Figure 1.--This photograph was taken at the Westmount War Fund Drive for Britain. They were collecting money for bombed out British families. Actually it was at the end of the Battle of Britain (June 3, 1941). The Canadians like Americans for a year have been watching horrifying newsreels of the Germans bombing London and other British cities. By this time, however, OKL had moved the Luftwaffe east in preparation for Barbarossa. This was, however, not yet known to the public. Westmount is a neigborhood within Montreal. It was a very toney neigborhood with British moneied families. They had set up a depiction of a German fighter shot down with a parachute in the tree. There was, however, no Me-109 handy, so this was a mock-up. It was staged in Westmount Park on Sherbrooke Street with Victoria Hall, a public library in the background.
Canada like the other beligerants sustained serious losses during World War I. The cost was high. Canada's casualties were 67,000 killed and 173,000 wounded, out of an expeditionary force of 620,000 people mobilized (nearly 40 percent of the mobilized forces). [Leach, p. 40.] This was a substantial contribution for a country of 7.5 million people, especially as the Quebecois (French-speaking majority of Quebec province) had avoided service. This was a higher casualty rate than suffered by the Americans. The Government ovewealmingly won an election victory in 1917. Like Britain, Canadians despeartely wanted to avoid another war. There was a general recognition among Anglo-Canadians, that Britain had done everything possible (except military preparadness) to prevent another war. There was, however, nothing like the isolationist movement which developed in the United States. French Canadians were opposed, but that primarily reflected anti-British sentiment and not the same anti-war sentiment that drove the American Isolationists. The Canadian people, except for the Quebecois (French-speaking majority of Quebec province), strongly supported the war effort. And poorly conceived British decision to use Canadian infantyry at Hong King (1941) and Dieppe (1942) did not shake Canadian support for the War. This begun from the point that Britain declared war on Germany after Hitler had ordered the invasion of Poland. Unlike World War I, the Government delayed the formal declaration of war a few days (September 10, 1939). This seems to have been to demonstrate the declaration was one of an independent country. It also provided a few days to rush American military equipment over the border before the American Neutrality Law restrictions kicked in. The Canadian people also strongly supported the war effort throughout the War. Historians tend to differ on the impact of World War I on the emerging Canadian natioal identity. Canada’s World War II war effort was far more extensive and impactful than that in World War I. And as a result, had a much more significant impact on Canadian society. There was still a feeling at the time that Canada was part of a great British Empire. For whatever reason this idea largely dispated after the War and modern Canadian nationalism began to emerge. Perhaps it was the realization that Canada could no longer depend on Britain for its defense and Canada had to fashion its own national foreign policy, independent of both America and Britain, but based on the assumtion that the country's defense was guaranteed by the United States.
Sources
Leach, Norman. Passchendaele: Canada's Triumph and Tragedy on the Fields of Flanders : an Illustrated History (Coteau Books: 2009).
