Remembering Ernest John Peden (1874-1947): A Fine Uncle and a Dedicated Soldier

Ernest in a uniform likely from the Boer War

(Updated from the original post October 2017, with additional information about Ernest - November 2020)

My grandmother, Isobel, and my father were somewhat estranged - by geography and emotional connection both.  In her later years, my father would visit and managed to get some scrawled notes from her on her family background.  She spoke fondly of her uncles, none of whom we knew or had met.  One in particular I wanted to research, likely due to the Canadian connection.  She wrote:  “Ernest went ranching and lumber-jacking in Canada (Alberta?), enlisted in 1914 and came over to France with the Canadian Contingent.  Survived most of the 4 years but was wounded several times and then shot through the head.  A quiet, good, thoughtful, kind man – well-named Ernest.”

Isobel's hand-written note regarding her Uncle Ernest Peden

Thus began a many years long effort of learning what happened to Ernest.  I learned first a lot about his family background, and difficult childhood.  I was able to track down some military records of his time with the Hussars in South Africa (the photo of him in uniform is from that era).  I lost track of him for a while, then found him again very near to where I live on Vancouver Island in Canada.  He must have joined some cousins here, as there are Pedens who settled in and around Victoria (but I haven't been able to conclusively link them yet).  I was excited when his records for the Canadian Expeditionary Force were posted on Ancestry, and I learned so much about him then.  More records started trickling in until I learned that he had in fact survived the war and landed back in Canada.  I could find nothing of his life after his release from the war for about a year.  Then, records surfaced in New Zealand - where he had clearly gone to visit his father.  There was no question that Ernest spent time there, but it was years before I found his death place - back in Scotland.  This year Remembrance Day I decided to fully update this blog in memory of Ernest.  

The eldest Peden brother, born to Alexander Peden and his then wife MaryAnne Emily Holtum, was true to his name – earnest in demeanour and serious by nature.  His childhood was marred by his father, who was a drunk who first mistreated and then institutionalized his wife, took up with a nurse, then abandoned the whole family to move to New Zealand in 1896 (Ernest would have been 22).  It can’t have been an easy childhood near the turn of the century England.  They were not a wealthy family, and hoped, apparently, to make their fortune in the brewing industry when Ernest was a young boy. It was no wonder that Ernest seemed to fare best as a soldier.

Boer War

Ernest was 5 foot 8 inches, of dark complexion, with black hair and grey eyes.  He joined up with the British side in the Second Anglo- Boer  War (1899-1902) and fought for the 18^th Hussars.  He was severely wounded near Boschpoort on the 30^th of June 1901, after surviving the battle for Talana Hill eighteen months prior (the participation in which garnered him a medal).  It would appear that Ernest joined the war effort early, when he was about 25, and stayed for the duration.  The one thing that I have from Ernest is his Talana Hill medal.

Ernest’s return from the Boer war was short lived.  In 1903 he left Liverpool for Halifax, eventually making his way, via the United States, to the west coast of Canada.  He worked a short way from where I now live (a small world indeed) – in Comox on Vancouver Island.  After his family dysfunction and the madness of the war in Africa, the peace of the tall trees on the rugged Canadian west coast must have provided some solace.  It seems that other Peden relatives were living in Victoria, but I have been unable to confirm who (other than a cousin James that Ernest mentioned in his travel documents).  

Ernest’s quiet Canadian life was interrupted when war broke out in Europe.  The call for help from his English homeland must have been strong. 

On September 21, 1914, Ernest joined the war effort, this time for the Canadian side, just over a month after Canada, as a result of the UK declaring war, joined the fray.  He was assigned to the 8^th Canadian Battalion, 90^th Winnipeg Rifles in the Canadian Expeditionary Force (CEF).  Ernest joined as a private and stayed a private throughout the length of the war. He was relatively older when he did join up (40 years of age), although his records show that while he spent some time as a clerk, he spent most of the war in the trenches. 

Class A War Service Badge

Ernest’s record shows that he received the Class A War Service Badge, denoting his service at the front in France and Flanders.  His battalion fought, among other places, at Ypres, Vimy Ridge, the Somme and Passchendaele.  He wore the Good Conduct badge for his four years in the CEF: a chevron worn on the left sleeve of the dress uniform.

