Our Family Tree

1904
Born in Listowel, County Kerry, Ireland. He was one of eight children. The family must have been poor and in 1911 census 3 of the children lived as servants in other homes. They lived on a farm outside Listowel in Gortcurreen.

1918
He entered the First World War and fought in the trenches in France with the British Army. This would have made William only 14 years old when he fought in WW1.

1920
He was also involved in the Sinn Feiners, in Ireland and fought against the Black and Tans. The Sinn Fein party has historically been associated with theProvisional IRA. The Black and Tans was one of two newly recruited bodies, composed largely of World War I veterans, employed by the Royal Irish Contrabulary from 1920 to 1921 to suppress revolution in Ireland. Although it was established to target the Irish Republican Army, it became notorious through its numerous attacks on the Irish civilian population. The Black and Tan gained a reputation for brutality, as the RIC campaign against the IRA and Sinn Féin members was stepped up and police reprisals for IRA attacks were condoned by the government.
The Black and Tans were not subject to strict discipline in their early months in Ireland and as a result, the deaths of Black and Tans at the hands of the IRA in 1920 were often repaid with arbitrary reprisals against the civilian population. In the summer of 1920, the Black and Tans burned and sacked many small towns and villages in Ireland, beginning with Tuam in County Galway in July 1920 and also including Trim, Balbriggan, Thurles and Templemore amongst many others. In November 1920, the Tans "besieged" Tralee in revenge for the IRA abduction and killing of two local RIC men. They closed all the businesses in the town and let no food in for a week. In addition they shot dead three local people. On 14 November, the Tans abducted and murdered a Roman Catholic priest, Fr Michael Griffin, in Galway. His body was found in a bog in Barna a week later. Finally, the Black and Tans sacked Cork city, on the night of 11 December 1920, the centre of which was burned out. Gortcurreen where William and his family lived was right in the middle of all this fighting, they lived 25 km from Tralee. William was only 16 years old while this fighting was going on.

1921
Emigrated to Canada and worked in frieghting jobs in Alberta and BC. William would have been 17 years old when he emigrated to Canada.

1938
Arrived in Fort Smith, NT

When war broke out in 1939 he walked from Fort Smith to Fort McMurray and enlisted in the 49th Edmonton Regiment. By road it is 1500 km and cross country the distance is 500 km. On 10 September 1939 Canada declared war on Germany. This time the military authorities decided the country would mobilize for war using the names of existing militia units, and The Edmonton Regiment was one of those chosen to form a war substantive battalion. The unit trained in England until 1943, when it went to participate in the invasion of Sicily.During this campaign, on 7 July 1943, King George VI granted a name change to reflect our alliance with The Loyal Regiment (North Lancashire). Now our unit became The Loyal Edmonton Regiment. Recruits who were offered $1.30 a day, 20Ø more than their fathers had received in 1914. Four days after leaving Edmonton the troops marched directly from the trains onto the Polish passenger liner Batory. The convoy arrived in Glasgow on the last day of the year. The weather and the continuing shortages of equipment hampered efforts to go beyond basic training. For the troops, the early months of 1940 meant more drill and route marches, relieved by the mostly pleasant process of learning the English way of life. By April, the Edmonton Regiment had yet to start training at divisional or even brigade level. They were firing blank ammunition from their Lee-Enfields and wooden bullets from the few Bren guns they possessed. Canadian forces landed at Pachino, Italy, July 1943 at the southeastern corner of the island of Sicily. They used landing craft (amphibious DUKWs) to transport them to shore from troop transports located farther out to sea. As events unfolded, when the Edmonton Regiment boarded their amphibious DUKWs and climbed down the nets into their landing craft on 10 July 1943, they were able to land and establish positions on shore without opposition. Patrols began moving inland at once and captured several dozen Italian soldiers after token resistance.On 16 July, just south of Piazza Armerina, the regiment encountered their first Germans and their first serious firefight of the war. The fighting in Sicily, which lasted less than a month, had provided a severe test for the well-trained but unblooded battalion. In spite of the intense heat, constant choking dust, loss of vehicles, and malaria and dysentery, the unit had more than held its own against battle-hardened German troops.

Only nine men who left Edmonton in December of 1939 returned in the fall of 1945. On the other hand, the periods of combat service were closer; thirty-six months in the First World War compared to twenty-two in the Second World War. The numbers of dead in the Second World War were just over a third of those in the First World War (334 as opposed to 977). It
was a very different kind of war, much more technologically complex than the earlier one for an infantry battalion. In it, the Loyal Edmonton Regiment showed the same qualities of courage, endurance, and resourcefulness as it had a generation earlier.
Overseas William served in England and Italy where we was wounded and returned to Calgary.

He returned to Fort Smith in 1957 and made it his home.

Nine grandchildren in 1987.

William passed away at the Fort Smith Health Center.