Norma Haasz thinks of her grandfather every day, not just on Remembrance Day.
A portrait of Pte. Henry William Phillips hangs in a place of honour in her living room in Aldergrove.
Pte. Phillips died over 100 years ago in France, after suffering fatal injuries in action near Aubigny. He is buried there at the Aubigny Communal Cemetery alongside 2,048 from the U.K. and 666 Canadians.
From March 1916 to Armistice Day in 1918, Aubigny was held by the British in World War 1.
Pte. Phillips was one of the 2nd Canadian Mounted Rifles (1st Central Ontario Regiment) and the photo that hangs in Haasz’s living room shows him proudly riding on a handsome steed.
“He died before I was born, but my mother and aunt both praised him and did what they could to keep his memory alive. They left me the photo and the record book of his burial when they passed on,” said Haasz.
Pete Phillips was born in Essex, England, but came to Canada and worked for Vancouver City Hall before he was enlisted. His name is one of the names engraved on a memorial at the hall.
“He served as a Canadian in the war and died of his wounds on April 9, 1918. He was 40 years old,” said Haasz.
His widow, Gertrude Mary Phillips, raised her family in Vancouver on Graveley Street, where she made her living teaching English to Chinese immigrants after the war ended. There she raised her children, including Haasz’s mother, and impressed on them the loss and suffering of war.
However, the cycle would soon repeat as both Haasz’s father and uncle served in the Second World War. They served on the B.C. coast, though, and did not see action on the front lines like Pte. Phillips saw.
Haasz is not always up to attending Remembrance Day ceremonies at her age, but she remembers every day when she sees that portrait of her grandfather hanging on her wall.