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Canada's Great War Album
Published to coincide with the 100th anniversary of the start of the First World War, Canada's Great War Album is an unprecedented and remarkable collection of Canadian photographs, memorabilia, and stories of the war. Two years ago, Canada's History Society invited Canadians to tell their family stories from the First World War. The response was overwhelming and assembled for the first time are their personal stories and photographs that together form a compelling and moving account of the war. Canada's Great War Album also includes contributions from Peter Mansbridge, Charlotte Gray, J.L. Granatstein, Christopher Moore, Jonathan Vance, and Tim Cook. In the spirit of the bestselling 100 Photos That Changed Canada, the war that changed Canada forever is reflected here in words and pictures.
- GenresHistoryNonfictionCanada
224 pages, Hardcover
First published September 23, 2014
30 people want to read
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Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews
December 18, 2020
This is the time of year to look back and remember the brave men and women who have served and the sacrifices they have made. According to this book, in World War 1 alone, “Worldwide, an estimated 8.5 million soldiers died. Two hundred and twenty-eight soldiers were killed every hour. Four every minute. One every fifteen seconds.” That’s almost incomprehensible.
World War 1 had a huge impact on Canada and its people. We became known as great fighters and strategists, able to capture significant enemy positions in all kinds of weather and conditions. Vimy Ridge is our most famous battle of course, but this book highlights all the other incredible successes and failures of our Canadian soldiers and everyone else involved.
I took my time reading this book in order to fully process everything I read. The people this book honours deserved my full attention. I love history and historical fiction but there’s something very special and moving about reading the stories of real people, real Canadians. I don’t know of any family members who were in the Great War but I figure there must of been. This book has gotten me more interested in my own family history during this war. I’ve been told lots of stories about our contributions to the Second World War, but not the first.
Each page had many pictures of these ‘real people’ with a bit of information about them. I was excited to find a picture of someone from my city in this book. I don’t live in a big city and my city was still rather small back then. I don’t think I know the man or his family but they might have moved long ago. I was saddened to know that while he survived the war itself, he relived it every day inside his head.
There is a chapter solely dedicated to the French-Canadians who served too. Most of Quebec opposed conscription and refused to go to a war that many didn’t feel was theirs. The French-Canadians who served - willingly or not - are not really talked about. Their stories are not as widely told. Thanks to the persistent digging by the author of this chapter - Michel Litalin - many personal accounts of French-Canadian soldiers have been found, and there stories are now being told.
Each chapter covered a different aspect of the Great War, from the trenches to the skies, to waters to the home front. Every page was filled with emotion but the most emotional chapter in my opinion, was Chapter 15: Carved in Stone by Eric McGeer. “With their loved ones buried overseas, families mourned the fallen with heart-rending epitaphs inscribed on gravestones most would never see.” And heart-rending they are.
The history courses in schools tend to focus on the dates, major events, and major people when it comes to history. This book goes deep into the stories of the everyday Canadians who didn’t really know what they were signing up for. We have no Great War veterans left, and the veterans of World War 2 are slowly disappearing. We need to preserve these stories before they’re gone so that the next generations can make connections to the people of the past. That was the goal of this war album and I believe they have achieved it.
I will forever feel more connected to those brave, long dead Canadian soldiers of the past who served and some of whom payed the ultimate sacrifice. You can memorize dates and events and the contributions of certain people all you want, but history is much more than that. We need to make people care about the past and the best way to do that is to connect them to those people. War movies have done a great job showing what it was like for the soldiers and making us care about those characters, but there are so many more stories that don’t get told like that. We need to remember them too.
“There’s a maple leaf on every Canadian headstone. So, no matter what else they were, these dead were part of us. The men who wore the Canadian uniform from 1914 to 1918 deserve to be remembered because, for whatever reason, they did what their country asked of them... We can’t possibly make sense of, or even properly remember the more than 66,000 war dead... But we can certainly try to understand those terrible years and that piercing pain. We can begin, I think, by remembering that those who were killed called themselves ‘Canadians.’ In that respect, they were family.” - Peter Mansbridge
World War 1 had a huge impact on Canada and its people. We became known as great fighters and strategists, able to capture significant enemy positions in all kinds of weather and conditions. Vimy Ridge is our most famous battle of course, but this book highlights all the other incredible successes and failures of our Canadian soldiers and everyone else involved.
