Introduction: World War One and Racial Segregation
In August of 1914, Canada went to war along with the British Empire to fight against the German and Austro-Hungarian empires. Of Guelph’s population of 16,000, 5,610 men volunteered to fight for their King and Country, and 3,328 were accepted, including Lieutenant-Colonel John McCrae, who wrote the poem “In Flanders Fields” in May 1915 after presiding over the funeral of friend and fellow solider Lieutenant Alexis Helmer. From the start of the war, Black Canadian men were eager to show their patriotism; approximately 800 Black Canadian men—including Frank Bollen from Guelph, Jacob Courtney from Simcoe, Ira Johnson from Oakville, and Lyman Hogan from St. Catharines—were able to fight alongside white volunteers of the Canadian Expeditionary Forces (CEF).
However, anti-Black racism made it difficult for most Black Canadian men to enlist in the CEF: “Canadians of African and Asian descent were seldom, if ever approached by recruiters, and those who offered their services were usually turned away at the recruiting stations” (Clarke 14). Responding to Black enlistment, Major-General Willoughby Gwatkin stated on 13 April 1916: “The civilized negro is vain and imitative; in Canada he is not being impelled to enlist by a high sense of duty; in the trenches he is not likely to make a good fighter; and the average white man will not associate with him on terms of equality” (qtd. in J Walker 5). Black Canadian volunteers were, what Nic Clarke calls, “rejected warriors” deemed “unfit for combat because of dominant racial stereotypes that assumed that they, as a racial group, were lazy and lacked initiative” (Shaw 566). Despite their rejection, Black Canadians continued to petition the government to show its commitment to British “fair play.”
Reminding white Canadians of the country’s abolitionist tradition, George Morton of Hamilton, for example, “framed his challenge of Jim Crow in the military” by “insist[ing] that racism should not thwart African Canadians’ deep sense of indebtedness and duty to their nation” (Mathieu 102). After two years of political struggle, Black Canadians finally got the opportunity to serve when the No. 2 Construction Battalion was authorized in July 1917: “In the end, more than six hundred black servicemen defended the British Empire during World War I in Canada’s segregated No. 2 Construction Battalion” (107). The No. 2 included Black enlistees from Canada. the West Indies and the United States. Many of the “African American men who fought under the Union Jack were southerners,” who “came of age in a Jim Crow South and learned the full meaning of citizenship upon immigrating to Canada” (108).
Anti-Black Racism & Jim Crow Segregation
While Blacks in Canada were granted “full legal equality and the rights of citizenship,” they “faced a daunting number of barriers to full inclusion in Canadian society.” The list of restrictions included barriers to education and employment, transportation and accommodations, entertainment and worship: “Blacks in Canada lived in a state of paradox, caught between formal legal equality and deeply entrenched societal and economic inequality” (B. Walker 3). Efforts to maintain the separation and subordination of Blacks in Canada through race-based exclusion policies were informed by anti-Black beliefs and myths in the United States. White Canadians embraced racial ideologies of Black inferiority in American popular culture.
The “codifying of blackness” in blackface minstrelsy through specific makeup, language, and movement created a legacy of racial stereotypes. David Leonard states, “[Blackface is] an assertion of power and control. It allows a society to routinely and historically imagine African Americans as not fully human.” Blackface minstrel shows were commonplace in Guelph, including a blackface minstrelsy performance. The photograph (ca. 1915) shows “The Black and White Minstrels” seated in front the British flag. The lackadaisical pose of the white actors in blackface associates blackness with laziness and carelessness; their posture intended to demean Black people contrasts with the restrained and refined pose of the other actors, including a man in uniform, that associates whiteness with civility and discipline.
The representation of blackness in the photograph “The Black and White Minstrels” reiterated racist caricatures of Blacks on stage and film, including D.W. Griffith’s Birth of a Nation (1915), which portrays African Americans as demented, blood thirsty, criminal, and brutish and the Ku Klux Klan as chivarlous protectors of American values and white womanhood. One of Birth’s most inflammatory scenes include the lynching of Gus, who is murdered for his desire for a white woman, Flora, who leaps to her death rather than succumb to his advances. While the lynching is performed off-screen, the body of the lynched man is brought on-screen by the triumphant Klan and left on the steps of the lieutenant governor’s house as a statement for “blacks and carpetbaggers.”
