# 53 ~ Toronto & The First World War, Part VI - Discrimination

Troops wear gas masks during the Second Battle of Ypres.  The new German weapon of poison gas killed anything in its path.  Over 6,000 Canadian soldiers were killed in the battle, either from poison gas or more conventional weapons.  As news of the battle came home to Canada, it increased a national hatred for all things German that had been simmering since the war began.

_____________________________________

This is the sixth in a series of nine posts leading up to the centenary of John McCrae's writing of In Flanders Fields, on May 3, 1915.  I've planned for articles to be posted over the next several weeks, and to culminate with actives commemorating the centennial of McCrae's poem.

Images of John McCrae or the poppy, or recitals of the poem, In Flanders Field, are usually just relegated to Remembrance Day.  We have come to associate certain images so much with November 11th, that they seem out of place during the rest of the year.  As I publish these posts, I hope that you will find enough about Toronto's history, to make the articles of interest.

John McCrae wrote his poem during the Second Battle of Ypres, which took place between April 22nd and May 25th of 1915.  The battle saw the first massed use of poison gas by German forces on the Western Front.  It was a important engagement for Canadian troops ~ for the first time, a group of "colonial" soldiers defeated a European power, on European soil.  Military experts often refer to how engagements like the Battle of St. Julien or Kitcheners' Wood helped to usher Canada into national adulthood.  

However, instead of focusing on an analysis of military activity in Europe, my series of posts will mostly follow how the war was "fought" on the Toronto home front.

_____________________________________

This is the sixth instalment in my series on Toronto in the First World War.   Entitled “Discrimination”, it documents the bigoted attitudes towards “enemy aliens” – those people of Austria-Hungarian, Turkish and particularly German descent in Toronto.

From the start of the war, there was an outbreak of bigotry against Germans in Canada.  Public schools dropped the teaching of German language from their classrooms.  Some orchestras refused to play German music.  Canadians saw themselves as engaged in a noble cause against an army of barbarians, and events that took place later in the war only seemed to confirm this.

There were some anti-German propaganda posters that were issued by Allied countries during the war, that we look back on now as being completely insensitive.  

With anti-German propaganda, stories of German atrocities in Europe, and the fear of sabotage at home, it would only be a matter of time before strong action was taken against German residents in Canada.  In total, 8,579 “enemy aliens” were locked up behind barbed wire in prison camps across Canada. 

Shown here are celebrations at a Canadian internment camp for Christmas, 1916.  The location of this particular camp remains undocumented.  

Here in Toronto, there was an internment camp at the Stanley Barracks, on the grounds of the Canadian National Exhibition.  

Stanley Barracks internment camp, Canadian National Exhibition Grounds.

The grounds of the CNE were busy during the Great War.  In addition to being a training ground for troops, and housing an internment camp for enemy aliens, the annual fair ran every summer during the war.  Here on the midway we see a popular game during the war, in which players are rewarded for knocking out the Kaiser’s teeth with a ball.  The advertisement for the game, in the back of the stall, reads “Willie the Warlord – Knock His Teeth Out!”  Prizes included one cigar for knocking out three of his teeth, two cigars for knocking out four of his teeth, and a doll for knocking out all six of the Kaiser’s teeth.

Shown here is a game found on the Midway at the Canadian National Exhibition during the First World War, where participants tried to knock out the teeth of "Willie the Warlord" (pictured, inset).

Even if they weren’t locked up, tens of thousands of enemy aliens were ultimately forced to register with authorities, and live by strict rules during the rest of the war.  Notices across Toronto and throughout Canada called for Germans, Austrians, Hungarians and Turks to report at the Office of the Registrar for Alien Enemies.

This notice called for Germans, Austrians, Hungarians and Turks to register immediately at the Office of the Registrar for Alien Enemies, at 34 Adelaide Street East, Toronto.

