Nova Scotia/Nunavut Command of The Royal Canadian Legion www.ns.legion.ca 135 and the hand-to-hand fighting that ensued, reduced the overall strength of the battalion to 200 and on the battalion’s last parade in Halifax in1919 only 48 of the ’originals’ answered their names. After the war, Carson remained in Nova Scotia for a short time, but eventually returned to Boston where among other jobs he was a building superintendent. Carson appears to have been lucky in war and lucky in life. In 1926 he received word that his uncle in Colorado had died and left him a sizeable inheritance, valued at $300,000 at the time (approximately $4 million today). After he was notified of his inheritance, he made arrangements to have a friend manage his affairs and went about practicing for an upcoming event. The relatives of Carson only recently became aware of the inheritance in 1926 and were at a loss to explain what eventually happened to the mine, mining stock, bonds and ranch in Colorado which made up his inheritance. Perhaps it didn’t survive the stock market crash of 1929. The last piper to be examined with Scottish connections is Walter J. Telfer, or as he was later known throughout the British army “The Hero of Vimy Ridge”. He was born at Tighnabruaich, Argyllshire, in 1885. Prior to the outbreak of the war, he was living in Boston with his mother and was employed as wine steward at a local hotel. He enlisted in Halifax in February 11, 1915 and on April 9, 1917 he was wounded at Vimy Ridge. The Battle of Vimy Ridge is considered by many to have been Canada’s coming of age as a country and still stands as Canada’s most important military victory. William Brand and Walter Telfer both piped their companies into action at the Battle of Vimy Ridge and both were awarded the Military Medal. Unlike Brand, Telfer was wounded severely during the assault. After being struck down by shrapnel he crawled into a shell hole and continued to play his comrades to their objective. While waiting for the return of his comrades Telfer spotted a German soldier in a nearby shell hole and some discussion followed as to who was whose prisoner. When the 25th Battalion withdrew from battle, they used several German prisoners to carry Telfer, pipes and all, back to the dressing station. The German prisoners kept pointing to Telfer’s pipes while on the stretcher shouting “Mitrailleuse! Mitrailleuse! (Machine gun! Machine gun!) According to a later newspaper account, Telfer had no idea what they were saying until many years after the war. He spent the next several hundred days in hospitals in France and England, where after numerous amputations to his right leg he was eventually outfitted with a prosthetic limb. For the rest of his life, he had limited left arm function and suffered from ‘ghost pain’ from his right ‘foot’. These hardships did not stop him from playing a few tunes for fellow patients at Cornelia Hospital in Poole, England where he was convalescing in August of 1917. It may have been around this time in hospital that Mrs. E.M.E. Pratt sketched Telfer. The image is dated 1917, and depicts Telfer sitting in a chair (side on), playing pipes, his missing leg obvious in the drawing. Telfer eventually returned to Boston and in the 1920s he was asked on several occasions to recount his exploits at various functions throughout the city, performing the “same tune on the same bagpipe” which won him so much fame and honour at Vimy Ridge. Telfer and his wife eventually moved to Everette, Washington State, where he died in 1966. The whereabouts of his pipes and service medals are currently unknown. The 25th Battalion was one of the most decorated Canadian battalions during the First World War, and pipers played an integral role in its success. “The 25th marched to the pipes as they moved from Boulogne to their baptism of fire at Kemmel: on the march from their ordeal at the Somme up to the Vimy sector; at Vimy itself their pipes played them over the top in a display of valor outstanding even on that day of glory; in the proudest moments of all- the triumphant entry into Bonn and the Victory March in London – the shrill defiance of the pipes seemed to symbolize the very soul of the Empire”. The 25th Nova Scotia Overseas Battalion was officially disbanded on September 15, 1920 and its regimental colours deposited in Halifax where they are now on display at Government House. continued ... John ‘Jock’ Carson in Boston Walter J. Telfer 1917 sketch of Water Telfer by E.M.E. Pratt
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