Collection search - Ellis, W.D. - Interview

Record information – Brief

1

Ellis, W.D. - Interview

Item number (ISN):

380560

Series title:

[The Great War and Canadian Society]

Hierarchical level:

Item (Accession level)

Date:

1974-07-30

Item number (ISN):

380560

Type of material:

Sound recordings

Found in:

Archives / Film, Video and Sound

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Record information – Details

Fonds/collection:

THE GREAT WAR AND CANADIAN SOCIETY PROJECT

Accession:

1975-0098

Media:

Sound

Part:

1 of 1

Production date:

1974-07-30

Production company:

Opportunities for Youth

Production credit:

interviewer, Sharon Mintz

Description:

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Interview of W.D. Ellis who was born in 1895 in England and came to Canada in 1912. He talks about: his parents; his family; his father losing all his money in a bank crash in 1910; his father, mother and sister moving to Canada in 1910; his being left behind because he was on a scholarship in grammar school; the family going to a farm in Georgetown; his father getting a job with a legal firm in Toronto and then sending for him; his getting a job in 1912 with the British American Insurance Company; his 45-year career with the with the Canadian Bank of Commerce, where he worked his way up to management; moving to Woodstock; the birth of his child; his description of life on Woodbine Avenue, with a steep hill, a wooden sidewalk and a horse-drawn fire engine; skating and playing hockey; going to the movies at the Family Theatre and the Allan Theatre; memories of movie stars Mary Pickford, Douglas Fairbanks and Charlie Chaplin; the film Birth of a Nation; finding out from a newspaper that the First World War had been declared; signs at the Massey-Harris Company that “No Englishmen Need Apply” because Canadians resented that Massey-Harris hired a group of Englishmen sent to Canada by the Salvation Army; the difficulties British people encountered in making friends in Canada; immigrants from countries such as Italy and Poland; not enlisting because his father was sick; joining the Corps of Guides in 1915; not feeling any social pressure to enlist; getting a job as a dispatcher at Exhibition camp in Toronto; taking camp orders to orderly rooms and to hospital clerks; his salary; recruiting cyclists; army discipline; more about the cylist corps; a comparison of military training in Canada and in England; his job as a signaller; learning how to use signalling devices; learning Morse code; the lack of hostility between the rank and file and the higher ups; writing letters to his girlfriend; at training camp in England; living conditions in the army in England; sleeping on boards and blankets; the awful food such as porridge and kippers; his own division; a mock funeral service for cyclists; French Canadians in the battalion; the generosity shown by the British to the Canadian troops in Britain; his awareness at the time of unrest in other military camps; riots in Whitley camp; fights at dance halls between Canadians and Australians; visiting relatives in England when he was on leave; getting wounded and being sent to the hospital; going to Calais to be shipped to England; being carried aboard ship by German prisoners; being put on a Red Cross train at Dover and being sent to Croydon, his birthplace; terrible conditions at the hospital in Croydon, where he had a nasty nurse; going to the Canadian military hospital at Orpington; going on leave to Belfast when he got out of the hospital; being fired on by the Irish army when he was in uniform in Belfast because they thought he was a British soldier; staying with some old ladies who had volunteered with the YMCA to billet soldiers; going back to camp and getting a job taking messages from headquarters and sending them on to other battalions; sleeping with headphones on so that he could hear messages; being on duty for 36 hours straight; his army pay; medals; his recollections of Armistice Day celebrations in London; crowds at the celebrations; his return to Canada on 23 December 1918; feeling strange when he got back to Canada; getting money from the army to buy civilian clothes; getting a job as a bank teller; women tellers at the bank during the war years; the trouble veterans had readjusting to civilian life; the failure of a veterans’ association because they did not want to remember the war; and the success of a veterans’ association in 1935 because by then people wanted to meet old friends.

Language:

English

Notes:

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1. The interviews took place in 1974 and resulted in the publication of a book entitled "The Great War and Canadian Society" edited by Daphne Read - copyright 1978 - New Hogtown Press, Toronto.~2. Release forms, data sheets, and summary analysis/transcripts are available in binders labelled Opportunities for Youth - War and Canadian Society in VSA's audio-visual section.~3. Part of a series of recorded interviews with elderly citizens who lived in Canada during the period of World War I. The interview material consists of their opinions and observations about the war, the war years, and the effect on Canadian society during and after WWI.~4. The interviewee signed an agreement giving consent for a recording of this interview to be placed in the Public Archives of Canada for the purposes of historical research and also signed a publication agreement allowing any transcribed portions of the interview to be used in the book under the condition that no full names, addresses or phone numbers would be published.~5. Subject description is based on information found in the fact sheet, deposit agreement, publication agreement and summary analysis.

Detailed holdings information:

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Vault ISN:

437688

Format:

SOUND

Location number:

C02409

Vault code:

GAT

Number of items:

1

Kind of sound:

R/R

Technical description:

POLY

Made from:

FROM LOANED MATERIAL

Status:

MASTER

Vault ISN:

437689

Format:

SOUND

Location number:

C02410

Vault code:

GAT

Number of items:

1

Kind of sound:

R/R

Technical description:

POLY

Made from:

FROM LOANED MATERIAL

Status:

MASTER

Vault ISN:

737173

Format:

SOUND

Location number:

1975-0098/221
1975-0098/222

Vault code:

GAT

Number of items:

2

Kind of sound:

CASSETTE

Made from:

DEPOSIT

Status:

ORIG
Ordering and viewing options

Conditions of access:

Open

Restrictions on consultation:

No Restrictions / Pas de restrictions

Reproduction access:

With written permission of Copyright Owner / Avec la permission écrite du détenteur des droits d'auteur

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