His records also contained hints about his experience in the First World War.  He was occasionally commended, sometimes punished for disobedience, worked as clerk (presumably to take a break from the front) and sent back to join his unit. He suffered with the front line soldiers, and was hospitalized for illness, dysentery, and trench fever several times over the course of the war.  He had had five months in hospital due to shell shock, and suffered typhoid fever.  He had lasting effects of these injuries and illnesses: he suffered from prostate problems and hemorrhoids, and undoubtedly other unseen mental illness compounded by his complex and traumatic childhood and youth. While his record may be normal for a private in WWI, it is a sobering thing to read in the comfort of your living room, not too many kilometres from his peaceful existence as a forestry worker on Vancouver Island. 

Ernest identified his oldest sister, Jessie Lloyd Stevenson (née Peden) as his next of kin. Jessie and Ernest were the oldest of the nine Peden children.  Ernest had left for the Boer war before his sister Jessie had married and left home in 1907, but as the eldest, and given his parents’ troubles, it is no wonder she was the one he most identified with. His mother, Mary Anne Emily Peden, née Holtum, had long since left her husband Alexander and was living on her own means.  Ernest, ever the conscientious eldest son, sent her money.

  

Ernest John Peden's discharge from the CEF was on May 7, 1919.  His travel documentation from his return to Canada after the war shows that in May 1919, Ernest sailed with other soldiers on the Empress of Britain, arriving in Quebec City with the intent of travelling to Vancouver.  He was 44 years old and had spent most of his life at war.  He had been injured multiple times, received medals, and had spent only a brief time in Canada between wars.  The first hint of what happened to him after his discharge is contained in his Canadian military records, which contain a card which says c/o Returned Soldiers Club, Albert Street, Auckland, New Zealand.  

It is through New Zealand military records that we can track some of what happened to Ernest next.

In September 1918, J.T.M. Hornsby, then Member of Parliament in New Zealand, writes to the Minister of Defence.  He had just been to the local library where he was waited upon by the librarian, Alexander Peden (an extraordinary change in careers for Alexander the brewer to have late in his life).  Hornsby was asking the Defence Department to help Alexander seek a furlough for his son Ernest from the Canadian military to New Zealand.  I gather that Mr. Hornsby and Alexander had had a long conversation as the letter included reference to his two other sons, one serving as second officer on a transport, and George, his third son, having been killed in Mesopotamia.  Mr. Hornsby concludes his letter as follows:  "The old folks (Scots people) would be glad if you could help them to have furlough granted to New Zealand of the eldest son."  The return letter from the Minister of Defence directs Mr. Hornsby to have Alexander write to the Canadian government.

Ernest's father Alexander Peden died in Carterton, New Zealand in October 1919.  Since Ernest was discharged in May, if we assume he made his way directly to see his father, Alexander would have died shortly after Ernest's arrival.  It is also possible that Ernest went to New Zealand upon learning of his father's death.  Regardless, Ernest had made his way to New Zealand after the war.  In July 1920, Ernest was admitted to Dannevirke Military Hospital in New Zealand, and released in August.

In 1921 Ernest wrote a letter to New Zealand's Defence Department from the Returned Soldier's Club in Auckland.  He was inquiring about an advertisement he had seen in the New Zealand Herald referring to War Medals, specifically the General Service Medal and Victory Medal.  He had received his 1914-15 Star, but not the other medals from the Canadian Government and was wondering how he could receive them.  He was hoping the New Zealand Government could contact their counterparts in Canada on his behalf.  The letter has a note on it from the administration in receipt of it suggesting he make his own inquiries of the Canadian Government.  This letter is the first time I have found something that belonged to Ernest, that included his handwriting and signature.  It was a moving find after years of trying to uncover what happened to him.  We don't know what he was doing in New Zealand after the death of his father.  He was 47 years old, had been through two ugly wars, severely injured and a half a world away from the rest of his family.

What we do know is that Ernest was in New Zealand until 1921 at least.  I spent many more months occasionally returning to my search for Ernest to find what had happened to him.

Perusing the newspapers on FindMyPast for obituaries for the Peden clan, I stumbled upon Ernest's  obituary.  He died November 27 1947 at Maryfield Hospital in Dundee, Scotland.

In 1947 Isobel Maxwell, my grand-mother and Ernest's niece, was living in Scotland.  When I discovered that Ernest had died in Dundee, and his niece, who adored him, never knew he survived the war and lived not too distant from her, I was very sad.  The Peden family was broken by alcoholism, domestic violence and dysfunction.  I know that my grand-mother (Ernest's niece) did not get along well with her mother, and that the family dispersed over time.  Someone went to the trouble of posting his obituary, presumably a family member who knew of his military service. 