Anti-German propaganda was a mix of real and fabricated events.  Many of the accusations levelled against German atrocities in Belgium, especially those against women and children, were exaggerated or simply untrue.  But the news of heavy Canadian casualties, especially when so many people expected the war to end in weeks, not years, turned public opinion against the Germans, too.  And the German use of a terrible new weapon – poison gas – at the Second Battle of Ypres, in April of 1915, galvanized public opinion against German “barbarity”.  The line between actual news and politically useful innuendo was definitely blurred.  It was this use of poison gas by the German military, and the news of the death of so many Canadian soldiers, that served as the backdrop for McCrae's writing of In Flanders Fields.

This photograph shows Canadian soldiers who were injured by the use of poisonous gas.  Some poisons, like mustard gas, burned the lungs, but also caused serious external blisters and disfigurements.

In this photograph, taken during the Battle of Amiens in 1918, both the German prisoners and wounded Canadians wear gas masks.  

Gas warfare became increasingly common and more dangerous as the war progressed. Wounded soldiers, often weak or unconscious, were especially vulnerable because they could not don their respirators.  As sisters, wives and mothers back in Toronto and across Canada learned of the horrors that Canadian soldiers were facing, anti-German outrage only continued to rise in Canadian cities.

So, not all reports of German atrocities were faked or exaggerated.  In May of 1915, just after the Battle of Ypres, a German submarine sank the civilian luxury liner RMS Lusitania, off the Irish coast.  Although this incident is mostly remembered for drawing Americans into the war, a total of almost 1,200 civilians died, including hundreds of Canadians.

The RMS Lusitania.

In total, 82 Torontonians perished in the icy waters of the Atlantic Ocean when the Lusitania was sunk by the Germans.  Among the dead was Alfred Clarke, 55, who owned A. R. Clarke and Company of Toronto.  His company made leather linings, vests, and moccasins.  He was married, and had a son and daughter.  Clarke managed to survive the sinking of the Lusitania, and was rescued, and taken to England.  He wrote to his wife to tell her that he had survived, but died from complications of pneumonia in a hospital in London on June 20, 1915, about six weeks after the Lusitania was sunk.  His body was returned to Toronto and he was buried in Mt. Pleasant Cemetery.  (Plot 1, Lot 3)

Among the other residents of Toronto killed in the sinking of the Lusitania was George Copping, the president of the Reliance Knitting Company, whose grave in Mount Pleasant Cemetery is shown here.

Another Toronto resident who’s life was claimed by the sinking of the Lusitania was Mary Crowther Ryerson, the wife of George Sterling Ryerson, founder of the Canadian Red Cross.  Her husband was thoroughly documented on a memorial plaque in Toronto’s St. James Cathedral.  Mary Amelia only received a short mention at the bottom of the plaque.  It reads “Mary Elizabeth Crowther, born in Toronto, 1855, married 1882.  Lost at sea by the torpedoing of the R.M.S. Lusitania.  May 7^th, 1915.”

Mary Elizabeth Crowther, who was a Canadian casualty in the sinking of the RMS Lusitania.

Mary Amelia Crowther only got brief mention on a memorial tablet that she shares with her husband.

Another cause for international outrage against the Germans during the Great War came in October of 1915.  Germans soldiers executed a woman who would become the war’s most famous female casualty.  Edith Cavell, a British nurse, was executed for helping Allied soldiers to escape occupied Belgium. 

Edith Cavell became both a martyr and a symbol for propaganda.  In Canada alone, she had a mountain, several schools, a nursing institute, streets and several hospital wings named after her.   In Toronto, these commemorations included a wing at Toronto Western Hospital, and Cavell Avenue in Etobicoke.

Edith Cavell.

The murder of Edith Cavell by German troops formed the basis of a lot of Allied propaganda for the rest of the war.

The monument to Edith Cavell that still stands outside the Toronto General Hospital.

_____________________________________

Coming up : My next instalment of the "Toronto & The First World War" series is entitled "Recreation".  It explores what those back home in Toronto did for entertainment during the war.

