remembering
10 Glebe Report January 12, 2018
WILLIAM CHARLES SAUNDERS
William Charles (Charlie) Saunders, son of Thomas and Margaret Saunders, was born January 26, 1897 in Woodroffe, Ontario (following much research, I suggest that this is the present day area surrounding Woodroffe Avenue in west end Ottawa). Saunders joined the Ottawa Boy Scouts 11th Troop and became 14th Troop Leader (St. Andrew’s), which led to him becoming a military cadet from 1913 to 1915. He moved to Ottawa and was working as a clerk and attending St. Matthew’s Church when he enlisted in the Canadian Overseas Expeditionary Force (COEF), #300124 on August 23, 1915, just seven months after his 18th birthday. He was assigned to the Canadian Field Artillery, 2nd Brigade as a “Signaller” and was shipped overseas almost immediately. Signaller Charlie Saunders entered the front lines of the Western Front on November 15, 1915 and was in the trenches just four days later along with his “chum” fellow Signalman Jack Heron, where he would remain for the next nine months. It is amazing to think that in less than 90 days, he went from being a teenage clerk in Ottawa to the battlefield trenches of the First World War. They were moved on April 4, 1916 to the Salient and from that time onwards were stuck in the daily actions of trench warfare, a dreadful experience for all servicemen. The life
Photo: The War Graves Photographic Project
We present the history of 19-year-old Charlie Saunders in this issue of the Glebe Report, in our continuing series of monthly stories about the 16 servicemen from St. Matthew’s Anglican Church in the Glebe who were killed in action in the First World War.
William Charles (Charlie) Saunders, who attended St Matthew’s Church in the Glebe, died in September 1916 in the Battle of the Somme at the age of 19.
of a signalman was a dangerous one and he often had to crawl out ahead of the trenches to signal his colleagues as to actions taking place, or repair communication wires cut by enemy bombardment. A good example of what Saunders and Heron endured took place just weeks after their arrival in the trenches. Heron wrote that on April 26, 1916 they were being held in reserve when “an exceptionally heavy bombardment” of the allied lines occurred. In their dugout, the two signalmen received an S.O.S. call for help. They immediately left their hole, which was then blown up a minute later by enemy fire. “Charlie then went out into the field and repaired a communications line which had been broken earlier, without regard to personal safety.” As of July 1, 1916 Saunders’ and his buddy Jack’s brigade was involved in the infamous six-month Battle of the
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Photo: Courtesy of Veterans Affairs Canada
by Kevan Pipe
Contay British Cemetery located near the village of Contay, France
Somme, a ferocious affair with over one million casualties on both sides that included more than 24,000 Canadians. Heron documented many of their activities on the line in a letter to his friends, later published in the Ottawa Citizen. He wrote, “No one expected to live. I was lucky enough to get away with a wound in my leg… Charlie took part in the greatest of the world’s great battles and helped towards its success.” Saunders received tragic news in June that his Uncle, William George Saunders, also of Woodroffe, was killed in battle on June 8, 1916. The 2nd Brigade war diary documents that on September 27, 1916 during action in the Battle of the Somme and in preparation for the specific Battle of Regina Trench that would begin on October 1, they fired heavy shelling of up to 50 rounds per minute, with the brigade itself subjected to heavy artillery fire and gas attacks. Signaller Charles Saunders was fully involved in this battle near Courcelette, a commune in northwest
France. His chum Jack Heron wrote, “When running a wire across open country in open view of the enemy’s lines, a task requiring the greatest of courage, William (Charlie) Saunders was killed.” He suffered severe shrapnel wounds in his legs and was brought to the nearby #9 Casualty Clearing Station. He never recovered from those mortal wounds and died shortly thereafter. Signaller William Charles Saunders, #300124, 2nd Brigade, Canadian Field Artillery, COEF, died at just 19 years of age and was buried in the Contay British Cemetery in the Somme valley near the village of Contay, France, along with 1,132 other Commonwealth servicemen. He rests there today and is remembered at St. Matthew’s, The Anglican Church in the Glebe. Kevan Pipe is a Glebe resident and member of the St. Matthew’s Anglican Church Communications Committee. For further information on The 48 of St. Matthew’s, please go to www. the48ofstmatthews.ca.