As “White Canadian audiences suspended their sense of British ‘fair play’ and supposed law-abiding nature and cheered Ku Klux Klan vigilantes as heroes,” Black Canadians protested the film, advocating the banning and censoring the film in fears that it would further incite racial hatred. As Greg Marquis notes, Black Canadians understood that that “acceptable racism reflected in Griffith’s popular film” undergirded Black separation and subordination in all aspects of Canadian society, including the military (442). While the Bollens, Courtneys, Goines, and Mallots were eager and willing to serve, the acceptance of derogatory depictions of Black people in Guelph and beyond was a barrier to demonstrating their loyalty and duty to King and Country. Black Canadians had to contest White Canadians’ “deeply internalized” racism; thus, Black Canadians waged two wars at home and abroad (442).
The Enlistment Struggle
Black Canadian newspapers were essential to activating racial consciousness during the two-year enlistment struggle. Established in 1915, editor Joseph R. B. Whitney used his Toronto-based newspaper, The Canadian Observer, to challenge de facto discrimination in the armed forces and recruit Black Canadians to assist “‘the Empire in fighting for justice and liberty.'” Whitney “urged his readers to ‘be loyal to your God, Race, and Country,’ and ‘in unity let us prove our worth to the country and the Empire'” (Foyn 102). In January 1916, Whitney began raising a separate “Coloured Platoon”: the Observer included a cut out for readers interested in “doing your bit.” Guelph resident Henry Francis Courtney wrote letters to Whitney expressing his desire “‘to go with the Boys of our Race to defend our King and Country'” (qtd. in Foyn 90). However, Whitney’s “recruitment attempts ironically faded into history just prior to the Canadian government’s authorization of the No. 2 that summer (Foyn 74).
The Atlantic Advocate Magazine was launched in Halifax, Nova Scotia in 1915. The Advocate was the idea of Wilfred A. DeCosta, who “emigrated from Jamaica around 1909 or 1909” (76). In its inaugural issues, the “Advocate prominently displayed H. S. Bunbury’s praise of Jamaican men who had taken up arms, presumably to encourage a similar patriotic response by African Canadians on Canada’s east coast” (Pollock 17-18). Three members of the Advocate‘s staff were recruiters for the No. 2: DeCosta, Clement Ligoure. and E. L. Cross. Born in San Fernando, Trinidad, Cross enlisted in the No. 2 and was the first witness to Guelph volunteer Tom Malott’s “Form of Will.” A graduate of Queen’s medical school, Ligoure’s recruiting activities and fundraising efforts took place in Nova Scotia and Ontario (Foyn 92-93). DeCosta and Cross both enlisted in the No. 2 in Halifax in November 1916 and January 1917.
DeCosta and Cross led a recruiting driving in Hammonds Plains in December 1916 where six men responded to the urgings of the recruiting editors. Despite this successful recruitment effort, recruitment was falling short of projected numbers: the Advocate appealed to the “spirit of patriotism…never dead in the breast of colored men”(January 1917). However, by April 1917, the magazine began to express “contemptuous disappointment” with “the No. 2’s recruitment and embarkation process.” Liguoure “reported that the men of No 2 CB were ‘locked up’ before leaving their barracks at Truro and at Halifax driven ‘like cattle’ aboard the SS Southland without ‘the last long good-bye to those near and dear to them'” (Foyn 95). The Advocate expressed Black Canadian war aspirations for equality and freedom, but the recruiting editors “eventually collided with Canadian racism” (77).
The No. 2 Construction Battalion
The No. 2 was created with the intent of securing 1049 black volunteers; however, only 670 Black men enlisted during the nine months between the formation of the battalion and when it left for England (Pollock 3). Some Black men were discouraged after the humiliation of being rejected by recruiting officers and others refused to serve in a segregated and non-combatant labour unit. Black volunteers came from across Canada, including several from Guelph/Wellington County: Henry Francis Courtney, Gordon Goines, Victor Goines, Jefferson Malott, and Thomas Malott. The volunteers had differing educational backgrounds: “Many were illiterate, with a handful of university students scattered among them” (5). The No. 2 was also international with volunteers from the United States and the Caribbean: of the 605 soldiers that departed for England, only 346 of them were born in Canada( 4).
