Introduction

After playing 63 ramp ceremonies in Afghanistan, Master Corporal James Gendron was ready to hang his bagpipes up for good.

His heart just couldn’t take the solemn melodies of ‘”Amazing Grace” or “Flowers of the Forest,” the Scottish lament for lost loved ones.

“At the end of my tour, I was pretty much done playing bagpipes,” he said.

“I didn't want to look at them for a couple of years. Every time I looked at them, I would just go back to that place and that would be a different ramp ceremony every time. I would close my eyes and I'm like, ‘I can't’.”

That’s when he put them up for sale on Kijiji.

“Thankfully they were not a hot commodity and nobody bought them,” he joked.

His ad went unanswered and that stroke of luck led to a moment he will never forget. A decade later, he played “Happy Birthday” for Prince Harry as the unofficial bagpiper for Team Canada at the Invictus Games in Dusseldorf, Germany in 2023.

Prince Harry takes notice

After Prince Harry heard the emotional rollercoaster Gendron felt over the pipes, he shared his story during his Invictus Games closing speech.

“I had no idea what they meant to him, nor did I know what memories they triggered for him,” Prince Harry said.

“For 63 caskets, for 63 souls, for 63 families. After that last ramp ceremony, he couldn’t touch them. This week, he didn’t even know if he could bring himself to play them. But he did. What had once haunted him, dare I say it, may now be what helps heal him. Thank you, James, for your service, for your courage and for sharing your gift.”

Gendron and the Prince hugged after the speech and a photographer captured the moment.

“It was pretty emotional,” Gendron said.

Nerve-wracking deployments

Gendron, a mobile support equipment operator, joined the forces in 1993 in Windsor, Ontario. He was deployed four times (twice to Afghanistan in2003 and 2008, and once to Egypt in 2012, and Sri Lanka in 2015).

He worked as a driver during his first deployment to Kabul, Afghanistan in 2003. It was “nerve-wracking,” arriving on scene moments after Corporal Jamie Murphy was killed by a suicide bomber, he said.

“Jamie only had about eight days left before he got killed. It was surreal at that time.

“You never really know what you’re going to do until you’re in a situation like that.”

Back to Afghanistan

In 2008, Gendron was deployed to Afghanistan again, this time to Kandahar.

“I was supposed to be the refueling guy. They were supposed to send me out to a fort observation base, and they were just going to leave me there for the six months, ” he explained.

“I was only out there about a week, and I got an email from the Task Force Commander saying, “we need you back at the airfield for your special talent.”

“I was like, ‘I'm just a trucker. I am not a specialist.’ So I read the email further and it said, you're the only piper in the task force.”

He was tasked as the piper for the repatriation for every soldier lost from every country.

“I would get a phone call and they would give me the details of where I had to be. I was on the ramp at the airfield in Kandahar, I would be woken up at three in the morning, eight at night or six in the morning. And this was on top of my regular job.”

He ended up playing for 63 ramp ceremonies.

And it took a mental toll on him.

The instrument he once loved became a source of pain and terrible memories.

Picking up the pipes again

He didn’t pick up the bagpipes again until five years later, when he was stationed in Halifax and joined the military band for mess dinners.

But he still couldn’t play those two songs he played in Kandahar.

“I wasn’t in the right place, it took me a while,” he said.

Through his two and a half decades of military service, Gendron said he trained his brain to just push things down and “soldier on.”

“You just keep going and, and don’t show that weakness, you can’t cry … you can’t have a bad day. I’ve had my training command tell me ‘you’re a master corporal. You can't have a bad day because your troops can’t see that,’” he said.

Gendron has since been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder PTSD.

“Not all injuries are visible,” he said.

In 2021, he was diagnosed with leukemia that doctors believe is  environmental because of his exposure to burn pits in Afghanistan.

When he was selected as an Invictus Games athlete in 2023, he brought his bagpipes to training camp and became the unofficial bagpiper of Team Canada.

That’s how he connected with Prince Harry, who made him promise to keep the music alive in him.

“It's a story of keeping the faith alive. He [Prince Harry] said, ‘just promise me one thing. Just keep playing your pipes,’ and I told him I would.” Gendron said.

With courage, integrity and loyalty, James Gendron is leaving his mark. He is one of our Canadian Armed Forces Veterans. Discover more stories.