During and after the First World War, which group made up most of the over 8,000 people interned as “enemy aliens”?
- American farmers
- Italian women
- Japanese families
- Ukrainian men
Answer: Ukrainian men
From 1914 to 1920, Ottawa interned over 8,000 former Austro-Hungarian subjects, mainly Ukrainian men, as “enemy aliens” in 24 labour camps, even though Britain advised against it. Do not confuse this with the forcible relocation of Canadians of Japanese origin in the Second World War.
Learn more: The South African War and the First World War
- Over 7,000 Canadians volunteered for the South African War (1899–1902), popularly known as the Boer War, and over 260 died. In 1900 they fought at Paardeberg and Lillefontein.
- When Britain declared war in 1914, Ottawa formed the Canadian Expeditionary Force, later called the Canadian Corps.
- More than 600,000 Canadians served, most of them volunteers, out of a population of eight million. About 60,000 were killed and 170,000 wounded.
- The Canadian Corps captured Vimy Ridge in April 1917, with 10,000 killed or wounded. One Canadian officer said he saw “the birth of a nation.” April 9 is Vimy Day.
- From 1914 to 1920, Ottawa interned over 8,000 former Austro-Hungarian subjects, mainly Ukrainian men, as “enemy aliens” in 24 labour camps.
- General Sir Arthur Currie, a reserve officer, is called Canada’s greatest soldier. Under his command, the Canadian Corps advanced in the last hundred days of the war in 1918.
- The hundred days included the Battle of Amiens on August 8, 1918 (“the black day of the German Army”), then Arras, Canal du Nord, Cambrai and Mons.
- More than 3,000 nurses, nicknamed “Bluebirds,” served in the Royal Canadian Army Medical Corps, 2,500 of them overseas.
- The war ended with the Armistice on November 11, 1918.
- On Remembrance Day, November 11, Canadians wear the red poppy and keep a moment of silence at the 11th hour of the 11th day of the 11th month.
- Lieutenant Colonel John McCrae, a medical officer, wrote the poem “In Flanders Fields” in 1915.