The Wartime Letters of Leslie and Cecil Frost, 1915-1919

Description

The Wartime Letters of Leslie and Cecil Frost, 1915–1919 brings to light the correspondence between two officer brothers and their family at home from 1915 to 1919. Despite wartime censorship, Leslie and Cecil wrote frank and forthright letters that show how the young men viewed the war, as well as what they observed both during training and from the trenches in some of the war’s bloodiest battles. The letters also deal with the war’s political context, including conscription and the Union government, as well as social issues such as the emerging role of women, the role of the growing middle class, nativism, and the use of liquor overseas.

R.B. Fleming, the collection’s editor, contends that Leslie Frost’s military experiences and hospitalization affected his policies as premier of Ontario (1949–1961), especially those related to medicare and liquor control laws. Frost’s government was the first to pass laws providing penalties for racial, ethnic, and gender discrimination on private property, creating a movement that led to the Ontario Human Rights Code.

The Wartime Letters of Leslie and Cecil Frost, 1915–1919 makes a significant contribution to military history and social history. Fleming places the letters in context and shows the value of their commentary. This book will be of interest to the general reader as well as scholars of military history and social history.

Sujets

• Primera Guerra Mundial
• Life writing
• Letters from Home
• World War I
• Government of Ontario
• Letter
• Military history of Canada
• Leslie Frost
• Première Guerre mondiale
• Ontario

Informations

• Publié par: Wilfrid Laurier University Press
• Date de parution: 07 avril 2011
• Nombre de lectures: 0
• EAN13: 9781554586851
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 3 Mo

Extrait

THE WARTIME LETTERS OF LESLIE AND CECIL FROST 1915-1919
LIFE WRITING SERIES
In the Life Writing Series , Wilfrid Laurier University Press publishes life writing and new life-writing criticism in order to promote autobiographical accounts, diaries, letters, and testimonials written and/or told by women and men whose political, literary, or philosophical purposes are central to their lives. Life Writing features the accounts of ordinary people, written in English, or translated into English from French or the languages of the First Nations or from any of the languages of immigration to Canada. Life Writing will also publish original theoretical investigations about life writing, as long as they are not limited to one author or text.
Priority is given to manuscripts that provide access to those voices that have not traditionally had access to the publication process.
Manuscripts of social, cultural, and historical interest that are considered for the series, but are not published, are maintained in the Life Writing Archive of Wilfrid Laurier University Library.
Series Editor
Marlene Kadar
Humanities Division, York University
Manuscripts to be sent to
Brian Henderson, Director
Wilfrid Laurier University Press
75 University Avenue West
Waterloo, Ontario, Canada N2L 3C5
The WARTIME Letters of Leslie and Cecil Frost 1915-1919
Edited by R.B. Fleming
We acknowledge the support of the Canada Council for the Arts for our publishing program. We acknowledge the financial support of the Government of Canada through the Book Publishing Industry Development Program for our publishing activities. We acknowledge a generous gift from the Symons Trust Fund for Canadian Studies, Trent University, Peterborough, Ontario.

Library and Archives Canada Cataloguing in Publication
Frost, Leslie M. (Leslie Miscampbell), 1895-1973
The wartime letters of Leslie and Cecil Frost, 1915-1919 / edited by R.B. Fleming.
(Life writing series)
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-1-55458-000-2
1. Frost, Leslie M. (Leslie Miscampbell), 1895-1973 - Correspondence. 2. Frost, Cecil, 1897-1947 - Correspondence. 3. Canada. Canadian Army. Battalion, 157th - Biography. 4. Canada. Canadian Army - Officers - Correspondence. 5. World War, 1914-1918 - Personal narratives, Canadian. 6. World War, 1914-1918 - Campaigns - Western. I. Fleming, Rae Bruce, 1944-II. Frost, Cecil, 1897-1947 III. Title. IV. Series.
D640.F83 2007 940.4 8171 C2007-902337-1
2007 R.B. Fleming
Cover image: The Artist s Own Dug-Out on the Albert-Braye Roadside (1916), by Thurstan Topham (1888-1966); watercolour on paper, 21.9 28.2 cm; Beaverbrook Collection of War Art, Canadian War Museum, 8896. Cover and text design by P.J. Woodland.
Every reasonable effort has been made to acquire permission for copyright material used in this text, and to acknowledge all such indebtedness accurately. Any errors and omissions called to the publisher s attention will be corrected in future printings.

This book is printed on Ancient Forest Friendly paper (100% post-consumer recycled).
Printed in Canada
No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system or transmitted, in any form or by any means, without the prior written consent of the publisher or a licence from The Canadian Copyright Licensing Agency (Access Copyright). For an Access Copyright licence, visit www.accesscopyright.ca or call toll free to 1-800-893-5777.
Published by Wilfrid Laurier University Press
Waterloo, Ontario, Canada
www.wlupress.wlu.ca
For Marjorie, of course
Mail is about the most popular of all things as far as the men out here are concerned Leslie Frost in France to his parents in Orillia, Ontario, 22 February 1918

