_ST. FRANCIS XAVIER UNIVERSITY AND THE WAR._
In the Great War students, past and present, of St. Francis Xavier
University served in every branch of the Forces of Canada, and in the
armies and navies of Great Britain, France and America. But it is the
especial pride of St. Francis Xavier to have furnished a complete Unit,
if a small one, of the Canadian Expeditionary Forces. The Unit was
officially known as No. 9 Stationary Hospital, C.A.M.C.
This Unit was organized in November, 1915, and was for some time
quartered in the University itself. It left Canada for the United
Kingdom in June, 1916, and proceeded to France in November of the
following year. Till April, 1918, it was stationed at St. Omer, but the
great German offensive of that spring made necessary its withdrawal to
Etaples, where it became part of the hospital system of the main British
base.
In the notorious bombardment of May 18, 1918, No. 9 was the first
hospital to be attacked, and suffered severely. Its premises were
completely destroyed, and more than forty per cent. of its personnel
became casualties. Towards the end of 1918, the status of the St.
Francis Xavier Unit was raised to that of a General Hospital. It
returned to Canada in July, 1919, and upon the reorganization of the
Military Forces of Canada, was preserved as an integral part of the
Active Militia.
More than three hundred and fifty Xavierians joined the colors.
Thirty-three were killed, or died on active service. The following
decorations were won by students or alumni of the University:
C.M.G. 1
D.S.O. 4
M.C. 11
First Bar, M.C. 1
Second Bar, M.C. 1
O.B.E. 1
D.C.M. 3
M.M. 5
M.S.M. 1
Three professors of the Faculty of the University saw active service in
the Canadian, Imperial and American Forces respectively; two were
severely wounded and one received the Military Cross.
In Canada during the War St. Francis Xavier took a becoming part in the
forefront of every patriotic activity. A contingent of the Canadian
Officers’ Training Corps was gazetted in April, 1915. Training had
hardly been begun when the Corps lost the majority of its officers by
enlistment and with the numbers of students continually dwindling—at one
commencement a single individual presented himself for graduation—it
became impossible to continue parades.
In every branch of war work pursued in the neighborhood of Antigonish,
the locale of the University, the lead was taken by members of the Staff
of St. Francis Xavier. The chairman of the local committee for the
Patriotic Fund, the Antigonish County Organizer of the Victory Loan
Campaign, and the Director of the re-establishment activities of the
Knights of Columbus over a wide area of Eastern Nova Scotia, were
professors of the University. In connection with the patriotic work of
the Knights of Columbus, it may be mentioned St. Francis Xavier did its
full share in the launching of the Dominion-wide campaign, which made it
possible for this body to perform its splendid services to our troops at
the scene of war. In brief in St. Francis Xavier, as in all the
universities of the land, it was the aim of all compelled to “carry on”
at home to become, by patriotic endeavor and sacrifice, not unworthy of
those who went from it to fight their country’s and the Empire’s
battles.
_Editor’s Note._—No. 9 Stationary Hospital Unit is more fully dealt
with in Chapter xxvi.