Events on the occasion of the anniversary of the first national internment operation

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October 28, 2024 marks the 110th anniversary of Order in Council PC 2721, issued under the War Measures Act of 1914. As a result of this decree, approximately 8,570 enemy aliens were arrested and sent to 24 internment camps across Canada. They were immigrants from states at war with Britain and Canada (Germany, Austria-Hungary and Ottoman Empires, Bulgaria) and were therefore considered a threat. More than 5,000 were ethnic Ukrainian immigrants from the territory of Austria-Hungary; the rest included Germans, Poles, Croats, Turks, etc. Internment camps operated across Canada between 1914 and 1920.

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World War I, enemy aliens, and internment in Canada

The start of the First World War in Canada was accompanied by fear and suspicion. Immigrants from countries at war with the British Empire, particularly Germany and Austria-Hungary, were widely believed to have loyalties to their former homelands. As a result, under the War Measures Act, the Canadian government issued orders that allowed it to monitor these individuals. The 80,000 people, called “enemy aliens,” had to register with authorities, carry a pass and report to local officials. Another 8,579 people, mostly of Ukrainian origin, will be interned as prisoners of war.

Although military measures were aimed at ensuring security, the government’s emergency powers proved appropriate for other matters. Rising unemployment among the hostile foreign population—a consequence of widespread anti-foreign sentiment—prompted the Canadian government to use internment to solve the problem. Arresting and interning unemployed and destitute enemy aliens as prisoners of war under Order in Council PC 2721, the government established camps on the Canadian border—mainly in the Rocky Mountains and northern Ontario and Quebec—where they were employed in clearing land and building roads under harsh and difficult conditions . Prisoners were subject to a military regime, forced to work under armed guard; disobedience and disobedience were met with corporal punishment. In desperation, dozens tried to escape. Several were shot, some fatally. Others succumbed to mental anguish due to false imprisonment and ill-treatment. Most, however, stoically endured their torment in silence, believing that it was all a mistake.

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Economic growth and the demands of industry eventually led to the parole of internees who, after years spent behind barbed wire, were invited back to participate in the Canadian economy and society. However, internment remained for those considered “undesirables” and continued to be used as a political measure against labor and political activists who were interned during the labor turbulence of the post-war period. The signing of the peace treaty of 1920 set the conditions for the removal of internees and their families from the country. More than 1,000 people will be deported.

Internment and other political measures (censorship, political disenfranchisement, selective banning of ethno-cultural organizations) cast a dark shadow over an almost unknown episode in the history of Canada’s participation in the First World War, highlighting the unfair treatment of immigrants who called Canada their home. Reflecting on this historical wrong, we are reminded of the importance of rights and freedoms, especially when the noise of war overcomes the mind and people’s hearts are hardened. To those who suffered, we have a duty to remember and reflect on the meaning and significance of this experience.

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Saskatchewan Connection

Fourteen kilometers southwest of the city of Saskatoon, near the railway line then known as Eaton, a Canadian internment camp was established during the First World War. The only facility of its kind in Saskatchewan, it was located on the site of the present-day Saskatchewan Railway Museum (intersection of Highway 60 and Canadian National Railway).

After the armistice was signed on November 11 and the internment operations ended, on February 25, 1919, 65 enemy alien prisoners from the Munson Internment Camp in Alberta were relocated for logistical reasons to the Eaton Railroad. Once there, the German and Ukrainian internees protested against forced labor. Work stoppages, escapes and unreliable military security convinced the authorities to abandon the site for more secure facilities. On March 21, 1919, 24 days after the facility was established, the internees were transferred to an internment camp in Nova Scotia to await deportation. Soon after, Camp Eaton was dismantled.

Knowledge of the location of the camp disappeared after the Eaton Railway Company changed its name to Hawker in 1919. Research would lead to its reopening as a place of internment, guided by the rural municipality of Korman Park to identify a heritage site.

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In 2004, the Ukrainian Canadian Congress of Saskatchewan and the Prairie Center for the Study of Ukrainian Heritage at the University of Saskatchewan, in cooperation with the Saskatchewan Railway Museum, commissioned and cocked a monument in honor of a historical place. In 2018, partners with the German Council of Saskatchewan placed an interpretive bronze plaque, adding a memorial garden and reflection bench next to the monument. A major permanent exhibition was also created in June 2022 to recognize the site’s history as an internment site for Canadians. The site and exhibition are open to visitors. We invite everyone to remember and reflect.

One hundred and ten years we remember. Eternal Memory. Eternal memory.

For more information visit https://www.internmentcanada.ca/

– Doctor Kordan is Professor Emeritus of Political Studies at St. Thomas More CollegeUniversity of Saskatchewanan

110TH ANNIVERSARY OF CANADA’S FIRST NATIONAL THORNBURN CAMP

Memorial events are taking place in Regina, Saskatchewan

Thursday, October 24, 2024

• At 7:00 p.m., the Regina Public Library Cinema (Lower Level) will be showing director Ryan Boyko’s “It Wasn’t Like That.” Entrance is free.

Sunday, October 27, 2024

• The program will be held at 1:30 p.m. near the monument to the victims of the Holodomor on legal grounds in Vaskan Park, after which an educational procession will take place (weather permitting). Follow the updates on the page “UKC Regina” on Facebook.

This article was provided for informational purposes by the Shevchenko Foundation’s Canadian World War I Internment Fund and the Regina Chapter of the Canadian Congress of Ukrainians.

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