I had to Sign Three or Four Times to get the Laces

Heroes Remember

I had to Sign Three or Four Times to get the Laces

Transcript

We didn’t, we were just like if we had been took out of a hole in the ground and put up on deck. We didn’t know who was Prime Minister, we didn’t know a damn thing. Take a man four years, five years that you don’t know, you don’t read a paper, you can’t write your name or nothing. Well, when we got back we were like a bunch (inaudible). Sometimes they joke about the poor Newfies but we were really Newfies, us fellows. Yeah. You know you couldn’t talk about nothing and you couldn’t, because you didn’t know nothing. And when we got back to Vancouver, they took our American clothes away and they issued us Canadian uniforms. And we had to sign and it was old uniforms and old pair of boots. It was all crooked. They gave us that, and you had to sign your initials for everything you got. So I had a pair of boots, no laces, so next day I went back for laces. Well, sir, it was just like if I had stole the laces. I had to sign my name three or four times to get the laces. So anyway, then they wouldn’t leave me to go back with the rest of the gang. They kept me here, I was telling you that, on account of beri-beri and my heart and all this stuff. But then when I was able to travel, I went to Quebec and in Quebec they sent me home. And then when I arrived home, when my mother and father was living, they had, they still had their farm and we had lots to eat and we were well there.

Description

Mr. Murphy reflects on certain aspects of his return to Canada and to his family home in Quebec.

Leo Murphy

Leo Murphy was born September 3, 1919 in New Richmond, Quebec, where he grew up and completed his elementary education by 1931. He was one of nine children. Before enlistment he was a day labourer working in a sawmill, construction, excavation, farming, and a lumber camp. Mr. Murphy enlisted with the Royal Rifles on Nov 25, 1940, and took his basic training in Newfoundland and Val Cartier, Quebec. He was overseas for four years, spending all but the first three months as a POW in Hong Kong and Japan. The emotional impact of the Hong Kong deployment started early for Mr. Murphy, when on the same day his brother was killed beside him and he took the life of a Japanese soldier. During his captivity, he suffered from beri-beri, dysentry, pellagra, had his foot crushed in a mining accident, and developed liver problems. At the time of his liberation, he was a mining coal in Omini, Japan, as a slave labourer. Mr. Murphy arrived back in Canada in October, 1945 and was discharged February 5, 1946. From 1947 to 1960, he was employed as a brakeman with the Canadian National Railroad. Mr. Murphy was married on Sept 1, 1947, to Yvette Savoie. He died March 26, 2001.

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