In a longer reminiscence, my grand-mother, Ernest’s niece, Isobel Maxwell, described him – I think it is an excellent way to end this Remembrance Day dedication to Ernest John Peden:

Uncle Ernest, the eldest brother, was a still, quiet man with a lean sensitive face and patient thoughtful eyes.  I never could imagine him as a cowpuncher or a lumberjack, yet he had been both in Alberta and British Columbia Canada.  I used to picture him alone by the side of a swiftly flowing river deep in the Canadian woods.  He had a … canoe beside him on the bank, and perhaps a campfire waiting to discourage blackfly and mosquitoes…

I don’t remember that he did actually smoke but I should like him to have had a pipe and maybe a dog.  His thoughts would be contented thoughts but I do not think they would be gay.

My mother said to me once in rather serious tones, “Ernest is good, you know.”

I only saw him in uniform, a strangely gentle soul to be a good soldier which it seems he was.  He came over with the 1^st Canadian Contingent.  Everything unpleasant happened to him, from trench feet to a bad head wound.  He did not complain.  I hope that as a lad he had some real fun and happiness because I do not think his latter years brought him much.  He deserved better.

One of my letters to him began “Dear Uncle Earnest.”  My mother smiled but would not let me re-write it.

Celebrating 198 Years of Our Family in Canada

It is exciting to reflect that the Allison surname in my ancestral family tree arrived in Canada long before it was known as a Dominion.  Of course, they were here millennia after the First Nations, who are in every corner of this great country.  While our ancestors were considered “settlers” at the time, they really weren’t.  Being a settler implies that no one was already there, that you are breaking new ground, that you are exploring a wilderness where no person had yet learned how to survive. 

This was a fiction perpetuated by the Europeans who declared much of North America terra nullius, and therefore able to be settled without consideration for the existing inhabitants.  It was the same attitude that the British had when setting out to conquer Ireland, considering the inhabitants savages and therefore needing a British influence. 

The first of our ancestors to arrive in what is now Canada were of Scottish ancestry – living under the yoke of the British, farming British land taken from the Irish in Londonderry.  Tiring of toiling the land without the benefits of ownership, our Allison ancestors took a ship to this new land to try their hand at settlement.  This was 1769, almost 100 years before men representing the colonies met in Charlottetown to create the Dominion of Canada and begin the process of peacefully freeing ourselves from British command.  Our family followed British settlement from Scotland, to Ireland, then to Nova Scotia, and stopped here on the east coast of a country that would, 98 years later, become part of a vast Dominion.

A picture of my great-grandparents house, from my grand-
parents, on Allison Drive in Rothesay, NB, looking
over the Kennebecasis River

The family spread across the country, eventually settling in various provinces.  By the time of the 100^th anniversary of the founding of Canada, I found myself, an ancestor of those early immigrants, celebrating at Expo ’67 in Montreal, where we were then living.  I was a very little and remember only seeing legs – lots of legs – mostly in mini skirts.

And here we are 150 years after the birth of Canada, 198 years after the landing of our ancestors on the shores of Nova Scotia, reflecting on this land.  We have had a history that in its current incarnation has learned the value of diversity and respect, but in its earliest history was about taking advantage of the First Nations and their territories, disrespecting the Metis, their heritage and their rights to rule their own land, treating Chinese immigrants as cheap labour and forcing them to live apart, imprisoning Japanese Canadians because of their heritage at a time of war, denying women the vote and rights to own property, and in very recent history finding increasingly cruel ways of separating our First Nations, aboriginal and Metis peoples from their families, their history, their language and their culture.  

In many ways, the survival of all of these peoples whom Canada treated with such disdain, is the story of Canada: perseverance, strength, resilience and pride.  With the Truth and Reconciliation Commission, Canadians are starting to see the damage that was caused by us to the First Nations.  We are coming to terms with it and trying to find ways to correct it.  We are realistically generations away from finding our way from this past to our common future, but talking about that history, reconciling with it, correcting the damage and then building a new future is our path forward, hand in hand with the First Nations, Aboriginal people and Metis.  This is what really sets Canada apart.  We have apologized formally for the head tax imposed on Chinese immigrants, for the racist refusal of entry to Canada of the Punjabis on the Komagatu Maru, to Japanese Canadians for their imprisonment on a false pretext based on racism, and most recently to Indigenous Canadians for the heinous policies that led to residential schools and the violence perpetrated on their families, the traumatic effect of which continues today.  As Canadians, we no longer see our past with rose coloured glasses, but with a desire to forge a future that truly celebrates diversity - and enshrines it in our Constitution.