The No. 2 left Pier 2 in Halifax on March 25, 1917; the nominal roll for the SS Southland includes Courtney and the Goines brothers; the Malotts were discharged earlier for medical reasons. The SS Southland was a “segregated troop ship specially commissioned by the Department of Militia and Defence in order to avert ‘offending the susceptibility of other [white] troops'” (Mathieu 108) and arrived in Liverpool on April 8. Stationed in Seaford, where, according to the unit’s war diary, their “military training was subordinated to agricultural labor, mostly planting potatoes” (1).
The No. 2 left Seaford for Boulogne on May 17 and spent the night at St. Martin’s Rest Camp. The following day, they were “entrained in comfortable cars, after being issued with Iron Rations and Steel Helmets.” The No. 2 arrived arrived in La Joux in the Jura Mountains the morning on May 20. During the train trip across France, the men were fed once during the journey; many of them, in an act of insubordination, decided to eat their rations. On May 21, 78 soldiers, including Gordon Goines and Henry Francis Courtney, were all ordered to forgive five days’ pay for “making way with iron rations.”
In La Joux, the No. 2 was attached to No. 5 District, Jura Group of the Canadian Forestry Company. “Although the soldiers were assigned to work parties with various construction companies station there,” Danielle Pittman notes, “the [No. 2] soldiers had their own separate camp to which they returned each night (63). Moreover, when in need of medical attention, the soldiers were “quartered in a segregated wing in Champagnole Hospital” (58). In October 1917, Private Robert Brent was brought to the hospital and treated for influenza; “according to Rev. Captain William White’s diary, Brent was not wearing socks or underwear that day” when he collapsed on his way to work; a month later, Rev. White reported another soldier was “being treated for trench foot” (69). While it is “unclear” whether the “inadequate supply of clothing” was due to differential treatment, the clothing issue presented serious health risks to the men, as they worked ten hours a day, in cold and wet environment (69).
Rev. White’s diary attests to the need for morale boosting in these unwelcoming conditions. He “regularly reported the packages he received from home that often contained items he need or food” (70). “It is likely that members of the unit also received packages from home,” writes Pittman, in addition to shipments of “Red Cross Comforts” (70). White, the only Black chaplain in the CEF, delivered church service on Sundays as well as other spiritual supports to soldiers; but while White was a Non-Commissioned Officer, he also experienced racism: “he reported that nearby units refused to accept him as a chaplain, even if they did not have one” (Boileau). Black soldiers were treated as second-class citizens at home and abroad. When Black Canadians were conscripted with the passing of the 1917 Military Service Act, it was determined that these unwanted warriors would also join segregated labour units: “these niggers do well in a Forestry Corps and other military unit,” wrote the British War Office in London to the Borden Government (qtd. in Pittman 41). While Black Canadians served with honour and dignity, the Canadian military and government were indifferent to their sacrifice.
Conclusion: From Race Riots to Political Renaissance
Black Canadian soldiers believed that their service would demonstrate that they were dedicated citizens worthy of equal rights and protection from discrimination. When the war ended, the No. 2 was sent to England, Kinmel Park, before retuning to Canada. In January 1919, a race riot occurred when Sergeant Edward Sealy, a black sergeant major, “tried to arrest an insolent white soldier”: “White soldiers attacked men of the black unit as they paraded for baths. In the ensuing melee five whites were slashed by razors and several black soldiers were hurt by flying rocks” (Morton 343). While only two Black soldiers were involved with the arrest, “all 275 members of the No. 2 were implicated in the incident report”: “It strongly implied,” writes Melissa Shaw, “that these Black men had used excessive violence against the white soldiers” (572). Shaw argues that the report suggests that the Black soldiers “audaciously transgressed ‘proper’ racial bounders.” Forgetting “their lowly place in the racial order of things, white soldiers “were therefore justifiably vexed by such an impertinent usurpation of their racial superiority” (573).
