As time goes by

This past November, Canada celebrated the sixtieth anniversary of the war brides' arrival by going back to Halifax's Pier 21, where they first set foot on Canadian soil to begin their second lives. Scroll through our photo gallery to see snapshots of that momentous journey and read on for just a few of their amazing stories. var titles = new Array("","","","","","","","","","","","","","","","","","",""); var descriptions = new Array("T. Brent Schaus is war bride Doreen Tilley Robinson's grandson. He wanted to surprise his grandmother at the Montreal station before her departure to Halifax's Pier 21.", "Jacqueline Gendron, 82, thinks about her first journey to Canada as the train makes its way to Halifax.", "Many war brides travelled with their husbands to Pier 21 after over 60 years of marriage.", "Yvonne Leahy (left), 80, and Peggie Bailey, 80, both came to Canada from London, England and currently live in Peterborough, ON.", "Agnes Gallie, 84, stands in her train bedroom on the way to Halifax. She arrived from Northeast Scotland and currently lives in Salmo, BC.", "The war brides arrive at the Halifax train station on November 7, 2006.", "A big parade welcomes the women off the train at the Halifax station.", "The welcoming parade continues.", "Elsie Mills (left), 84, kisses her daughter Betty Hutchinson, 60, at the Halifax train station. They currently live in Glencoe, ON.", "Some old photographs were displayed at the Pier 21 Museum.", "Joan and Paul Dumaine renew their vows after 61 years of marriage at Pier 21 in Halifax.", "Muriel Andrews and Andy Andrews renewed their vows after 61 years of marriage.", "A photograph of Joan and Paul Dumaine, taken 60 years ago.", "War bride Joyce Taylor laughs at husband Walter Taylor.", "Alma Macdonald and her husband look out the window at the Halifax train station.", "Margaret Weaver, holding the citizenship documents she received when she landed in Canada, talks of her journey.", "Alma Macdonald, wearing one of the three dresses she brought with her to Canada from England, talks with Canadian naval officers.", "Jeannette Holm, 81, hugs friends before her departure in Halifax. Originally from Sussex, UK, she currently lives in Brandon, Manitoba.", "A gala dinner took place during the last night of the trip to commemorate the war bride's 60th anniversary."); image0 = new Image(); image0.src = "/english/images/issue/2007/02/20061108_085318_5244_01.jpg"; image1 = new Image(); image1.src = "/english/images/issue/2007/02/20061108_085318_5244_02.jpg"; image2 = new Image(); image2.src = "/english/images/issue/2007/02/20061108_085318_5244_03.jpg"; image3 = new Image(); image3.src = "/english/images/issue/2007/02/20061108_085318_5244_04.jpg"; image4 = new Image(); image4.src = "/english/images/issue/2007/02/20061108_085318_5244_05.jpg"; image5 = new Image(); image5.src = "/english/images/issue/2007/02/20061108_085318_5244_06.jpg"; image6 = new Image(); image6.src = "/english/images/issue/2007/02/20061108_085318_5244_07.jpg"; image7 = new Image(); image7.src = "/english/images/issue/2007/02/20061108_085318_5244_08.jpg"; image8 = new Image(); image8.src = "/english/images/issue/2007/02/20061108_085318_5244_09.jpg"; image9 = new Image(); image9.src = "/english/images/issue/2007/02/20061108_085318_5244_10.jpg"; image10 = new Image(); image10.src = "/english/images/issue/2007/02/20061108_085318_5244_11.jpg"; image11 = new Image(); image11.src = "/english/images/issue/2007/02/20061108_085318_5244_12.jpg"; image12 = new Image(); image12.src = "/english/images/issue/2007/02/20061108_085318_5244_13.jpg"; image13 = new Image(); image13.src = "/english/images/issue/2007/02/20061108_085318_5244_14.jpg"; image14 = new Image(); image14.src = "/english/images/issue/2007/02/20061108_085318_5244_15.jpg"; image15 = new Image(); image15.src = "/english/images/issue/2007/02/20061108_085318_5244_16.jpg"; image16 = new Image(); image16.src = "/english/images/issue/2007/02/20061108_085318_5244_17.jpg"; image17 = new Image(); image17.src = "/english/images/issue/2007/02/20061108_085318_5244_18.jpg"; image18 = new Image(); image18.src = "/english/images/issue/2007/02/20061108_085318_5244_19.jpg"; function changeSlide(di){ var val = (document.holdingTank.placement.value)*1; if(di=="up") val++; else val--; if(val(titles.length-1)) val=0; document.getElementById("desc").innerHTML = descriptions[val]; document.getElementById("slideof").innerHTML = " "+(val+1)+" of 19"; document.getElementById("productImage").src = eval("image"+val+".src"); document.holdingTank.placement.value = val; }

Stories of the War Brides By Jacqueline Nunes I boarded the train in Montreal with more than two hundred women who had been on this journey once before. For two days, we sat in tiny cabins and spoke of the Canadian soldiers stationed in Europe that they had fallen in love with and married over six decades ago. At the end of World War II, over 46,000 war brides, along with 21,000 children, boarded ships mostly in England, but also in Holland, Denmark and Italy, to join their husbands in Canada. Today, one in thirty Canadians is directly related to a war bride. Here are just a few of their incredible stories: Peggy Carter, Winnipeg, Manitoba "We both loved dancing. That's how we met. The dance hall was surrounded by airfields, so at that time, if the weather was bad and the airmen couldn't fly at night, they'd come into the town and go to a dance. I was with a group of girls. He was very tall and blonde, and I just saw him straight across the room, and then next thing I knew, he was asking me to dance. We saw each other as often as we could for about