thebravestcanadian

by Sam McBride

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.