75 WINTERS IN SHILO, MANITOBA CAN BE BRUTAL AT TIMES. It has temperatures that stay far below zero and cold winds that can cut through a person like a knife. Snowfalls as late as April are common and ones in May are not unheard of. The first few days of March 2006 had been like that, cold … windy … a bit of snow, but they hadn’t been the worst of days as far as the weather went. They would, however, be days that would test the soul of the little military community that calls Shilo home. It had been a tough day for Debbie Gallagher and it was about to become a lot tougher as she stood in front of the door of one the base’s private married quarters. Debbie’s husband, Steve, commanded A Battery of the 1st Regiment, Royal Canadian Horse Artillery (1 RCHA) which had been deployed to Kandahar, Afghanistan a mere month prior. Canadian gunners had been to Afghanistan before: once in the immediate aftermath of 9/11 and then again, starting in 2003 for several years in Kabul. There had been a few Canadian casualties during those tours but none from the artillery. This new deployment to Kandahar, however, was rumoured to be the one that would really challenge the mettle of Canada’s small military family. After learning that the battery would be deploying, Debbie and Steve had gone to Colorado Springs to meet with an American army wife and husband that they had become good friends with while living in Gagetown, New Brunswick. Debbie had gone there to learn about what needed to be done to prepare herself and, more importantly, the families of their soon to be deployed members. Her friend told her how the Americans handled things. It quickly became clear to Debbie that Canada had none of that; that no one in Canada, “was talking about it. No one was saying that, you know, this is war; and this is, this is going to be ugly. People are going to die …and nobody was talking about it.”1 Debbie and Steve immediately resolved to set things in motion to create a network in Shilo that would be there to support the families while the battery was overseas. With the help of several of the other spouses they formed a team and created plans to support each other, to support their deployed members and to be ready in case the worst should happen. Their motto was “Nobody sits and worries at home alone.” One of the team’s efforts was the creation of a newsletter to circulate to the soldiers’ families. Doreen Savage from Gaspé, Quebec, mother of Gunner2 Janie Duguay, who was on her first operational deployment, stressed the importance of that connection. For her it provided an opportunity of contact with the military and reinforced the fact that there was no need for her to be alone and worry; that they were not alone even if they felt like they were.3 It was that planning and her role on that team that had brought Debbie to that door on that cold day. It had started with a request to meet with one of the spouses in the network who needed to talk. The spouse had said to Debbie, I don’t know what to do with the guilt…You know how we all know that if you get through six o’clock, chances are we’re going to be okay. Well, I woke up early and went to the kitchen and didn’t turn on the light … and I saw the cars pull on the street. I saw a man in uniform and the padre get out and I went over to the phone and I sat in a fetal position on the floor and watched the clock until six thirty and then I realized they weren’t going to ring my doorbell; they rang the neighbour’s.4 The fatality had been a member of the 2nd Battalion, Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry whose wife and children were new to Shilo and whose own families lived far away. Debbie quickly agreed to help and so, I called our girls and we went that night with cots and pillows and beds and food and made sure that everyone was going to be okay…When I came to the door, a little girl was coming down the stairs, and it was a little girl from the school so, of course she knew me, and she said: ‘Mrs Gallagher. My daddy went to heaven today. He’s a hero. Can you help me tie my bathrobe?’ And I did. And she wrapped her little arms around my legs and then she said: ‘Did you bring cookies?’ So we went and we had a cookie.5 It wouldn’t be long before the Regiment would have its own losses. On April 22nd, Bombardier Myles Mansell, a reservist from the 5th (British Columbia) Field Artillery Regiment, RCA from Victoria, British Columbia and Lieutenant William Turner, a reservist who had been with the 20th and 11th Field Artillery Regiments, RCA from Edmonton, Alberta and Guelph, Ontario, both serving with the Kandahar provincial reconstruction team, would be its first sons to die. They, along with two other soldiers, died when their vehicle struck by an improvised explosive device in Gumbad village Kandahar Province, Afghanistan. Just a few weeks later, on May 17th, A Battery’s own Captain Nichola Goddard, operating as Call Sign Golf
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