WWI medal leads to remembrance 91 years later

A soldier from southwestern Ontario who died in the First World War is finally being celebrated, in a Remembrance Day 91 years in the making.

William Evlyn Skinner was barely 18 when he enlisted in the Canadian Overseas Expeditionary Force on Nov. 3, 1915.

Born in Stratford, England, on Feb. 22, 1897, Skinner was living in Detroit, Mich. with his mother when he enlisted in Windsor, Ont.

He became a lance corporal, then the lowest-ranking non-commissioned officer in the Canadian Expeditionary Force, in the 21st infantry division.

He died in battle in Amiens on Aug. 8, 1918, and is buried in Villers-France.

For the last 91 years, little was known about William Skinner.

But his story began to be dug up, literally, by a chicken in Chatham-Kent 40 years ago.

That's when 12-year-old Andy VanDerMolen's mother sent him outside to the backyard to play. He was gathering eggs in a chicken coop, he said, when one of the chickens, pecking away, found a war medal.

"I thought it was kind of neat and interesting," VanDerMolen told CBC News. "I took it to school and showed the kids, then I pretty much lost interest in it and put it away."

He put it in a tin box for safe keeping, along with some old coins and other medals.

40 years later

VanDerMolen grew up and eventually moved out, taking his tin box with him.

But he never opened it, and the medal remained there, untouched, until VanDerMolen's curiosity got the better of him four decades later.

He dug out the medal from among his belongings and contacted Dave Benson, curator at the Chatham-Kent Museum.

The medal, Benson discovered, was a Victory Medal, a circular, copper medal given to "all ranks of the fighting forces" who served in the First World World, according to Veterans Affairs Canada.

On one side, the winged figure of Victory stands holding a palm branch in her right hand. On the other, the words "The Great War For Civilisation" and the dates "1914-1919" are inscribed, surrounded by a wreath.

But it was the inscription on the medal's rim that VanDerMolen and Benson found most intriguing: "Cpl. W.E. Skinner, 12433," Skinner's rank, name and service number.

'These are the guys that are most likely to be forgotten.' —Dave Benson, Chatham-Kent Museum

The two men checked the museum's records for information about Skinner, but found none. Then they checked an online database of First World War soldiers on the website of the National Archives of Canada, and found scanned copies of Skinner's original attestation papers.

Those papers paint a portrait of the young Skinner: a slight man, just five-foot-four, with a chest whose "girth when fully expanded" was 35½ inches, light brown hair, grey eyes and a fair complexion. He was a Methodist, and a farmer.

"I'm imagining a kid just out of high school, and that look of youth," Benson said.

"Because he was killed so young in his life, he didn't have any children or a wife, or anybody who will remember that 'grandfather or great-grandfather was in the war,'" he said. "These are the guys that are most likely to be forgotten."

Benson and VanDerMolen don't want Skinner to be forgotten.

They hope anybody with any connection to a William Evlyn Skinner will come forward.

Otherwise, the medal is "the only surviving thing that showed that this guy was even alive, let alone what he did for his country," Benson said.

"I guess when you think about it, especially this time of year, the fact that Andy found the medal, brought it in, and you're doing a story on it, is giving this guy some remembrance he probably never had."