In March, cancelled shipping and beer shortages sparked three days of rioting at Kinmel: “The Toronto Daily Star‘s front-page headline declared that Kinmel camp soldiers had exploded in rage when 4,800 ‘Colored Troops [were] Shipped to the States while Canadians Are Held’ in England.” “Canadian newsmen,” writes Mathieu, “rationalized that white Canadian servicemen rampaged ‘due to preference being given to United States negro troops in returning home'” (111). In early May, race riots moved to Seaford when, as the Montreal Gazette headlines, an “Outbreak Started over [the] Arrest of a Colored Soldier.” The race riots began after “a white guard on picket duty harassed George Beckford, a black conscript, and demanded that ‘he adopt a more soldierly demeanour in public'”; news of his arrest prompted “one thousand servicemen” to storm the jail and steal Beckford back to hospital. In winter and spring 1919, white Canadian soldiers acted out their frustrations on Black soldiers.
Black Canadians great expectations that their service and sacrifice would be rewarded were dashed as they faced increased hostilities at home from white Canadians who reminded them of their subordinate “place” in Canadian society. While Black Guelph sacrificed to serve King and Country, they continued to be ridiculed on Guelph stages. Soldiers recuperating at Speedwell Hospital performed a minstrel show in Guelph City Hall on February 19, 1920: “The Speedwell Minstrels performance was liked well enough that they were invited to repeat it in Elora” (Shelley). Throughout the 1920s, Canadian audiences cheered at heroic Klansmen in Birth of a Nation, as it was screened and re-screened in movie theatres across the country. The revival of the Ku Klux Klan in the United Sates began in 1921, and the organization expanded into Canada with the first registered chapter in Toronto in 1925. In Hamilton, Klansmen burned fiery crosses up the mountain and paraded through Hamilton streets in the late 1920s and early 1930s.
In February 1930, Ira Johnson, a Black veteran from Oakville, and Isobel Jones, a white woman, got a marriage licence. Isobel’s mother, Annie, disapproved of the marriage, and appealed to the KKK to save her daughter from ruin. On February 28, 75 Klansmen searched Oakville for Johnson and Jones: they burnt cross, abducted Jones, and threatened Johnson, declaring that “‘if Ira… was ever seen walking down the street with a white girl again the Klan would attend to him.’” The police recognized many of the Klansmen as “prominent Hamilton businessmen,” and “let them ride off without penalties…’there was no semblance of disorder and the visitors’ behaviour was all that could be desired” (Bradburn). Members of Toronto Black community moved to have the government deal with the Klan and its action. Lawyers for the First Baptist Church of Toronto—including E. L. Cross, recruiting editor of the Advocate and Sergeant in the No. 2,—pressured the Attorney General of Ontario to launch full investigation.
In the post-war years, Black veterans as well as other Black Canadians became social activists and advocates protesting Jim Crow policies and anti-Black racism they were facing in Canadian society. In Winnipeg, John A. Robertson led the Order of Sleeping Car Porters (OSCP), rallying Black railwaymen as agent of political mobilization to fight for Black Canadian rights (Mathieu 100). Through the OSCP, other various racial uplift institutions were created, making postwar Black Canadian radicalism possible (100). In major cities such as Halifax, Montreal, Toronto, and Vancouver, Black railwaymen unionized, creating a national stage for Black voices and actions (140). Citing their rights as men, citizens, and now veterans, Black Canadians took to the streets to protest racial inequality: a political struggle that would be just as difficult as the one they had just overcome (120).
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Student Research and Writing by ENGL 2130 (Fall 2020): Saudah Butt, Sophia De Goey, Blair Gwartzman, Paige Kemper, Stefanie Kuizenga, Kaylee Millen, Ryan Nemeth, Rebecca Nijhuis, Brett Norman, Swarthy Sethuraman, Mira Soukenik, Adam Tripp, Kennedy Warren.
Image Colouring by Zahra Mirabolfathi-Nejad.