“Even though Canada,
with the empire, is at war, there is much for Canadians to be thankful for in
the circumstances of the war.”
Hamilton Herald. October 12, 1914.
Thanksgiving Day in
1914 was on Monday, October 12. Although many of the traditional observances of
the day took place in Hamilton, there definitely was a different context as war
in Europe was on everyone’s mind.
In its editorial on
Thanksgiving day, 1914, the Hamilton Herald urged readers to be thankful
despite the unsettling events across the ocean in France and Belgium:
“We should be
thankful that in entering the conflict the empire is defending a just cause –
the cause of weak and oppressed people against truculent powers which would
oppress them.
“We have gone into
this fight in defense of freedom and justice. Never in recorded history has a
nation had more ample justification for taking up the sword than Britain has in
the present war.
“This is something to
be thankful for. It is something to be thankful for that the empire’s course
needs no apology and defense and that no British subject has reason to be
troubled in conscience about it.”1
1 “Thanksgiving”
Hamilton Herald. October 12, 1914.
After enumerating a
number of reasons to be thankful in how the war effort was being directed by
the leaders in England, the Herald editorial writer ended by directing his
comments to Canadians specifically:
“It is an anxious
time and the prospects are that the war will not soon be over. But Canadians are
not called upon to suffer the worst evils of the war.
“Our harvests can be
gathered: they are not trampled and destroyed by armed hosts. Our cities and
hamlets are not danger of being reduced to blackened ruins. Canadian men and
women and children are not exposed to outrage and murder and mutilation. Though
at war we continue to enjoy the blessings of peace – no worse, off, indeed than
the people of our great neutral neighbor – due chiefly, under heaven, to the
protecting naval power of Britain.
“For these things,
Canadians have reason to give thanks
today, and our gratitude should stimulate us to do all in our power to mitigate
the anguish of the unfortunate people in the war zone.”1
The Hamilton
Spectator also published an insightful editorial on Thanksgiving day, 1914,
urging readers to feel a spirit of thanksgiving despite the news from western
Europe that was dominating the newspapers everyday:
“Amid war clouds and
in an era of commercial depression, there may be less reason than usual for
thanksgiving this year.
“Against this view,
however, there are many considerations. Here in Canada, how many grounds for
thanksgiving remain!
“Our country has not
been ravaged as has Belgium or northern France. The sacrifices we have been
called upon to make are as nothing
compared with those now common in all the great European countries.
“Every individual may
be thankful for life, health, home, family, friends, comfortable environment,
cheering prospects. As a nation, we may be thankful for abundant crops and and
ever-expanding development of unlimitable resources.
“There is a ditty
popular in certain circles which may well express our mood:
“ ‘Count your
blessings. Name them one by one.
‘And it
will surprise you what the Lord has done.’
“Even war with its
horror and its havoc is not without compensations. How it has brought out into
fuller view the nobler side of human nature. What instances of heroism do we
not daily behold! How our whole empire has been raised above the realm of great
hearts and great souls!
“Already in the wake
of war, there are rumbles of a religious revival. In the face of momentary
death, we think of immortal life.”2
2 “Thanksgiving”
Hamilton
Spectator. October 10, 1914.
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