A Port Hope couple got a surprise earlier this year dating back to the Second World War.
Colleen and Jim Dobie said they were contacted by the curator of the Canadian Museum of
Immigration at Pier 21 in Halifax regarding letters his father had written during World War 2. The museum had received a box containing approximately 330 letters written by Canadian
soldiers during the war.
The Dobie family were the first ones the museum had tracked down in relation to letters from Jim Dobie’s father, Douglas who signed up at the age of 19 and was a Gunner during the war. Jim believes that at the time his grandmother wasn’t fond of the idea of her only child signing up because her husband had died three years earlier. Dobie was overseas from 1942-1946 and passed away in 2005.
“We’re Dobie, which is not a common name but one of the families was Smith,” said Colleen while sitting at the dining room table of their home with her husband and Today’s Northumberland.
Around them are numerous military artifacts and photos that his father took during his time in the military.
“One of the museum volunteers had come into possession of a box of 330 letters from a number of soldiers,” said Colleen.
“Somehow there were 18 letters from Jim’s dad.”
The letters were sent to Gunner Dobie’s mother, Edith. “but how they ended up in the box with the others we don’t know.”
George Zwaagstra has been a tour guide at the Canadian Museum of Immigration in Halifax for the last decade when the letters came to him during a unique set of circumstances.
Zwaagstra said when a number of tall ships came into port in July/August 2017 he had arranged for a group of 18 international students from Stan Stead College in Quebec to tour the museum.
While speaking to the students about emigration/immigration and World War 2 one student told him they immigrated to Canada 10 years earlier because of the war in Syria.
“He told me that his mother who is a volunteer with the Salvation Army in Newmarket had a box which had been given to the Salvation Army and contained over 300 letters from three war veterans,” Zwaagstra wrote to Today’s Northumberland in an e-mail.
“They could not find out anything about the families and he was wondering what to do with it.”
“I told him, “you make darn sure I get the letters and I will look after it.”
In November 2017 he received the box and the task began to search for the families of the veterans.
With the help of the Scotia Bank Family History Centre at Pier 21 and Cara MacDonald, the families were tracked down. Zwaagstra said they did a fantastic job.
“If it was not for her I don’t think I would have found the families.”
An ad was even put in Legion magazine in hopes of finding them.
The Dobies said they were never aware of the letters prior to Zwaagstra contacting them.
Colleen is the historian of the family and was very much looking forward to receiving the letters, but her husband was home when they arrived and couldn’t wait for his wife to get home. He opened the package and starting reading the letters from his father.
“They were very cool,” said Jim.
“I started reading them as soon as I got home.”
“Even if I didn’t know they were from my dad I could recognize the humour and some of the expressions. And his handwriting never changed.”
“He was quite the character.”
Colleen said she’s always been fascinated by the Second World War. Her father was also in the war where he met her mom, who was a nurse in England.
“If the war hadn’t happened, I wouldn’t be here.”
“Military strategy doesn’t interest me, but the soldier who had to fight that battle interests me along with the woman waiting at home and the woman decoding messages.”
Getting to read the letters gives insight to life in the military. The first letters don’t mention where Dobie is stationed, but as the end of the war got close, the military censors seemed to be less concerned.
Originally his father worked at Simpson’s in Toronto, but after joining the military he was soon was overseas.
“He didn’t talk about the war much,” said Jim.
“He did talk about social things at the end of the war. He told me about a family from Holland inviting him for dinner.”
Dobie’s father thought he was having roast beef and onions for dinner when it was actually horse meat and tulip bulbs.
The first letters were from England when he was living in the barracks, then France, Belgium, the Netherlands and finally Germany.
Some of the letters talked about how his fiancé broke up with him while he was overseas.
“I didn’t know he was engaged before he left,” said Jim.
“I had heard of Doris before and knew they were engaged at some point, but I didn’t know it was before he left and that she broke it off while he was gone,”
“It’s funny because he remained good friends with her family.”
Part of the letter read “I’ve had no quarrel with Doris, she just called it off. As far as I’m concerned everything is ok the way it is now. What do you mean about the idol gossip and story part? No one has said anything to me about Doris and I so far.”
In other letters Dobie talks about how he hasn’t changed his clothes or had a bath in six days.
No specific battles are mentioned, but reading the letters you get a small sense of what life must have been like.
In an early letter, Dobie spoke of British Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery coming to inspect their regiment. Dobie was on duty at the time and missed the inspection, but wrote it didn’t bother him that he did miss it.
“In one of the letters he mentions about things being very grim,” said Jim.
“Another said he’s been very busy so he couldn’t write.”
A girl who worked with him at Simpson’s sent him a letter with her photo and tells him she’s sad because everybody is going off sick because of toothaches or backaches, “but that’s not the case, it’s heartaches. They are pining away for heart smasher Dobie with the dimpled knees and cookie duster on the upper lip.”
She also sent him toilet paper because she heard he was short.
“The second last one said they are going to have a big two day party because they had just announced VJ day.”
The letters spoke of how it took longer to de-mobilize than to mobilize and they were planning a two day party in a castle.
In today’s society where e-mails are sent and received within seconds, it took approximately two weeks for letters to arrive from overseas.
Colleen and Jim plan to scan the letters if other family members want to read them, then tuck them away as part of the family history.
Author: Pete Fisher
Has been a photojournalist for over 30-years and have been honoured to win numerous awards for photography and writing over the years. Best selling author for the book Highway of Heroes - True Patriot Love
