For soldiers in the Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry (PPCLI), there was little time for celebrating the New Year during the few first days of 1915. Having arrived in France just weeks before, the battalion was now on the move towards Ypres, Belgium. It could not have been a pleasant march; the soldiers’ Canadian issue boots were defective with the soles disintegrating in the wet of a Flanders winter. The unit diary of 5 January notes, “Bn (battalion) much handicapped from want of boots” followed the next day with this comment, “Lack of boots much felt many men marching with no soles at all to their boots.” It was not the most auspicious beginning for what would become one of Canada’s most storied units. Canada was not yet ready to send a contingent overseas when war was declared in early August, 1914. It would take several months to assemble, train, and transport Canada’s first contingent to Europe. Not willing to wait, thirty-two year old Montreal millionaire Hamilton Gault took matters into his own hands and offered the Government $100,000 (about 2.5 million in 2016 dollars) to raise and equip a battalion for overseas service. In order to expedite mobilization of the unit, men with previous military service were sought. Some By John Goheen The First of Many Above Princess Patricia inspecting the PPCLI in 1919, Library and Archives Canada.
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