David Yates reflects on cenotaph research, stories this Remembrance Day

BY SHAWN LOUGHLIN

Every community in Huron County has men and women who have sacrificed their lives for their country. Every community in Huron County is home to families who have mourned and still mourn the losses of loved ones due to the violent, senseless recurrence of war. So, as a result, every community in Huron County is home to a cenotaph - a well-thought-out monument to that community’s war dead around which community members touched directly or indirectly by war-related violence and death congregate both together in acts of remembrance and individually when silent reflection is what is called for on that day.

 

Every year, as October turns to November, communities come together and gather around their town’s or village’s cenotaph. Members of their local Legion Branches, as well as dignitaries and others, carry out a tradition that remains as resonant and strong today as it was over 100 years ago - Remembrance Day remains a fixture on the Canadian calendar. Residents stop what they’re doing, business owners shutter their shops, and everyone comes together at the cenotaph to think, reflect and mourn while, at the same time, celebrate all that was won and has been preserved for generations and generations still to come.

 

David Yates is a Goderich-based historian and author who has penned many books about Huron County, mostly focusing on its people and their stories. Some of these books have even focused on the men and women who fought to preserve the Canadian way of life in World Wars I and II. However, late last year, Yates and his photographer partner, Conrad Kuiper, decided to turn their attention to the cenotaphs of Huron County, bringing together Yates’s dogged research and carefully-chosen words with Kuiper’s pointed and evocative photography to tell the stories of these beloved memorial monuments - together for the first time in one book.

 

As no stranger to local history or to the cenotaphs of Huron County, Yates approached the project with a certain level of familiarity, but was still surprised at some of the pieces of information he came across as he began work on the book that would eventually become Never Shall Their Glory Fade: The Cenotaphs of Huron County.

 

Yates was fascinated by the variations from one cenotaph to another and the debates that would entangle communities over exactly how they should honour their war dead and who should pay for it, as well as who should take the lead on the project. However, even going back a bit, Yates said that the term cenotaph wasn’t widely used in the early years following World War I, known to many at the time as The War to End All Wars. 

 

He said they were often called a war memorial or a soldiers’ monument, before they were widely regarded as cenotaphs, a word that comes from the ancient Greek for “empty tomb”, which would have made sense in a heavily Christian world at the time.
Yates and Kuiper had originally approached Huron County Council for the project on a non-profit basis, hoping to cover costs and then return any profits to the county. However, with the Huron Heritage Fund discontinued, council turned down the request and the pair went back to the drawing board with the project sitting dormant for a time.

 

Luckily, the team had a believer in the project in Goderich Mayor Trevor Bazinet, who suggested they reach out to Bruce Power for funding. They did, they were successful and the rest is history. 

 

As for the creation of the book itself, Yates said its genesis can be chalked up to the intersection of a number of his lifelong interests: history and war monuments. He said he had always been fascinated by them and felt there should be a complete, comprehensive history of the area’s monuments and thought he could be the man to do it. And while the Huron County Historical Society had dedicated the 2005 installment of its Historical Notes to the region’s cenotaphs, he felt this volume could be a welcome addition to the discourse with a lot more detail and more modern photography.

 

As a long-time teacher, Yates said those large conflicts, such as World Wars I and II, are naturally more engaging and interesting for students, so he found himself naturally gravitating towards those stories in his teaching days. Over the years he’s penned stories and entire books about the locals who went off to war, leaving their families and friends behind in an effort to fight for a greater good. He found that those stories, as well as stories of the local cenotaphs, would often intersect other historical research he was doing, which is what led to the idea for the book.

 

Through his research, Yates said he was astounded to see just how many communities quarrelled over the construction of their cenotaph. In Clinton, for example, debate raged for decades through a number of failed referendums on what to build and where to build it. Whereas some communities got straight to work on monuments once World War I ended, Clinton would finally see its monument completed in the late 1960s.

