Ontario

The Paris District High School First World War Memorial Plaque was erected by the NU Omicron society in commemoration of former pupils who gave their lives in defence of Canada and the Empire 1914-1918.

First World War memorial plaque.

This memorial recalls a historic injustice Canadians should pause to remember, as we recall the First World War and the valour of all those Canadian men, and some women, who served. It is a tribute to mark the memory of the thousands of "enemy aliens" who had their civil rights stripped, and were subsequently imprisoned during Canada's first national internment operations of 1914-1920, following the implementation of the War Measures Act. 2014 marks the 100th anniversary of the War Measures Act - adopted on August 22, 1914 during the First World War. It was used to imprison Ukrainian-Canadians, and other ethnic groups, including German, Hungarian, Serbian, Croatian, and Armenian communities, into one of Canada's 24 internment camps.

Dr. Lubomyr Luciuk, a professor at the Royal Military College of Canada and former chair of the Ukrainian Canadian Civil Liberties Association (UCCLA), had taken it upon himself to lead the way and organize the memorial. In the CTO ("One Hundred") project, 100 aluminum plaques were simultaneously unveiled at 100 different locations across the country at 11:00am local time on August 22, 2014. The first plaque was unveiled in Amherst, Nova Scotia, followed by a wave of plaque unveilings moved west, from province to province, culminating in Nanaimo, British Columbia. The plaques, which cost $1,000 to make, were funded by the generosity of the Endowment Council of the Canadian First World War Interment Recognition Fund.

Each plaque features a photo of internment prisoners confined behind a wire fence at the Castle Mountain Internment Camp in Banff, Alberta. The Castle Camp, which was built in 1915 at the base of Castle Mountain, was a Canadian internment camp which held immigrant prisoners of Ukrainian, Austrian, Hungarian, and German descent.

The Brant War Memorial was designed by Walter S. Allward and erected in 1933 in memory of the local war dead of the First World War. The pylons dominate, their great mass gives dignity, solemnity and a sense of guardianship over the stone of remembrance. The stone is a raised slab, ornamented with poppies. Above the remembrance stone is a cross, deeply cut in the main pylon. The park land on which the memorial sits was formerly used as a parade ground for those who left Brantford during the First World War.

Brant County, which included the City of Brantford and the Town of Paris had 5,571 enlist in the First World War. 701 died and 58 were reported missing or taken prisoner.

The memorial was later modified to incorporate the commemoration of the local war dead of the Second World War and the Korean War. In 1952, a Memorial Gallery was added and serves as a backdrop to the Brant War Memorial. On July 2, 1954, the memorial was rededicated.

The original design by Allward included a group of bronze sculptures to represent "Humanity", consisting of a wounded youth, a resolute mother and a figure praying. Financial obstacles prevented the completion of the monument according to the original design. The Brant County War Memorial Committee initiated the completion of seven bronze statutes which were designed and sculpted by Helen Granger Young. The figures represent men and women who made the supreme sacrifice and commemorate local Veterans and are depicted in the uniforms of a nursing sister, Navy, Army, Airforce, Women's Royal Canadian Naval Service, Canadian Women's Army Corps, and Royal Canadian Air Force Women's Division. The statutes were unveiled and dedicated on September 12, 1992.

Sculptor Walter S. Allward left school at fourteen and learned about sculpture through books and magazines at the local library and by studying replicas at a nearby museum. By twenty, he had won his first commission. One of Allward’s first projects was through Sir Edmund Walker, President of the Bank of Commerce. In 1918, Walker asked Allward for memorial ideas honouring bank employees who had served and Allward submitted two wax models sculptures. The first, The Service of Our Women—Healing the Scars of War, depicts a woman sowing seeds on rocky incline strewn with war debris, including a broken canon. The second, The Service of Our Men–Crushing the Power of the Sword, portrays a man standing over a recumbent figure with his sword cast aside, symbolizing the brute beast of willful war waged by a misguided nation. The sculptures were never used, but his proposals explored ideas that would be expressed in his future war memorials: Stratford, 1919–22; Peterborough, 1921–29; and Brantford, 1921–33.

The IODE Cenotaph was provided to the city following the Great War by the local members of the Imperial Order of the Daughters of the Empire (IODE) and designed by architect F.C. Bodley. The limestone monument bears the inscription “Let those who come after see to it that their names be not forgotten”. These words were part of the message on a Memorial Scroll that was sent by King George V to parents or wives of the fallen soldiers during the First World War.

The memorial was originally located in Gore Park and was dedicated on 11 November 1923. On the armories gore were the Dufferin Rifles and band under Bandmaster Johnson, Brant Dragoons, Brantford Machine Gun Company, Great War Veterans Association, and pupils of Mohawk Institute. The eight standard bearers of the Brantford chapters of the IODE, Mrs. Cameron, Miss Gilkison, Mrs. Newman, Mrs. M. Paterson, Mrs. Popplewell, Miss Craddock, Mrs. Earl Smith, Miss Murray Thorburn, with their silken standards, stood by the side of their respective regents. 