I took my time reading this book in order to fully process everything I read. The people this book honours deserved my full attention. I love history and historical fiction but there’s something very special and moving about reading the stories of real people, real Canadians. I don’t know of any family members who were in the Great War but I figure there must of been. This book has gotten me more interested in my own family history during this war. I’ve been told lots of stories about our contributions to the Second World War, but not the first.
Each page had many pictures of these ‘real people’ with a bit of information about them. I was excited to find a picture of someone from my city in this book. I don’t live in a big city and my city was still rather small back then. I don’t think I know the man or his family but they might have moved long ago. I was saddened to know that while he survived the war itself, he relived it every day inside his head.
There is a chapter solely dedicated to the French-Canadians who served too. Most of Quebec opposed conscription and refused to go to a war that many didn’t feel was theirs. The French-Canadians who served - willingly or not - are not really talked about. Their stories are not as widely told. Thanks to the persistent digging by the author of this chapter - Michel Litalin - many personal accounts of French-Canadian soldiers have been found, and there stories are now being told.
Each chapter covered a different aspect of the Great War, from the trenches to the skies, to waters to the home front. Every page was filled with emotion but the most emotional chapter in my opinion, was Chapter 15: Carved in Stone by Eric McGeer. “With their loved ones buried overseas, families mourned the fallen with heart-rending epitaphs inscribed on gravestones most would never see.” And heart-rending they are.
The history courses in schools tend to focus on the dates, major events, and major people when it comes to history. This book goes deep into the stories of the everyday Canadians who didn’t really know what they were signing up for. We have no Great War veterans left, and the veterans of World War 2 are slowly disappearing. We need to preserve these stories before they’re gone so that the next generations can make connections to the people of the past. That was the goal of this war album and I believe they have achieved it.
I will forever feel more connected to those brave, long dead Canadian soldiers of the past who served and some of whom payed the ultimate sacrifice. You can memorize dates and events and the contributions of certain people all you want, but history is much more than that. We need to make people care about the past and the best way to do that is to connect them to those people. War movies have done a great job showing what it was like for the soldiers and making us care about those characters, but there are so many more stories that don’t get told like that. We need to remember them too.
“There’s a maple leaf on every Canadian headstone. So, no matter what else they were, these dead were part of us. The men who wore the Canadian uniform from 1914 to 1918 deserve to be remembered because, for whatever reason, they did what their country asked of them... We can’t possibly make sense of, or even properly remember the more than 66,000 war dead... But we can certainly try to understand those terrible years and that piercing pain. We can begin, I think, by remembering that those who were killed called themselves ‘Canadians.’ In that respect, they were family.” - Peter Mansbridge
September 29, 2016
Normally I would steer clear of anything that has to do with wars... BUT... I am doing some research for that timeframe (The Great War-- The War To End All Wars-- World War I)and a nice chap at the library referred me to this big coffee table picture book of the War as remembered by the relatives and historians of Canadians from that period.
It was fascinating and very, very sad. I suddenly remembered that my Great-Grandfather Flatt (who died in 1931) had signed up as a medical officer for that gig. I looked for him in all the photos but didn't see anyone who looked remotely like my photo of him in uniform. He was 52 years old when the War started and 56 when it ended. It was the most gruesome of wars. I can't imagine what it must have been like for an older gent. Maybe he stayed in Canada? In any case, I also thought a lot about my Grandmother and her family. She told me once in her vegetable garden that she never wanted to talk about that War-- so many young men she knew (she was around 18 or so when that war ended) didn't come back, or if they did, they returned with the Spanish Flu. Also, although she didn't say so, her father didn't come back to his family but went out to Vancouver. The War must have been a heart-breaking time of life for all concerned.
This book made all the tidbits I had picked up about WW I very clear-- thanks to the essays by professional Canadian historians. The masses of stories and photos and other anecdotes turned what I initially thought would be rough-going into quite a page-turner.
It was fascinating and very, very sad. I suddenly remembered that my Great-Grandfather Flatt (who died in 1931) had signed up as a medical officer for that gig. I looked for him in all the photos but didn't see anyone who looked remotely like my photo of him in uniform. He was 52 years old when the War started and 56 when it ended. It was the most gruesome of wars. I can't imagine what it must have been like for an older gent. Maybe he stayed in Canada? In any case, I also thought a lot about my Grandmother and her family. She told me once in her vegetable garden that she never wanted to talk about that War-- so many young men she knew (she was around 18 or so when that war ended) didn't come back, or if they did, they returned with the Spanish Flu. Also, although she didn't say so, her father didn't come back to his family but went out to Vancouver. The War must have been a heart-breaking time of life for all concerned.
