When my dad’s wartime secrets emerged, I regretted the material things I wanted growing up

November 6, 2024 Canuck

This First Person column is the experience of Margaret Thibault, who lives in Mayerthorpe, Alta. For more information about CBC’s First Person stories, please see the FAQ.

I never knew the secrets my dad held inside his tough five feet five inches, 145-pound body until I finally interviewed him for a college project when I was 20.

I realized I had never truly known this man. Before that, I thought I was hard done by and often commiserated with my two older sisters about how we never got anything fancy, new or extra from our dad. How he made me work hard on our haywire and binder twine farm for no money, so occasionally I would pick his pockets.

How other people had running water and I could only take turns with my five siblings and my mom to bathe once a week in an old tin tub (Dad sponge-bathed after we went to bed). I was sure that I stunk like our dog with all the chores I had to do. I didn’t really care about stinking; I cared about getting running water like my friend at school.

An old black and white photo of three girls in a field of tall grass. — Thibault, right, and her older sisters Betty, left, and Nancy, centre, on the farm ready for the first day of school, circa 1958. (Submitted by Margaret Thibault)

Now I realize how lucky I was to be a part of a happy farm family. Dad was right when he said we should be thankful for all that we had.

We had a huge garden that I ate straight out of regularly and helped plant and harvest while laughing with my sisters.

We had our own farm-raised beef that I delighted in helping to butcher, getting an up-close look and slippery feel of the different bloody parts of an animal’s body.

I learned to read when I was five because Dad believed in education and because I didn’t want to think my two sisters — older than me by one year and three years — were smarter than me.

Teaching us to survive

I was too small to be leaning over the low crib on the well to haul up the water bucket with our plodding old horse and a barrel on a stone-boat, but Dad always said we should always be open to learning. The water sparkled crystal clear in the sunlight. It was teasingly cold when spilled on my bare feet and smelled like the clean air after a rainstorm. I didn’t understand at the time that Dad was teaching us to survive.

I remember him often asking in his beautiful Scottish brogue, “Occht, what more do you need than food, water, shelter, education and a clear mind?”

As I interviewed him years later for my project, he said at 72 years old it was time he told somebody in the family a bit about his war years.

“And since you’re the baby, it might as well be you.”

After four hours of listening, it became clear why he raised his children as he did.

An old photo of a man in an Irish military uniform. — Thibault’s father George Fraser as an 18-year-old when he enlisted in June 1916. (Submitted by Margaret Thibault)

Between 1916 and 1921, he had seen military action in the First World War, the Russian Civil War and a skirmish in India — and was a prisoner of war for seven months when he was 20.

“You learn to survive with very little, and for the rest of your life you learn to live with only basic necessities,” he said.

The prison camp

For the first time, he slowly pulled up stories from his mind as if he was back in the horrible prison camp.

His voice was strong but sometimes quavered. I felt his hidden pain and understood why he hadn’t talked about his hardships or his challenges. He said the prisoners slept huddled together outside in a cage in a row like little pigs so hopefully no one would freeze to death. I thought of my sisters and I huddled in our nice warm bed with quilts to keep us warm from the winter drafts from the leaky windows.

He said they ate grain picked from the horses’ poops and raw meat from a long-dead horse. I thought of the abundant warm meals we gobbled up three times a day with very little gratitude.

He told of only getting his helmet half full of weak broth once a day for the first week of his captivity, and I compared that to the clean well water we drank from a metal bucket whenever we were thirsty.

Now I understood why our family didn’t live lavishly.

As his words percolated in my mind that day, I felt incredibly selfish for all I felt I was entitled to and all the material things I wanted.

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With absolutely no anger or self-pity, he told so much more. I taped his gentle voice as I couldn’t keep up with notekeeping and listening at the same time. I was awestruck with this amazing, wiry little man with his patched pants and threadbare work shirt. I studied his weather-wrinkled leathery face and work-strong hands with the visible veins that had kept him alive, and I felt the warmth of my tears that God had spared him to become ours.

My heart was flooded with loving gratitude that Dad had shared with me what he had carried for 50 years. At the end of the day, I was no longer looking at “just my father” — a good man small in stature. I was looking at a huge hero.

A poster with a soldier's portrait. — Thibault’s dad George Fraser was commemorated on Remembrance Day by his family. (Submitted by Margaret Thibault)

CBC Edmonton first visited Mayerthorpe in March and this First Person piece came from a writing workshop this fall with the Mayerthorpe Public Library. Read more about CBC’s workshops at cbc.ca/tellingyourstory.

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When my dad’s wartime secrets emerged, I regretted the material things I wanted growing up

Teaching us to survive

The prison camp

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