In front of the cenotaph was the guard of honor, which presented a very smart appearance under Captain Bolt, Captain Lloyd Colquhoun and Lieutenant Brooks. At 10.30 Captain (Reverend) W.G. Martin preluded the service with the invocation followed by the reading of a passage of scripture. He then asked Mrs. M.A. Colquhoun, as representing the mothers who had lost sons in the war, to unveil the cenotaph. The memorial was revealed and from standard rests at the sides floated two Union Jacks, while above was the symbolic torch, whose brightness shall serve to remind the passerby that the living flame which it typifies, burns in human hearts and that the supreme sacrifice of Canadian manhood was not made in vain.

On 2 June 1992, the memorial was moved to Tom Thumb Park and rededicated on 11 November 1992.

This memorial is dedicated to the three local war dead and 27 local Veterans of the South African War. Funded by the city of Brantford, the memorial was dedicated on 24 May 1903.

There were thirty men who volunteered to fight with the British and Canadian units in South Africa in 1899. The monument, designed by Hamilton MacArthy of Ottawa, depicts a soldier ready for battle mounted on a granite base. On the four sides of the base are bronze plaques, one depicts the three Brantford heroes who lost their lives and three illustrate the respective battles in which they fell. The attack on the Boer position at the Battle of Spion Kop where Lieutenant Osborne fell; the Battle of Hart's River where Corporal Sherritt lost his life; the defense of the British guns at the Battle of Belfast where Lieutenant Builder suffered fatal injuries. A Howitzer is located behind the memorial.

Hamilton P. MacCarthy was born on 28 July 1846 in London, England. He studied with his father, sculptor Hamilton Wright MacCarthy and at the Royal Academy Schools. MacCarthy moved to Toronto, Ontario, in 1885. Thirteen years later he moved to Ottawa and studied at the Royal Canadian Academy of Arts. MacCarthy had 15 children and his son Coeur de Lion MacCarthy was a sculptor who produced numerous commemorative works after the First World War.

Other memorials by Hamilton MacCarthy include: South African War Memorial and Lieutenant Harold Lothrop Borden Memorial in Nova Scotia;Soldiers Monument in Prince Edward Island; General Isaac Brock Monument, and South African War Memorial in Ontario Boer War Memorial in Quebec.

The St. George and Blue Lake and Auburn Women's Institutes purchased the land in 1920 then later commissioned this cenotaph for the St. George Memorial Park which was dedicated on the 1st of August 1926 to honour those from the area that had given their lives in service during the First World War. An update in the way of a bronze template was later placed on the monument to add the names of those who gave the supreme sacrifice during the Second World War. A second bronze template was added after the Korean War to honor those who had fallen.

In 2013 the South Dumfries Historical Society spearheaded the restoration of the Memorial Park and cenotaph. The rededication was held on July 1, 2013 and featured Terry Kelly singing his song ‘A Pittance of Time.’  Some of the lyrics are on the new monument base.

The Paris Cenotaph was erected in memory of those who fell in the Great War and dedicated on 11 November 1930. Designed and built by George Hunter of Simcoe, Ontario (Hunter Granite Works), it originally had torches on the top at each end. 

Two shafts were added for the Second World War and dedicated on 11 November 1947. Later, inscriptions were added for the Korean War.

The structure shifted over the years and the entire foundation had to be re-cemented. In May 1995, Deroche and Sons removed components from the cenotaph in preparation for the foundation work which was funded by the Brant War Memorial Committee and the Town of Paris.

In 1919, the Board of Education decided to name its new facility in the East Ward after Major Panayoty Percy Ballachey. It was the first school in Brantford to be built since the armistice and would be opened in what would be known as Peace Year. The name of this school would be closely connected with those men of Brantford who made this peace year possible. It would serve as a recognition of the great debt the community owed to its fighting men and those who did not return, thereby providing a lasting, living and just memorial to all of Brantford’s noble heroes. Major Ballachey was the only member of the Board of Education who paid the supreme sacrifice.

The school opened in September of 1920 and was the first school in Brantford to be named after a local citizen.

The Memorial Gallery was erected in 1952. It was designed by local architect Charles Brooks and serves as a backdrop to the Brant War Memorial.

On March 23, 2021, City staff discovered the six bronze torches had been stolen. Brantford Police Service recovered two of the torches from a local scrapyard. A third was recovered, but had suffered too much damage. Replicas of the four missing bronze torches were custom made with silicon bronze by art foundry Artcast Inc. The broken pieces of one of the recovered torches were restored with bronze welding. All torches were patina-coloured to match and installed again on November 9, 2021.