MAP 1: Western Europe in 1914, with two insets showing where most of the letters in this collection were written.
Table of Contents
List of Illustrations
Foreword by Thomas H.B. Symons, CC, FRSC
Memorandum by the Honourable Leslie M. Frost
Preface
Acknowledgements
Abbreviations
Introduction by R.B. Fleming
The Letters
1 Training in Canada
2 From Orillia to England
3 Training and Touring in England and Scotland
4 Leslie Frost Arrives in France
5 Cecil Frost Arrives in France
6 Leslie Frost Wounded
7 Cecil Frost Wounded
8 Armistice
Appendix 1: Unit Sizes and Designations
Appendix 2: Electoral Ridings
Appendix 3: Soldiers Mentioned in Letters and Commentary
Selected Bibliography
Index
Illustrations
MAP 1: Western Europe in 1914
Leslie and Cecil Frost, 1913
Letterhead of the Glasgow Bakery, 1869
MAP 2: The Frosts Orillia
The Frost house at Mississaga and Wyandotte Streets, Orillia, 1884
The Highlands, Orillia
Interior of Diamond Hall, the Frost jewellery shop, Orillia
At Geneva Park, Lake Couchiching, 1913
Advertisement for a Stephen Leacock reading, March 1915
Army band on parade, Niagara-on-the-Lake
At Camp Niagara, August 1915
Farewell ceremonies in Orillia, June 1916
At Camp Borden, near Barrie, Ontario, July 1916
Notice of farewell dinner for C Company, October 1916
Presentation of colours at Camp Borden, October 1916
Mobile field post office, France, 1918
Cecil Frost near Bramshott, England, 1916
Leslie Frost in England
William S. Frost in 1917, age 53
Margaret Frost in the library of the Highlands
Germans attempting a counterattack on Hill 70, August 1917
Canadian soldiers carrying water at Hill 70, August 1917
Wounded Canadian, France, 1916
Three members of the Dumbells
King Edward VIII with Canadian veterans at Vimy Monument unveiling
Premier L. Frost, Premier J. Lesage, and Dr. T.H.B. Symons, 1965
Halifax Harbour, October 1916
1st Simcoes on the Cameronia , October 1916
MAP 3: Southeast England
Canadian artillery training in England at Witley Camp
Christmas dinner, Bramshott Camp, 1916
Etching of Cecil Frost by Bill (W.H.) Woods
Leslie Frost s map of the training camps in Kent
Mumsie s Dream
Members of C Company in French farmhouse billet in Ferfay
Lt. Cecil Frost on horseback in England
Cecil s diagram for an identity bracelet
MAPS 4 and 5: Details of France and Belgium
The 22nd Battalion-the famous Vingt-Deux
The old Menin Gate, Ypres, Belgium
At Potijze, Belgium
Passchendaele, November 1917
Canadian election propaganda in France, December 1917
Canadian nursing sisters in France cast their vote, December 1917
Transporting the wounded, 1916
Leslie Frost s field message book with bullet hole
Trench art aeroplane made from bullets and shell casings
Wounded Canadian near Iwuy, October 1918
Canadian soldiers in Mons, Belgium, on 11 November 1918
Sir Arthur Currie inspecting Canadian soldiers crossing the Rhine
Final march through London, May 1919
The Frost family at Lochbrae, 1924
MAP SPECIFICATIONS
Sources
Base Map 1 : ESRI digital files
Base Map 2 : Air photos from National Air Photo Library Section 31D/11: A3082 #36 1930 1:13000 Section 31D/11: RA 2 #67 1927 1:10000 Section 31D/11: A9190 #18 1932 1:10000
Base Map 3 : Illustrated Atlas of the World (Chicago: Rand McNally, 1982) Big Road Atlas Britain (Hampshire: Automobile Association, 1992)
Base Map 4 : Illustrated Atlas of the World (Chicago: Rand McNally, 1982)
Base Map 5 : Michelin #236 France Nord Flandres-Artois-Picardie 1:200,000 (Paris: Michelin ditions du voyage, 2000)
Other: John Keegan, The First World War (Toronto: Key Porter Books, 1998), and Anthony Livesay, Atlas de la Premi re guerre mondiale (Paris: ditions autrement, 1996)
Projections
Map 1 : Cylindrical equal-area CM 3 Lat 50
Map 2 : Not applicable.
Maps 3 and 4 : Delisle Conic Equidistant
Map 5 : Unknown
Disclaimer
These maps are representations and not intended as precise models. Please refer to sources for more information.
Design
Chantal Ellingwood, Lindsay, Ontario, using Adobe Illustrator CS.
Two Likely Lads
Foreword by Thomas H.B. Symons
Two likely lads -that was how an Old Country sergeant major described Leslie and Cecil Frost when he encountered them in France in 1917. He got it right.
The wartime letters from these two remarkable brothers to their parents reveal thoughtful, decent, utterly unpretentious young men of character and quality going about their duty as they saw it. They reveal, too, the great promise they had for service to Canadian society in their postwar lives.
Dr. Rae Fleming has rendered a valuable service by ensuring the survival and wide accessibility of the letters in print form and by his scholarly introduction to them and his many informative footnotes. The letters are important source material for students of Canadian history on several counts. They provide a clear and often telling picture of personalities, events, and conditions throughout the war years-in Canada, in Britain, and in France. They also provide snapshots of the evolving formation of the views and values of these two young men who would, in their later lives, have such an influence on shaping the public life of Ontario and of Canada.
The letters convey very well something both of life on the home front in Canada during the titanic struggle over there and of the life of Canadian infantry soldiers who went to serve in France and Flanders and to train or recuperate in E