This book made all the tidbits I had picked up about WW I very clear-- thanks to the essays by professional Canadian historians. The masses of stories and photos and other anecdotes turned what I initially thought would be rough-going into quite a page-turner.
July 20, 2019
I saw this book at my local library and I thought I would take the time to look at it. It’s a beautiful book that is a great memorial to the brave soldiers that fought there.
July 29, 2021
This book... Where to start with what this book is? Let's start off with the obvious, shall we? This book was published to commemorate the centenary of the start of World War I. This war is one of the most famous wars in human history, and to many countries (Canada in specific), this war marked our independence from Great Britain as it showed that Canada could step out of the shadow of Britain and be capable of greatness.
The First World War to Canada is incredibly important. It was the first war in Canada's history that we had Canadian born generals (Arthur Currie) lead Canadian troops to battle. It was where we changed the way war in the trenches was fought (the battle of Vimy Ridge), but most of all it helped cement Canada's full independence as first a Dominion and then as a Nation.
However, the First World War also exposed Canada's division, it's war amongst itself and her people (especially English, French, and Indigenous), and it very nearly destroyed her in the process. The issues on the home front left a fragmented nation in the wake of the First World War and led to another Prime Minister to focus on these issues that helped guide Canada into the Second World War.
This book is not a comprehensive history of Canada's participation during WWI... Nor does it pretend to be a thorough history of The Great War in its entirety. Instead, what this book does is provide Canadians (and the world) a human look at Canada's pride, loss, and mourning.
It provides pictures of the men, women and children that laid their lives down for their king and Dominion. It also provides basic information about infamous battles that saw Canada's participation. The Battle of the Somme, Vimy Ridge, The Battle of Passchendale, and so many others. It shows a Dominion divided but still fighting for the same cause... But most of all it commemorates the lives and deaths of those that fought and lost their lives or came back as broken people to a country just as fragmented.
This is a beautiful book. I sincerely hope that there's going to be a commemoration of the centenary of Canada's celebration of the Second World War.
The First World War to Canada is incredibly important. It was the first war in Canada's history that we had Canadian born generals (Arthur Currie) lead Canadian troops to battle. It was where we changed the way war in the trenches was fought (the battle of Vimy Ridge), but most of all it helped cement Canada's full independence as first a Dominion and then as a Nation.
However, the First World War also exposed Canada's division, it's war amongst itself and her people (especially English, French, and Indigenous), and it very nearly destroyed her in the process. The issues on the home front left a fragmented nation in the wake of the First World War and led to another Prime Minister to focus on these issues that helped guide Canada into the Second World War.
This book is not a comprehensive history of Canada's participation during WWI... Nor does it pretend to be a thorough history of The Great War in its entirety. Instead, what this book does is provide Canadians (and the world) a human look at Canada's pride, loss, and mourning.
It provides pictures of the men, women and children that laid their lives down for their king and Dominion. It also provides basic information about infamous battles that saw Canada's participation. The Battle of the Somme, Vimy Ridge, The Battle of Passchendale, and so many others. It shows a Dominion divided but still fighting for the same cause... But most of all it commemorates the lives and deaths of those that fought and lost their lives or came back as broken people to a country just as fragmented.
This is a beautiful book. I sincerely hope that there's going to be a commemoration of the centenary of Canada's celebration of the Second World War.
January 24, 2023
This is an interesting collection of essays and personal mementos of Canada's time in WWI. The essays are all by different authors, on different topics, and vary wildly in quality. Some of them struck me as pretty antiquated analysis of the Great War, but some of them were really interesting - in particular, I appreciated the discussion of the incredibly sleazy 1917 election, and the relative obscurity of Quebecois soldiers in our national remembrance. The photos and mementos submitted by members of the public were very moving and are the stand-out of the book. Overall, well-designed intro to Canada in the Great War, even if the essays were a little uneven.
November 8, 2025
A remarkable book with so many great photos of soldiers, families, places and events from WWI. I especially loved the personal stories that families shared of their loved ones experiences. My grandfather was a stretcher bearer in this war and was wounded and invalided out after having his elbow shot off. Very poignant album to review as we approach Remembrance Day 2025. Highly recommend it.
May 7, 2017
An interesting collection of short articles, photos of soldiers with their bio's, and publications from the period, that brought out the many human tragedies from the war.
March 29, 2015
A coffee table book, but it does cover a variety of subjects, as well as perpetuating some misinformation. All in all a decent book to start investigating the Great War if you know little about it.
Displaying 1 - 8 of 8 reviews