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The Not-So-Nice Canadians of World War I

Khalid Elhassan December 9, 2024 15 min

Canadian - A WWI Canadian recruitment poster — A WWI Canadian recruitment poster. Library and Archives, Canada

2. The Mental Price

Canadian troops take German officers prisoner at Vimy Ridge. Canadian War Museum

Brutality affects, most of all, the brutalized victims. However, it often also affects those who commit such acts. Thousands of WWI veterans returned to Canada with what we would nowadays term post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD. What ate most at some was not what had been done to them, but what they had done to others in split seconds of rage and vengeance, that left them with a lifetime of regret. One soldier endured the war’s bloodiest hells, but what bothered him the most was the execution of two captured Germans. It was decided that there was no time to escort them to a POW collection point, so straws were drawn to see who would slay them. Another veteran was scarred for life by the execution of a dazed German who had been trying to surrender, but who had forgotten to drop his rifle.

Written by

Khalid Elhassan

A lifelong history buff, I developed a particular passion for WW2 history as a child, when I spent hours listening to my grandfather, enraptured, as he recounted his wartime experiences in the British East African Campaign and with the British 8th Army in North Africa.

I graduated with a history BA from George Mason University, then went on to get a JD from the University of Virginia School of Law. After lawyering for a decade, I moved to sunny Rio de Janeiro and a less demanding career, opening a tourism agency in Copacabana.

A big chunk of my free time is spent blogging (you can follow me on Quora https://www.quora.com/profile/Khalid-Elhassan ) or freelance writing, mostly about my favorite subject, history.