Eighty years ago my father Leigh Morgan McBride and his younger brother Kenneth Gilbert McBride were lieutenants of the Vancouver-based Seaforth Highlanders of Canada regiment in the thick of one of the fiercest battles of WW2, the Battle of Ortona (Dec. 20-28, 1943). Against all odds, the Seaforths were able to enjoy a very brief, but much appreciated, Christmas dinner in a church just a few blocks from the building-to-building and hand-to-hand fighting. It was one of the few “feel good” stories to come out of the war at that time.
1944 would be a tough year for the McBride family, as Leigh was seriously wounded and lost an eye from grenade shrapnel in the attack on the Hitler Line in May. Some German soldiers found him unconscious and took him as a prisoner for medical treatment. He was listed as “missing in action” for four months until word came from the Red Cross in September that he was alive and recovering at a hospital in Germany. His parents were in the middle of celebrating the good news about Leigh when a telegram arrived Ken and his driver were killed when their jeep ran over a road mine near Rimini. Leigh made it back to Nelson in a prisoner exchange in late January 1945.
Lieutenant Leigh Morgan McBride, one of the serving officers at the famous Christmas dinner in Ortona
After the war, Leigh made regular trips to Vancouver for treatment for his lingering injuries at the Shaughnessy Veterans Hospital. There was still some shrapnel left in his legs that years later would set off metal detectors at airports.
In 1975 Leigh was among 300 Canadian veterans to attend the 30th anniversary of the Italian Campaign led by Veterans Affairs minister Daniel McDonald, who himself was seriously injured in Italy, losing his left arm and leg in battle there. Leigh preferred to put the war behind him and normally did not participate in reunions, but was strongly encouraged by his Seaforth friends to go to this one, as it included a memorial ceremony at the Coriano Ridge cemetery which has Ken’s grave, which he had never visited.
Captain Kenneth Gilbert McBride (1920-1944), was a lieutenant along with his brother Leigh at Ortona in December 1943. He was killed in September 1944 near Rimini by a roadside mine.
The two-week-long reunion would be Leigh’s last visit to the battlefields and cemeteries in Italy, but the experience led him to take a great interest in Italian art and architecture, which would be — along with golf — his hobby for the rest of his life.
Leigh Morgan McBride (second from right) with fellow Seaforth Highlanders of Canada veterans in April 1975 at the 30th anniversary of the Canadians in Italy, as they were vigourously thanked by a local resident.Leigh McBride (right) with Seaforth pal Borden Cameron during the return to Ortona on April 29, 1975. Cameron was quartermaster who came up with the supplies for the famous Christmas dinner.From left, Leigh McBride, Bert Hoffmeister and Borden Cameron, as they took a side trip to Venice after the 30th anniversary ceremonies.Leigh and Seaforth comrades at Coriano Ridge cemetery where his brother Ken G. McBride is buried.Ravenna parade that was part of the Canadians in Italy 30th anniversary reunion.
I remember my mother insisting when I was a young boy in Nelson that I must take the Red Cross swimming lessons. She said Kootenay Lake, while wonderful for swimming and boating, was hazardous for anyone who was not a proficient swimmer.
For one thing, unlike many of the lakes in Alberta, Kootenay Lake started to get deep very close to shore. Also, the lake was notorious for sudden storms and squalls. She said there had been many terrible stories over the years of local children drowning.
She didn’t mention the Robert Hume drowning specifically (it was before her time), but in retrospect it was among the highest-profile drownings in Nelson history, as the parents J. Fred and Lydia Hume were well-known and highly respected. From the Nelson Daily News reports, the whole city was heartbroken.
It happened at about 10 am on Wednesday, August 1, 1906 in the water near the dock of the Hume’s summer residence across the lake from downtown Nelson, known affectionately as Killarney-on-the-Lake. While playing near the shore with two chums Robert’s life jacket apparently got tangled in the wooden dock. When the playmates noticed he had disappeared they yelled for help. The first adult to arrive was CPR conductor Andrew Halkett, who was at his next-door residence. He dove in the water looking for Robert, but had difficulty finding him. Fred Hume rushed down from the house and dove in as well. They found Robert lying on the lake bottom and brought him to shore. While Fred worked on resuscitation, Andrew went to get medical assistance. Dr. Hall came to help, but after much effort realized Robert was beyond saving. Fred took the body up to the house where Robert was privately mourned by family members.
The Daily News report said Robert was “an exceptionally bright little chap, known the city over… a joy to his parents, a manly little fellow beloved by all his playmates.” He was described as a great favorite among guests at the Hume Hotel, and his passing “was the sole topic of sympathetic utterances, not only around the hotel, but in every home in the city.”