I am celebrating this Canada Day by contemplating the strength and resilience of my ancestors, how they found their way to virtually every corner of this great country, and the strength and resilience of the First Nations who came long before us and understood how the land contributed to their wealth and culture, and how their communities thrived.

Images:

Photo of New Brunswick by myself, circa 1984, taken with a Kodak Instamatic

Photos of Expo 1967 from my father

1885 photo of Robert Harris' 1884 painting, Conference at Quebec in 1864, to settle the basics of a union of the British North American Provinces, also known as The Fathers of Confederation. The original painting was destroyed in the 1916 Parliament Buildings Centre Block fire. The scene is an amalgamation of the Charlottetown and Quebec City conference sites and attendees. Photographer: James AshfieldThis image is available from Library and Archives Canada under the reproduction reference number C-001855 and under the MIKAN ID number 3194982 

Where Did John Allison (1652-1739) Come From?

Who were the Allisons that preceded John Allison (1652-1736)? The Allison headstone in Ireland starts with John and he is the last confirmed relative on our family tree. The Saint Aidan’s Mixed Graveyard inscription for the Allison family gravestone reads:

Allison tombstone
photo by James Allison

John, 19 Nov 1736 (84), Jane Clark, his wife, 10 May 1684 (24). Mary Fleming, wife to John, 17 March 1733 (78), William Allison, son of John 20 June 1766 (86), Rebekah Caldwell, wife of William, 11 March 1751 (66), William, son of William 24 Nov 1798 (74). Mary Lawrence, his wife 8 Feb 1796 (62), Samuel son to last named William and Mary Dec 3 1818 (64), Jane Fleming wife to Samuel Sept 2 1843 (82)

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Family historians have observed that all three generations listed on the headstone are carved uniformly, making it unlikely they were added at the time of the deaths of each separate ancestor. Perhaps they were carved by a future generation who was unfamiliar with Allison family prior to John and in memory of their own ancestors? We know that a few of these generations had other children besides those listed, so these appear to be the sons who inherited the leasehold for the Allison farm. It’s worth understanding a little about the farm in order to see if we can glean some further information about John’s origins.

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While there may be primary sources available to further study the history of the farm at Drumnaha and the Allison family, there are very few available electronically. Also, many such primary sources stretching back to John’s birth and before no longer exist. In 2008, Bobby Forrest published an overview of remaining primary documents from Magilligan in the first volume of his account Scots-Irish Origins 1600-1800 A.D. Genealogical Gleanings of the Scots-Irish in County Londonderry, Ireland. This particular work has been enormously helpful in testing theories about John’s origins. Between this and the very helpful book by Winthrop Pickard Bell (A Genealogical Study), some conclusions can be drawn about the Allison family farm at Drumnaha.

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In the 16th and 17th centuries, England moved to further their violent colonization of Ireland by taking over land and transplanting friendly protestant populations, displacing the native Irish. British landowners were given the job of ‘civilizing’ Ulster. This was as unpleasant as it sounds. British landowners were not permitted to rent to the Irish. The Irish were moved off their land and only a quarter of the area was set aside for them (predictably resulting in poverty). Wealthy British landowners brought over English-speaking protestant tenants of their own British properties.

For British landowners, plantation costs were quite high. Landowners who received plantation land had a number of financial and other obligations that went along with it. They had to bring in families, including a specified number of men, to work the land. They had to set up shop, create and manage the villages, and undertake other costs in exchange for the land. As a result of these onerous requirements, a number of London guilds subsidized the venture. The area around Magilligan, the parish in which we find the Allison family farm, was likely supported by the Haberdashers’ Company.

Drumnahay - in Irish is Druim-na-h-aiithe, meaning ridge of the kiln – in the 16th century was one of 43 townlands in the parish of Magilligan. The farm at Drumnaha within this parish appears to have been developed as a result of the Ulster Plantation. The parish was originally named Mhicgiollagain after the original Irish hereditary landholders. When the British seized the land in Magilligan, they found it sparsely populated as a result of previous conflicts. Most Irish had been killed, moved or imprisoned. The “plantation” of British interests in Magilligan was therefore more peaceful for the new tenants than some other parts of Ireland (not to say that the Irish thought it so, but there were so few native Irish left that there was no violent confrontation between them and the new tenants - mostly Scots in origin).