_____________________________________

# 52 ~ Toronto & The First World War, Part V - Dedication

The ruins of Ypres Market Square.

_____________________________________

This is the fifth in a series of nine posts leading up to the centenary of John McCrae's writing of In Flanders Fields, on May 3, 1915.  I've planned for articles to be posted over the next several weeks, and to culminate with actives commemorating the centennial of McCrae's poem.

Images of John McCrae or the poppy, or recitals of the poem, In Flanders Field, are usually just relegated to Remembrance Day.  We have come to associate certain images so much with November 11th, that they seem out of place during the rest of the year.  As I publish these posts, I hope that you will find enough about Toronto's history, to make the articles of interest.

John McCrae wrote his poem during the Second Battle of Ypres, which took place between April 22nd and May 25th of 1915.  The battle saw the first massed use of poison gas by German forces on the Western Front.  It was a important engagement for Canadian troops ~ for the first time, a group of "colonial" soldiers defeated a European power, on European soil.  Military experts often refer to how engagements like the Battle of St. Julien or Kitcheners' Wood helped to usher Canada into national adulthood.  

However, instead of focusing on an analysis of military activity in Europe, my series of posts will mostly follow how the war was "fought" on the Toronto home front.

_____________________________________

Part Five of my collection of articles on Toronto in the First World War is on “dedication”, or the types of commitment that those on the Toronto home front were expected to make to helping the war effort. 

During the war, the government took on a much more prominent role in managing the lives of citizens.  The government needed to manage sensitive military information, and the surveillance and editing of the letters that soldiers sent home to their families was just one step.  Official sensors also monitored newspapers and other publications.  Editors were faced with prison time if they failed to comply with censorship laws.

Large scale propaganda became a part of every day life.  Posters urged enlistment, and other forms of war support.  Citizens were urged to contribute to charitable campaigns, to buy Victory Bonds, or to ration scarce materials like food or fuel. 

Those living in Toronto were of course removed from farms, where food was produced.  Food production may not have been something that commonly occurred to a Torontonian during the Great War, but they were still encouraged to preserve and can for the winter, while being warned against “hoarding”.

The imagery in propaganda often relied on patriotic symbols, recognizable icons and historical figures. 

Public parades, rallies and charitable events encouraged voluntary contributions and also helped to shame or embarrass those who weren’t “doing their bit”.  The photograph below shows a military parade along University Avenue, near Queen Street West.  It would have been just one of many rallies held in Toronto during the Great War.

The parade up University Avenue, pictured above, would have passed the South African War Monument at Queen Street.  In addition to providing imagery from another conflict in which those from around Toronto and across Canada volunteered, the monument provided an image of another kind, by way of a billboard.  The billboard shows a reproduction of a famous British propaganda poster, in which a young girl asks her father, "Daddy what did YOU do in the Great War?".

Those who didn’t volunteer for service often risked vilification as “shirkers” or cowards.  However, many fathers and husbands were aware of their responsibilities to their families.  Pay from the army was often not sufficient enough to leave a man without concerns for providing for his wife, children, or elderly parents.  Posters like the one above suggested that men would be held accountable by their children, for the patriotic service that they’d done for their country, instead of for staying home and ensuring the social security of the family unit.  Various countries around the world produced propaganda posters that involved home and family as emotional motivation to fight in the war.

The government needed to greatly increase its income in order to pay for the war.  A new federal tax on businesses was introduced in 1916.  Labour organizations, farmers, churches and other groups pressured the government to make sure that corporations “did their bit” for the war effort.  Charges of war profiteering by corrupt officials made sensational headlines and undermined government propaganda. 

Several pamphlets were issued by the Canadian Liberal Party during the First World War, intended as a means to embarrass the Conservative Government under Robert Borden.  They allege profiteering, kickbacks, fraud, unnecessary supply shortages, production delays and wartime profiteering.

You can read the above pamphlet, "War Scandals of the Borden Government", printed in 1915, here.

You can read the above pamphlet, "Shell and Fuse Scandals", here.

