Sherlock Sidney Muir

Well, the main reason was the [Great] Depression. Another reason was because the army was sort of in our household. My grandfather had been in the army, my two uncles had been in the army. I used to sit up as a youngster listening to all the stories when they were together. So the army was just an automatic. Nothing else was considered.

Just after the war had started, I got a phone call from Stanley Park Armouries saying, “Report to the armouries tomorrow morning.” Once you were in the army, you were in the army period. You just did what you were told. Well, we kept going from Italy, we moved over into, we had a week going through France, had a month in Belgium and then we spent the rest of the war in Holland.

I was married when I was overseas. Got married in1940. Yeah, end of August. And I got married in my desk uniform. We were in a little town in Holland by the name of Groningen. And the whole platoon had got out on a convoy, doing some job or other. And there was only two of us back in camp. Word came into company headquarters, the war was over. Bill and I said, “Well, we’ll have a little bite to eat and we’ll take a walk downtown.” We were just on the outskirts of a town and we walked down into town and the people were out on the streets, all cheering and celebrating the war was over. And of course, as soon as they spotted Bill and I, they grabbed us and had us up on their shoulders. Bill and I were so embarrassed, as soon as we could get our feet on the ground, we went straight back to camp.

I was taking a small convoy up into Italy one time and there were civilians going the other way, down the roadside, walking. And they were walking away from the war. And I only wish that people back home could see that.