two months. He was a navigator. He'd be in the plane with the pilot and three other airmen. On his second trip, bombing Dresden in Germany, his plane was shot down. He was taken prisoner-of-war for two years. He telephoned when he got back to England, and he was with me the day after that phone call. We were married two weeks later, the 26th of May, 1945, in London in a church called St. Catherine's. But the church had been bombed so we were married in the parish hall. I wore my sister's wedding dress. When I had my first child, my sister, who was a seamstress, cut the dress up and made a pillow and comforter for his crib." Joan Dumaine, Point Claire, Quebec "I thought he was handsome. He looked good in his uniform. His uniform was always pressed. You could see your face in his boots, they were so shiny. And he had a very bad habit of saying, "Don't step on my boots, watch my shine." We met in 1941, but couldn't marry because he was sent to Dieppe. He was reported killed in action. He had his obituary in the newspaper and a memorial service in the local cathedral. But my mother said, "No, he's not dead, he'll be back." He was missing for two months. Then I got a card from him. It said that he was in a German prison camp. I wrote to his mother and father and told them he was still alive. Meanwhile, I joined the army as a driver of trucks and ambulances. They taught me how to drive, fix the cars, change tires. He was released in 1945. When he came back, he was so small, his skin was yellow, he was so thin. My mother looked after him, because I had to go back to my unit. My cousin gave me a wedding dress, and my aunt borrowed a veil made of 125-year-old Spanish lace. It was a beautiful white veil, right to the floor. We got married on the 4th of July, 1945. I had him for two weeks, and then he was shipped back to Canada. And I didn't come until nearly a year later." Phyllis Cummings, Belleville, Ontario "He said good-night at the garden gate. He said, "See you tomorrow night." But then he didn't show up that next night. So I thought I'd gotten stood up. We didn't find out until the day after that all the soldiers had left to go over to Normandy. They all knew that they were going, but they weren't allowed to tell us. It wasn't until a week later that I got a letter from him. We corresponded as he fought in France, Holland and Germany. Then he came back to England on leave. He didn't tell us he was coming. I was out someplace, but when I came in the door, there he was, standing at the kitchen sink, shaving. And the next day, he asked me to marry him. So I said yes. I had just enough coupons to buy material to have a wedding dress made." Joyce Taylor, Dartmouth, Nova Scotia "When I came to Canada, I worked at a big newspaper – the Gazette in Montreal – as a telephone operator. I was very fortunate I got any work at all. They didn't hire married women. In those days, there was no welfare, no Medicare, no home help. The only place you could get help from was the Salvation Army or your local pastor, and they were very limited because everybody was asking for help. So consequently, when I went out to work, there was no place to leave my son. No such place existed. I finally found a place. I left my son with the 'grey nuns.' I don't remember what their proper name was. That was a nickname. I'm sure they were good to the children. But when I went there, I could never hear children's laughter. I thought they were quite strict, which upset me. So I would cry all the way to the nursery, and he would cry all the way. And then when I picked him up, he would cry all the way home, and so would I, on the streetcar." Margaret Weaver, Grande Prairie, Alberta "I lay in bed at night planning how I could get home. I was the only war bride for miles around. The locals looked at me as though I'd come from Mars. There was no heat or running water, and no outside toilets. My father had told me, "You have to be careful of the wolves. They'll come up out of the toilets at you." The first night I was there, my husband went on horseback to the post office to fetch the mail. Outside there was a coyote howling its head off and, I swear to God, I locked all the doors and crawled under the bed with my son. My husband came back from the post office and couldn't get in. I yelled, "I can't come out. There's a wolf out there." I was scared of everything that moved. But my husband's family was good to me. Only one of his cousins was mean. I heard her say, "Oh, this is some slut he picked up off the streets of London." But I'd come from a good middle-class family. We'd been through so much during the war. They just didn't understand." Elsie Mills, Glencoe, Ontario "I'll tell you one funny story. There was one particular time (in Canada) when all we had to eat was hamburg. And hamburg was the cheapest stuff you could buy. So I said to the kids, "I'm going to cook you hamburg, and I'll make you a promise that I'll make you a different dish every day for a whole month." And I did. I made 31 recipes of hamburg, and it wasn't the same one twice. You could make it into stew, you could make it into meatloaf, you could make it into patties, you could make it with macaroni, you could make it with spaghetti, you could make pies. The kids loved hamburg gravy. And that was just hamburg ground with vegetables with it. You put it over potatoes. This was all their lives, but this particular time was when we were living at Camp Borden (in Borden, ON). I'd never known, before I moved to Canada, what it was like to sit at a table that wasn't loaded with food. But you didn't cry about it. You made fun of it."