 

Yates said that some residents were divided on what they wanted to do regarding The War to End All Wars, with some seeing it as a no-brainer to honour those who perished in the conflict and others simply never wanting to think about the dark period of history ever again.

 

That is in stark contrast to Blyth’s Memorial Community Hall, which saw its cornerstones laid in 1920 and its grand opening followed shortly thereafter.

 

That community got right to work when World War I was over, thinking outside of the box to create its memorial. However, with Blyth Memorial Hall also arose a theme that Yates would find was all too common in the stories of the cenotaphs of Huron County. It was not the towns, villages or townships that stepped up to create these monuments to their fallen citizens. The vast majority of them were spearheaded by service clubs or regular citizens wanting to honour their friends, neighbours and family members - not the official governance channels that many might assume.

 

Using Blyth as an example again, it was a committee of residents and the local Women’s Institutes that got the ball rolling for the beautiful structure that still stands in the village today, raising the necessary funds and creating something that would make Blyth residents proud for generations to come.

 

Just two years after the war had ended, the committee had raised enough money to move ahead with the construction of the hall and the rest is history. It opened in 1921 and, that day, the 600-seat room could not house the over-1,000 people who attended.

 

The names of those who perished in the two World Wars have been memorialized on special plaques at the hall with the intention that they always remain front and centre, which they have over the years. To this day, the hall is home to the Blyth Legion Branch’s annual Remembrance Day ceremony, which is attended by hundreds.

 

There are many other stories of interest related to the cenotaphs of Huron County, Yates says. One of his favourites is the structure in Wingham, which is one of just two of its kind in Canada (a third had been placed, but has since fallen by the wayside). In his book, Yates calls this piece, “one of Canada’s most sacred pieces of public art.”

 

The statue is a bronze rendition of a soldier created by Charles Adamson, one of the few World War I soldiers who was capable of creating these monuments himself. 

 

His experience would come into play in that very way. His sculpture was criticized heavily when it was first unveiled; many residents saw the soldier as disheveled and looking almost as if he were a vagrant. However, when pressed on it, Adamson defended his design, saying it reflected the state of soldiers fighting in the trenches of the western front. It has elements of realism that are not present in many of the area’s other cenotaphs in which soldiers are clean-shaven and dressed well, as if they were part of a military parade.

 

In Goderich, much thought had been given not just to the statue of the soldier that stands in the town today, but of its placement as well. The soldier is seen tipping his helmet (even that gesture is up for debate - with residents being split on what exactly the soldier is doing and to whom), but, in regards to placement, a lot of thought went into it. The soldier faces East Street, which is where the soldiers both marched to and from the train when they went off to war and when the lucky ones returned again. 

 

When asked if he has a favourite cenotaph in Huron County Yates says that his answer could easily change daily and that he has found something to appreciate in every one that he’s researched. 

 

Similarly, when asked about a favourite story, he said there are many, but that there is one associated with the Goderich cenotaph that he finds fun for its light-hearted nature. A Goderich man’s name was included on the cenotaph, despite him being alive and well in Michigan. It was a simple mix-up, as the town had lost track of him and assumed he had perished in the war, but it was resolved when he wrote a letter to the local newspaper, evoking Mark Twain and his thoughts on reports of his death being exaggerated. He informed the residents of Goderich that he was alive and well. To this day his name remains on the cenotaph.

 

These are just a few of the many stories that can be found in the book, which includes not just the photography of Kuiper and Yates’ writing and research, but a detailed index of the names honoured on those cenotaphs.

 

As for the book itself, which can be found at The Citizen office in Blyth, among other places, Yates and Kuiper say it has been selling well and has captured the interest of residents. However, Yates says that the pair do not plan to recoup any profits from the sale of the book. There are plans to perhaps create a monument to the 22 airmen who lost their lives over Lake Huron, who still have not been formally memorialized, or, if that doesn’t pan out, another veteran-centric charity.