On this, the 150th anniversary of the confederation of the Dominion of Canada (i.e, Canada Day) we here at Field Punishment No.1 thought it timely to share one of our favourite pamphlets from the First World War: A Form of Prayer and Thanksgiving printed “for use at Parade Services in the Canadian Corps on Dominion Day…1917.
Canon Frederick George Scott mentions this particular day in his memoir The Great War As I Saw It:
” I was the only man in the whole Canadian Corps at the front who could remember the first Dominion Day. I could remember as a child being taken by my father on the 1st of July, 1867, to hear the guns firing a salute on the grounds of McGill College, Montreal. Canada had travelled [sic] a long distance on the path of nationhood since that far-off time, and now, after fifty years, I had the satisfaction of being with the great Canadian Army Corps on European soil, engaged in the biggest war in history. Such an experience is not often the privilege of a human life, and the splendid body of men before me gave promise of Canada’s progress and national glory in the future. Everyone felt the peculiar significance of the celebration (189-90).”
Recall that on July 1st, 1917 the Canadian Corps was still recovering from their success at Vimy Ridge, and in a matter of months would be sent into the mire of Passchendaele.
A link to a PDF is below the cover image. Enjoy…a mari usque ad mare.
A Form of Prayer and Thanksgiving