The next day there was a funeral service for Robert at the family’s house on Victoria Street conducted by Rev. R. Newton-Powell, pastor at the Methodist Church. This was followed by a solemn procession up to the cemetery, where he was laid to rest in the Hume plot in the Oddfellows section where 11 years earlier the Hume’s three-year-daughter Lulu Kathleen Hume was buried after dying from diphtheria. In November 1912, another sister, 27-year-old Eva Hume McBride (first wife of my grandfather R.L. McBride, who had been a pallbearer at Robert’s funeral), died from premature childbirth complications. Eva is buried next to R.L. and Winnifred McBride in the nearby Mason section of the cemetery.
The picturesque Killarney-on-the-Lake summer residence of the Hume family in early 1900s, across the lake from downtown Nelson. The picturesque Killarney-on-the-Lake summer residence of the Hume family in early 1900s, across the lake from downtown Nelson.Boathouse and dock in front of the Killarney-on-the-Lake summer residence of the Hume family. Date of photo not known.Hume family stone at Nelson Memorial Park. Located in the Oddfellows section (J. Fred Hume had been an active member of the I.O.O.F. for many years.
This year marks the 125th anniversary of the S.S. Moyie, the oldest intact passenger sternwheeler in the world, which is lovingly preserved and protected in Kaslo as a National Historic Site. Now that many of the pioneer-era local newspapers are available online, I thought I would take a look at what was being reported back in 1898 when she launched.
I was interested to see that the ship’s “maiden voyage” was part of a special excursion organized by the Canadian Pacific Railway (CPR) for West Kootenay community leaders that included train trips on the CPR’s brand new Crowsnest Railway. The CPR official in charge of the excursion was its Kootenay district freight agent Francis White “Frank” Peters, assisted by Captain James Troup, who had a large role in the building of the Moyie and was in charge of CPR’s lake fleet, and several other company officials.
Invitations were sent out to members of West Kootenay municipal councils and Boards of Trade as well as press in the region and further afield. That drew an enthusiastic response, as there was intense interest in this new transportation link that dramatically improved access to and from Canadian markets. The Moyie and its sister sternwheelers were essential to the new route, as the end-of-rail was at Kootenay Landing at the south end of Kootenay Lake.
S.S. Moyie seen overlooking Kaslo Bay in September 2023.front page story in Dec. 7, 1898 issue of Nelson Daily MinerFrancis White “Frank” Peters (1860-1933), who was in charge of the VIP excursion.from December 8, 1898 Nelson Daily Minerfrom December 11, 1898 Nelson Daily Miner
The excursion participants included prominent names from West Kootenay history, such as Colonel E.S. Topping from Trail, J.S.C. Fraser and John Kirkup from Rossland, G.O. Buchanan and G.T. Kane from Kaslo, J.M. Harris from Sandon, and Judge Forin and Frank Fletcher from Nelson. You wonder how often – if ever — these leaders from that era would be together like this, with a chance to interact and get to know each other.
According to various accounts, there were between 80 and 105 guests on the excursion. It began with the Moyie leaving Nelson shortly after 8 am on Wednesday, December 7, 1898. At about 11 am the ship had a quick stop at Pilot Bay to pick up guests from the north part of Kootenay Lake and Slocan Valley who had come from Kaslo on the S.S. Kokanee to join the excursion. Landing at Kootenay Landing at about 4 pm, they transferred to a special train that included three sleeping cars with porters, which took them to Cranbrook at about 7 pm, where they were greeted by a delegation of Cranbrook businessmen led by lumber merchant Archibald Leitch. (Note from Nelson history: five years later, on April 29, 1903, the same Archie Leitch rushed from Cranbrook on a special CPR recovery train to the site of the Frank Slide disaster to pick up three nieces who miraculously survived the slide, while their parents and four brothers were killed. The family decided that the youngest of the nieces, Marion Leitch, would stay in Cranbrook and be brought up by Archie and his family, while her older sisters went to Manitoba to live with other relatives. With Archie and his wife as legal guardians, Marion went through school in Cranbrook, then studied music in Vancouver, and decided to settle in Nelson B.C., where she would be a prominent teacher of piano lessons from the mid-1920s until retiring in 1971.)
The Cranbrook Board of Trade sponsored a banquet for the visitors that included numerous toasts of thanks and congratulations back and forth. At that early stage of the new railway there were no dining cars or other food facilities on the trains, so meals were arranged off the train at stops.
After the event wrapped up towards 2 am, the visitors retired to their sleeping cars on the train. Continuing noise from excited passengers made it hard to get much sleep. In the morning the train headed to Fernie, with stops along the way to tour coal mines and coke ovens, as smelters in Trail and elsewhere in the region needed a good supply of coke for their operations. Returning west, the train stopped at about 4 pm at Doris (near Cranbrook), where two-horse and four-horse sleighs would take them about ten miles to Fort Steele, where the local board of trade hosted a banquet at the Vanoster Hotel featuring more toasts, speeches and another ample feast.
