157 14 15 16 17 18 The GreatWar Albert. I don’t know if anyone from my extended family has made the pilgrimage to visit his resting place, but I am certain that I will in my lifetime. Private Wilcox received the 1914-1915 Star, which his father John received in 1919, and later the British War Medal and the Victory Medal, which his mother Mary received in fall of 1921 (with John, his legal next of kin, having passed away earlier that year). Through conversations with a mutual friend, I discovered that there was an odd connection – my friend knew a relative of the soldier buried next to Fred at Knightsbridge. A phone call was arranged, and I first spoke to Ed Fewer in 2020, one hundred and four years after our relatives died and were buried side by side at Knightsbridge. Ed lost his great uncle Laurence Fewer at Beaumont-Hamel on July 1st. It turns out Ed grew up across the street from my great grandfather in Grand Falls. My grandma grew up in the house across the street from Ed’s. I visited that old family house myself in the 1970s and Ed still lives in his family house to this day. We laughed at the coincidence and wondered how our dear family veterans might have known each other too. ‘Come from away’ or not, how lovely it is to let these connections give us a space for remembrance and reflections for those who have sacrificed so much. Following the Great War, five Caribou memorials were erected in France and Belgium to commemorate Newfoundland’s accomplishments, contributions, and sacrifices. In 2021, a sixth Caribou was installed at Gallipoli in Turkey. The Beaumont-Hamel Newfoundland Memorial stands as an important symbol of remembrance and a lasting tribute to all Newfoundlanders who served. Officially unveiled by British Field Marshal Earl Haig in 1925, the memorial overlooks the 74-acre preserved battlefield park encompassing the grounds over which the Newfoundland Regiment made their unsuccessful attack on 1 July 1916. Wiki Commons.
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