The British Gage family owned much of the land, inclusive of Drumnaha. Documents describe John Gage’s estate in the parish of Magilligan, leased from the Sea of Derry beginning July 1634 for a term of 60 years. The boundaries were described in the 1654/55 civil survey:

One the East side with the Clothiers proporcon or parrish of Drumboe upon the South lieth the Habberdashers proporcon, one the South west the Roe water, and one the Northwest lieth Logh Foyle, one the North and Northeast lieth the Ocean or Maine Sea.

Listed in this same survey is Dromnaheigh: including one “towne”, paying 50 pounds, and the area consisting of 20 acres of arable land, 4 acres of meadow and ten acres of pasture, with 16 acres of unprofitable land.

In 1658, John Gage had control over this property, and in “Ortaghmore and Drumnacagh” together there were 19 people, 17 of whom were English and Scots and only two were Irish. The map of County Derry was drawn in 1662 and clearly shows Drumnaha.

So we know that the map of County Derry, including Drumnaha, was drawn in 1662. Prior to that, beginning in the 1630s, the Gage family had control over this property as part of the Ulster Plantation. There is no record of any Allisons associated with this property that could be found in the early years up to and including the year of John Allison’s birth in 1652. As a ten year old, it’s unlikely John would have been granted land anywhere as part of the plantation in 1662. Therefore he either arrived much later and took on tenancy of the Drumnaha property, or else he inherited the tenancy from his father. If the latter, then we may be able to find records of ownership of this property belonging to an Allison forebear (or Alison, Alyson, Ellison or other name variant) in the Forrest collection. I could find nothing there or in the PRONI database (Northern Ireland’s archives online).

This calendar of wills is the most interesting piece of evidence. Our John is listed here. William, his son, and the death year jive with the cemetery monument as well. If you consider typical naming conventions of the period, the first born of any male will often (even likely) be the grand-father’s name. This could mean that John’s father’s name may have been William. There is a William Allison in the calendar of wills who died in 1661, and he was listed as a soldier.

In 1642, a number of Scots came to Ireland as part of Monro’s Scottish Presbyterian Army (10,000 strong) to defend the land after the Irish uprising of 1641. Monro was ruthless and laid waste to much of Antrim in brutal fashion. Many thousands of Scots arrived in Ireland in this fashion, taking the place of Scots who were in Ireland before them and who fled or died in the uprising.

In Kevin Forkan’s compilation Army List of the Ulster British Forces, 1642-1646 (Archivium Hibernicum. Vol. 59 (2005), pp. 51-65), there are lists of names of the officers associated with Monroe’s Army, but no digital lists that I can find with soldiers’ names. Given that the William Allison in the records was listed as a soldier, with no identified rank, it is possible he was one of the thousands who came to Ulster with Monroe’s army and stayed to settle there. This is conjecture of course, but the timelines and records accord with it. Our John would have been nine years old at the time of his father’s death (1661) if William was indeed his father.

Calendar of Wills 

There is some evidence that perhaps there were no Allisons living in Drumnaha prior to John. The hearth taxes (a charge on each hearth in a home - a sort of tax on the rich as only the wealthy would have more than one hearth) had no recording of any hearths in Drumnaha, let alone to anyone named Allison in 1663. Interestingly, the Gage family home had eight hearths at their homestead in Ballerena (where the train station now stands). They were wealthy indeed.

In 1666 there were no Allisons on the muster roll. Young John would have been 14 and too young to be enlisted. For whatever reason, no other Allisons are listed either. Perhaps the Allison family was not yet fully situated in Ireland. The William Allison in the calendar of wills had already died (1661) by the time of this muster roll.

It is certainly possible that William, listed as a soldier, came to Ireland either married already or married once he arrived. He had a son and died nine years later. His son grew up in Ireland and eventually was given land to work on behalf of the Gage family in Drumnaha. The theory that William, a soldier, came to Ireland, met a Scots-Irish woman, had a child and died when the child was nine years old makes the most sense to me. William Allison on the calendar of wills has no affiliated town, but is listed in the Magilligan parish records - so he died there. He was listed as a soldier, so not formally a tenant in the plantation at the time of his death. At that time there was no one apparently working the land at Drumnaha, while later records show the Allisons consistently on that property. If John grew up in Magilligan, perhaps the enterprising young man sought out Gage and offered to work that property once he was of age. Given that Magilligan was so sparsely populated, this is a possible logical conclusion.

Another possibility is that John was born in Scotland or England. No evidence has been uncovered to support that theory. While other information may turn up, the working theory right now is that John is the child of William, his father was a soldier, and John himself started the Allison farming tradition in Ireland at Drumnaha.

Magilligan Point - Photo by James Allison