Several of the passengers in the horse-drawn sleighs encouraged their drivers to race against other sleighs, just for fun. Unfortunately, two Rossland guests suffered injuries when their sleigh overturned. The problems getting to Fort Steele were a reminder that it was the big loser in the routing of the Crowsnest Railway, as the CPR decided late in the project to save money by bypassing the long-established Fort Steele community in favour of the small settlement of Cranbrook where land costs were much lower. There was talk of a spur line being built to Fort Steele, but that never happened. By the early 1900s it was a ghost town, destined to become a restored and rebuilt tourist attraction in the 1960s.
Based on the comments during and after the excursion, the participants appreciated it as a learning experience with lots of fun and camaraderie. According to the Cranbrook Herald, the most popular dinner speaker at the Fort Steele banquet was Reverend Frew, pastor of the Presbyterian Church in Nelson. He joked that he had taken on the role of chaplain of the travellers, guiding their spiritual and moral protection through the tour. Frew drew a great round of laughter when he said he found the married men to be the most difficult to handle, and “if I succeeded in keeping them from breaking the whole Ten Commandments my mission was not in vain.” His estimate that “just one or two” of the men were not total abstainers from liquor was obviously a gross underestimation, based on the great number of toasts by the revellers.
On Friday the 9th there were further tours for the group during its homeward travel on the rail line to Kootenay Landing, and then sailing the Moyie through the lake to Nelson, stopping at Pilot Bay to drop off Kaslo-bound guests for another boat so they didn’t have to come all the way back north from Nelson. It was less than two weeks since five lives were lost in the sinking of the S.S City of Ainsworth near Pilot Bay in a fierce storm, so that disaster was likely a topic of conversation for all onboard.
On Saturday, December 10, a meeting was held in the Phair Hotel billiard room in Nelson where organizers and participants reflected on the tour. On behalf of the participants, Colonel Topping (known as the Father of Trail) presented excursion leader Frank Peters with a silver punch bowl and tea set as a token of appreciation. Unfortunately, Captain Troup was unable to attend and receive his gift, but three other CPR officials were also honoured with gifts from the travellers.
In 1931 the expensive construction of the rail line from Kootenay Landing through difficult terrain on the west side of Kootenay Lake towards Nelson was completed. This substantially reduced travel time on the Crowsnest line. My dad Leigh was among about a dozen students from Nelson who travelled on the Crowsnest Railway many times in the 1930s and later to get to and from the University of Alberta in Edmonton. At the same time, his brother Ken and other Nelsonites were taking the CPR’s Kettle Valley Railway west to UBC.
Sadly, sternwheeler transport on Kootenay Lake ended with the last voyage of S.S. Moyie in April 1957.
Peters continued his work as freight agent, which included working out new schedules of rates. In the summer of 1900, outside of his CPR work he served as the first president of the Nelson Electric Tramway company, which provided much-needed streetcar service for the hilly community. He was also a member of the exclusive Nelson Club, and active in the Masons as well as curling and other sport associations.
In 1900 the new Nelson streetcar company, known as the Nelson Electric Tramway Company, was having difficulty getting financing from European investors who were wary of investing in such a small, far-away community. Knowing that Europeans had high regard for the CPR and its amazing achievement of the cross-Canada railway, Frank Peters was elected as the first president of the Nelson Electric Tramway company. He presided over the official opening of the streetcar service and the development of what would later be known as Lakeside Park, meant to increase ticket revenue for the streetcar company. Peters’ duties in Nelson ended in late 1900 when the CPR transferred him back to Winnipeg. He reached executive ranks in the company in 1913 with his appointment as general superintendent of B.C.
Peters began a long railroading career at age 13 in his native Saint John, New Brunswick as a telegraph operator with the Intercolonial Railway. After gaining experience with a couple of U.S. railroads in the Great Lakes region, he joined the CPR in Winnipeg in 1881 shortly after its incorporation. He reached executive rank with the company in 1910 with his appointment as B.C. Superintendent in Vancouver. While in Nelson he was an active member of the Nelson Club as well as the Masons lodge and several sports organizations.
He enthusiastically took up golf in Vancouver and was president of the prestigious Shaughnessy Golf Club in 1922, and a year later was part of a Shaughnessy golf foursome that included visiting U.S. President Warren Harding, exactly one week before the president’s death from a stroke while visiting San Francisco.
Peters retired from the CPR in 1927 after 46 years with the company, while continuing to serve as a director of the CPR subsidiary Esquimalt and Nanaimo Railway. He died in 1933 after 60 years in the railroad business, and was known as the Grand Old Man of Canadian Railroading. .
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