Someone's Son: Learn about the repatriation of Newfoundland's Unknown Soldier

The repatriation of Newfoundland's Unknown Soldier started with a dream Thomas Nangle had in 1920. 

Nangle was the Royal Newfoundland Regiment's padre during the First World War, and later rose to the rank of lieutenant-colonel.  When the fighting stopped, he served as Newfoundland's director of war graves registrations and enquiries — the country's representative on the Imperial War Grave Commission.

Nangle was in charge of a gruesome task: burying and tracking graves of the men who fought and died with the regiment.

He called for an Unknown Soldier to be repatriated from the battlefields in France in the St. John's Daily Star in December 1920, just one month after an Unknown Warrior was entombed in Westminster Abbey in London.

Nangle wanted to choose the gravesite himself — a secret known to him alone. 

But that dream wouldn't come to fruition until a century later, when 40-year navy veteran Frank Sullivan picked up the torch and started a chain of events to complete Nangle's vision.

For Sullivan, repatriating an Unknown Soldier from France is personal. His great-uncle, Pte. Charles Canning, served with the regiment in France and was killed in 1918.

He has no known grave.

"I was in the military when Canada brought home the remains of an Unknown Soldier, and in the foyer of Parliament buildings while he lay in state," Sullivan told CBC News.

It was that moment that got Sullivan thinking about Newfoundland repatriating a soldier of its own.

"In the First World War, Newfoundland was its own dominion within the British Commonwealth, and in 1993 Australia brought home an Unknown Soldier. In 2000 Canada did, in 2004 New Zealand did, and in 2015 South Africa did. So why not Newfoundland?"

Sullivan started in on the task in 2020, writing letters to politicians, but he didn't get a response back.

Repatriating an Unknown Soldier was a tall order, given Canada already has one in Ottawa.

The soldier, brought home from Vimy Ridge in 2000 is a Canadian, not a Newfoundlander.

"The Unknown Soldier in Ottawa, God love him, doesn't represent the people of Newfoundland and Labrador," Sullivan said.

A tall order

Berkley Lawrence — soon to be named president of the Royal Canadian Legion and a former military guard of the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier in Ottawa — supported Sullivan's ambition.

At the same time, the legion was working on its own project: refurbishing the National War Memorial in downtown St. John's to mark its centennial anniversary.

The legion asked the provincial government for help, and it was through those conversations with Premier Andrew Furey that Sullivan pitched his own idea — bringing home an Unknown Soldier who would complete the National War Memorial and Nangle's dream. 

The premier supported the idea and started writing letters of his own, with federal government support following soon after.

"In the absence of a family, given that the soldier is unknown, as premier of the province I occupy the distinct honour and role of next of kin," Furey said.

"It was one that was conveyed to me long after we started this process. When Gary and Frank came into the office and made a brief pitch, I was on board right away. But I never thought I would occupy such an important role in the province's history."

But repatriating a soldier who had been buried in France for over 100 years wasn't a done deal.

The Commonwealth War Graves Commission, an organization that cares for the graves of 1.7 million Commonwealth soldiers across the world, had to be convinced. 

That was Ralph Goodale's job  — as Canada's high commissioner to the United Kingdom, he has a seat on the commission, and made the case that secured the green light. 

"We felt that it was a matter of justice for Newfoundlanders," said Xavier Puppinck, the commission's area director for France.

But before a soldier could be selected, historian Melissa Davidson and colleagues with the Department of Defence's casualty identification program in Ottawa had to do their homework. 

Davidson looked into the regiment's movements through France, down to where companies were on the battlefield, even tracking where particular individuals might have ended up throughout the course of a day.

"It was not only a large-scale search about the regiment itself, but also really about the men who made it up," Davidson said.

Normally, researchers like Davidson aim to name men killed in battle. But this time, the team searched for a grave with a long list of candidates for who could be inside, as a way to help to keep the Unknown Soldier's identity concealed, because he needed to represent all Newfoundlanders killed in battle.

From the First World War, about 820 men from Newfoundland — serving in all branches of the military —  have no known grave. 

In the end, only six graves in three separate cemeteries had the potential to hold the Unknown Soldier.

As the archaeologists started digging, the team discovered a crucial clue that indicated they were on the right track.

"As we were exhuming the remains, we did find a Newfoundland shoulder title," said Sarah Lockyer, a forensic archaeologist who works with the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Armed Forces.

Planning and preparation

Six members of the Royal Newfoundland Regiment were selected to carry the Unknown Soldier home.

The chosen pallbearers spent days drilling and planning every movement leading up to the moment their fallen comrade would be handed over by the French military during a ceremony at Beaumont-Hamel on May 25.

"This is probably going to be the most important event in my military career and I am very, very honoured to be a part of it," said Cpl. Benjamin Roberts, whose great-grandfather Cpl. John Thomas Roberts served with the regiment from 1917 to 1918.

The regiment's modern-day leader, too, has a connection to the regiment of the past.

Lt.-Col. Kyle Strong's great-grandfather, Lance-Cpl. Aaron Strong, served with the regiment and was wounded at Monchy-le-Preux in April 1917. 

Strong is also a hero in his own right. 

Shortly after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, he was deployed to Afghanistan, where he earned the Canadian Medal of Bravery for saving the life of a fellow soldier.

The significance of repatriation of Newfoundland's Unknown Soldier isn't lost on Strong, given his military service and family connection.

"I'm immensely proud to say that that I'm a part of this beyond the capacity that I hold as the commanding officer," he said.

"To be able to stand there and represent Newfoundlanders and Labradorians, such a monumental time, [I'm] very humbled by that. And to say that that I'm doing it as the commanding officer is something beyond words. Something that I could never explain. Something that I could never adequately express. Something that I could never, never have dreamed would have happened."

Back in the arms of his own

On the morning of May 25 at Beaumont-Hamel, the Ode to Newfoundland rang out over the former battlefield where so much Newfoundland blood was spilled a century ago. 

Hundreds of onlookers gathered to witness history happen on that hallowed ground once more as the Unknown Soldier was transferred back into the arms of his own regiment.

In a slow and steady procession, the soldier's polished pallbearers carried him homeward, and in his final moments on French soil, he was loaded onto a Canadian government airplane to be flown back across the Atlantic Ocean.

In St. John's, the fog lifted for the soldier's approach as hundreds of people waited outside the airport gates to watch the moment he touched down.

The soldier will lie in state at the Confederation Building on Friday and throughout the weekend, leading up to his full military funeral on Memorial Day.

His final resting place, the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier on the National War Memorial, overlooks King's Beach on St. John's harbour, the site where he, and so many others, last set foot on Newfoundland soil.

The Unknown Solider represents everyone from the province who didn't make the journey home.

Watch the full documentary Someone's Son: Repatriating Newfoundland's Unknown Soldier by clicking on the video above.

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