough room at the bottom right of the front page to report on the latest doings of the Duncan Board of Trade. There was a new board of directors led by president and journalist Hugh Savage, and good attendance but for Cobble hill and Shawnigan. Duncan Mayor Pitt spoke on the condition of the lumber industry, grocer S.R. Kirkham advocated further lobbying of the federal government to get the building Canadian National Railway (formerly the Canadian Northern Pacific Railway) to run a spur to Duncan, and there were more complaints about the service (or the lack thereof) of the E&N.
Because there were many British immigrants living in the Valley there was criticism of the British government’s income tax policy that penalized ex patriates. Fisheries, rising telephone rates and the need for more policing in Shawnigan district rounded out the agenda.
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