01/06/2026
106 years ago this month, ships packed with Canadian soldiers were crossing the Atlantic, finally heading home after the horrors of the Great War.
The Canadian Expeditionary Force had fought through mud, gas, and unimaginable loss at Vimy Ridge, Passchendaele, and the Hundred Days. Now, crammed below deck, they were going home—but the war wasn’t done with them yet. Spanish Flu tore through the crowded troopships. Some men who’d survived four years of trenches died within sight of Canadian shores.
Imagine that journey. The relief of survival mixing with the weight of what they’d seen. The anticipation of embracing family members they hadn’t touched in four years, now almost strangers. The demons already settling into their minds—what they called “shell shock” then, what we understand as PTSD now. Nightmares that would wake them for decades.
They came home to a world that had kept turning without them, carrying memories that wouldn’t translate into words. The laughter of children who’d grown up. Wives who’d become different people. The ghosts of friends who’d never make this crossing.
The surreal relief of stepping onto Canadian soil again, alive, when so many weren’t. Beginning the longer, quieter war of learning to live with what they’d endured.
We remember not just their service, but their survival—and everything that came after.
🕊️