Of course, individuals faced new taxes, too.  In 1917, a supposed temporary wartime measure – personal income tax – was introduced.  Unlike Britain and the United States, the Canadian government had avoided charging income tax before the war, but this all changed almost 100 years ago.  The temporary measure has never been repealed, and today, personal income tax supplies the Canadian government with nearly four times as much revenue as corporate tax does.

An editorial cartoon from the time that income tax was introduced in Canada.  It shows a smiling figure, representing "The People", carrying the hefty figure of "War Tax" up the stairs of "Hard Times", with a caption that reads, "Grin and Bear It".

Canadian Income Tax form from 1919.

The Income War Tax Act was published by a Canadian accountant in 1917.  It goes through the tax act, clause by clause, to explain its impact on Canadians.  You can read the full booklet here.

Another way that the government raised war time revenue was to sell War Bonds.  The response to war bonds by Canadians during the First World War exceeded all expectations.  No bond in Canadian history had raised more than $5 million, but the first “Victory Bond” drive of the war brought in $100 million.  Publicity campaigns, including tens of thousands of posters, connected buying War Bonds to the suffering of soldiers who were overseas. 

Victory Bond posters often relied on well known poems and potent emotional imagery.  This poster plays upon the poem “In Flanders Fields”, which was written by Canada’s own John McCrae, in 1915.  It would become one of the best known pieces of literature to emerge from the Great War.

This poster contains the image of a soldier in a field of poppies, and the motto, "If ye break faith ~ we shall not sleep", which is an excerpt from In Flanders Fields.

This poster, too, used imagery from In Flanders Fields, and includes the simple expression "Be yours to hold it high", another quotation from the poem.

For the more practically minded investor, long term interest rates of 5.5% for terms of up to 20 years were also a powerful incentive. 

Possible condemnation by one’s neighbours could even be used to sell Victory Bonds.  Those who contributed were issued pins like the ones shown below, so that everyone would know that they had “done their bit” and contributed to the war effort, financially.

In this photograph, two Canadian soldiers read a British War Bond poster found in a ruined village behind the lines.  The War Bond campaign targeted soldiers in the field, as well as those civilians on the home front. 

The success of the Victory Bond campaign would be repeated in the Second World War, and today’s Canada Savings Bonds are direct descendants of those bonds issued during the First World War.

While local men fought on overseas battlefields, they were no doubt concerned about who was taking care of their wives and children back on the home front.  The Canadian Patriotic Fund was established as a private organization in August of 1914, with the Governor General as its patron.  This organization would eventually raise nearly $50-million for the families of soldiers.  The fund encouraged Canadians to “fight or pay”, and helped reassure men fighting in the trenches that their families would be cared for back at home. 

Shame was once again used as a motivating factor to get Canadians to donate, in posters that were drawn up for the Patriotic Fund.  This poster encourages those on the home front to "Fight or Pay".

Posters for the Patriotic Fund, and for war efforts in general, also used imagery that would today be considered racist.

Here we see a mobile campaigning unit for the Canadian Patriotic Fund, collecting donations on Bay Street in 1915. 

Those who contributed to the Patriotic Fund were also given pins, to aid in identifying their patriotism, and to help them avoid any negative judgement from their neighbours. 

Hundreds of women worked as volunteer social workers, and visited families to determine if they qualified to receive aid from the Canadian Patriotic Fund.  Recipients who were later deemed unworthy of aid could be dropped without appeal.  These volunteers also gave advice on budgeting, childcare and nutrition.  The Canadian Patriotic Fund played an important role in establishing government run social assistance and public welfare in Canada. 

Shown here is a group of women holding a bazaar to raise funds for charitable efforts in Toronto.

_____________________________________

Coming up : My next instalment of the "Toronto & The First World War" series is entitled "Discrimination".  It documents the bigoted attitudes that were expressed against "enemy aliens" - those people of Austrian, Hungarian, Turkish and particularly, German, descent in Toronto.

_____________________________________