New Glasgow Cenotaph

In the late 1920s, the New Glasgow Gyro Club, some of whose members were war Veterans, gained public support to provide the town with a war memorial. John E. Clarke, member of the Gyro Club, wrote every city and town in Canada with a memorial to find out why they chose a memorial over a library or building and vice versa. No detail was too much trouble for him. With co-operation of the Royal Canadian Legion and the town council, the club organized a financial drive. They raised $12,000 going door to door soliciting funds.

A citizens' committee assisted in selecting and erecting the memorial and chose the figure submitted by J. Massey Rhind, a Scottish-American sculptor. He began his studies under his father then attended the prestigious Royal Scottish Academy as a 15-year old prodigy and continued his studies with Jules Dalou in Lambeth, England. He continued his studies in England, then two more years in Paris and moved to New York in 1889 when he was 29. After the First World War, Rhind lived in Chester, Nova Scotia. His work in Nova Scotia includes the Halifax Grand Parade Cenotaph, Chester Cenotaph and Cornwallis Statue.

J. Massey Rhind designed the Highland bagpiper. Rhind fashioned the piper in the garb of all pipers in the British Empire military during the First World War. He supervised the casting in a Scottish foundry and the careful packing involved in freighting it across the ocean. It was erected on a granite base shaft listing the names of those who died in the First World War.

All branches of military service had in common a burial ceremony for the dead. When permitted, the dead were interred to the notes of the buglers' or trumpeters' Last Post, and the belief of Resurrection symbolized by sounding the Reveille. Then followed the keening of the pipes, the Lament, a mournful cadence in farewell to a comrade in arms. In Carmichael Park, the piper in bronze perpetually pipes a Lament for the Fallen.

The New Glasgow War Memorial was unveiled on September 25, 1929, in memory of those who lost their lives during the First World War. The actual unveiling was performed by Mrs. Frances Maclntosh Sprossen, a sister of four Maclntosh brothers who had served overseas, three of whom paid the supreme sacrifice.

This beautiful monument has been seen and admired by many thousands of people over the years, and it is the most photographed subject in the area during tourist season. Immigrants from Scotland settled this part of Nova Scotia in 1773, whose largest town is named after the great city of Glasgow. This is where each year, during the Festival of Tartans Celebrations, the sounds of the pipes can be heard among the hills. Therefore, it is fitting that such a monument should be here, reminding us not only of our great heritage, but also, of the many brave who sacrificed their lives for the good of mankind during the First World War.

The name of the bronze piper's Scottish sculptor lives on in Pictou County, born Massey Cotter of Westville, himself a Veteran of the Korean War. Gyro Club member J. Geddie Cotter named his son after sculptor Massey Rhind.

[front/devant]
ISABEL K. CUMMING
MARGARET MARGORIE FRASER
LILLIAS McKAY
WILLIAM T. BECK
FRASER BETTS
JOHN MICHAEL BROWN
MURDOCH ROSS CAMERON
FRANK CAMERON
HUGH A. CAMERON
ALLISTAIR CAMPBELL
HARRY CAVANAGH
HARRY CAVANAGH,
WILLIAM EDWARD CHISHOLM
FRANK COBB
JOHN W.R. CROCKETT
JOHN CURRIE
A. HAARVEY DAND
FRED DAVIS
HARRY DEARN
SYLVANUS DEE
GEORGE W. DUNN
STEWART MUIR DUTHIE
FRANK JAMES FRASER
JAMES GIBSON LAURIER FRASER

TO OUR GLORIOUS DEAD
AND TO THOSE WHO SERVED
1914 1918

[right side/côté droit]
LOUIS FRASER
WARREN FRASER
JAMES DOWNIE FRASER
AUBREY E. GRANT
ERNEST GRANT
WILLIAM H. GRANT
ANGUS GRAY
ALBERT HAYLOR
IVAN HENDERSON
ALBERT EDWARD HICKEN
F.W. HINCHCLIFFE
HARRY C. HORNE
COURTNEY A. HULL
WILLIAM H. JENKINS
PERCY LARTER
HORACE LELACHEUR
EARL LOCKERBY
THOMAS LOGAN
ANDREW LOVE
HAROLD McCULLOCH
HAROLD McDIARMID
ALEXANDER D. McDONALD
DANIEL A. McDONALD
STEWAART HICKEN

[back/arrière]
DANIEL VINCENT McDONALD
RONALD P. McDONALD
W. McEACHERN
DOUGALD McGILLIVRAY
HUGH McGILLIVRAY
IAN C. McGREGOR
ALEXANDER W. MacHARDY
HUGH McISAAC
ALEXANDER R. McKAY
ARTHUR McKAY
ADAM JAMES McKENZIE
J.W. McKENZIE
L.W. McKENZIE
LEO MacKENZIE
ARCHIBALD McLAUGHLIN
J.W. McLAUGHLIN
FRED McLENNAN
D.H. MacLEOD
JAMES D. MacLEOD
JAMES D. MacLEOD
WILLARD L. MacMILLAN
HERBERT McNEIL
DUNCAN H. McPHERSON
D.C. McPHERSON
JOHN P. McQUEEN

ERECTED BY THE CITIZENS OF NEW GLASGOW
1929 IN PROUD REMEMBRANCE

[left side/côté gauche]
ALFRED MAKINTOSH
HERBERT MACKINTOSH
W. HAYWARD MACKINTOSH
ROBERT A. MUIR
LILFORD S. MULLINS
HARCOURT A. MURRAY
WILLIAM NICHOLSON
GEORGE V. PASS
WILLIAM PETTIFER
RODERICK C. PORTER
JOHN HENRY ROGERS
HUGH ROSS
BOWMAN ROSS
WILFRID E. STANCOMBE
MAXWELL STEVENS
ROLAND J.B. STEVENS
GEORGE SYLVESSTER
GEORGE SYLVIA
DONALD THOMPSON
GRANT THOMPSON
R. DAWSON TUPPER
FRED E. WARD
GEORGE WILSON WHITE