The Lives of William Carl and Jessie (Cairns) Fraser
William Carl Fraser
&
Jesse (Cairns) Fraser
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| 70th Wedding Anniversary of William Carl and Jessie Fraser, 1984 |
The Life of William Carl Fraser
William Carl Fraser was born November 15th, 1888 in Arkwright, Bruce County(1). His parents moved to the area after they married that spring. European settlement in the hamlet began in the 1850s and most of these early settlers were of Scottish descent like the Frasers. The land was formerly the territory of the Mississauga, Odawa and Anishinabewaki, acknowledged widely today as the Saugeen Ojibway Nation and the Chippewas of Nawash.(2) For the SON, treaty 45 ½ signed in 1836 exchanged 1.5 million acres of land to white settlement for housing, economic assistance and a guarantee of no settler expansion into the Saugeen-Bruce Peninsula forever.(3) This agreement was breached in 1854 when Treaty 72 opened the peninsula up to settlement, leading to land claim issues that persist today. Chippewas of Nawash never ceded their land to either Upper Canada or the Government of Canada.
During William Carl’s young life Arkwright had two hotels, a wagon shop, blacksmiths and a physician. There was a nearby sawmill and a school. A post office operated there until 1915. With no railway running through the town, however, the population began to decline. By the time of the 1901 census, young William Carl’s family had moved north to Amabel township.(4) Today Arkwright has a small number of residents. Several original buildings remain, and they are used as private homes. It is situated at the corner of County Road 17 and Side Road 15 of Arran Township.
Childhood & Early Life
William Carl was the son of a labourer, William Lauder Fraser(5) and his wife Mary (Margaret) Berry.(6) His parents were married April 4th,1888 in Orangeville, Ontario. He had four siblings: Lawrence Archibald (b.1891), Charlotte (Lottie) May (b.1892), John Austin (b.1895), and Grace Mary (b. 1897).(7)(8) Both John and Grace passed away the same year they were born. (9)(10) Lawrence lived until 1955 and Lottie passed in 1920.,William Carl grew up in Hepworth, moving to Owen Sound sometime after the death of his father in 1905.(11) On April 9th,1914 he married Jessie Cairns from Derby township in Grey County.
Work Life
William Carl worked as a wire chief for the Bell Telephone Company. He started with the company as a lineman around 1911 while he roomed at the Owen Sound YMCA. At that time, he worked 60 hours a week and earned $650 a year. Ten years later he was an inspector for the Bell Telephone Company, and he was one of the highest earning men in his 3rd Avenue Owen Sound neighbourhood.
Military Career
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| William Carl Fraser |
As a member of the 31st Militia Regiment, William Carl was summoned to Canadian Exhibition Fairgrounds in Toronto for military training in the fall of 1914 following Canada’s entry into the Great War. He enlisted on November 11th just a few days before his 26th birthday. After completing some basic training at Valcartier, Quebec where he met the not-yet world famous bear, Winnie-the-pooh, he departed for England by way of Montreal on the S.S. Megantic. He arrived May 24th, 1915, five months after the birth of his first child,
William Kitchener Fraser. By September, he was at the front.
For most of the Great War, William Carl served in 2nd Division of the Canadian Expeditionary Force with the 20th Battalion. In 1916 he was wounded at St. Eloi in the disastrous crater fighting that took place there. He was among dozens of men crouched in a shell crater after their night-time barbed wire work in No Man’s Land was driven back by enemy artillery fire.(14) Upon calling for retaliation, the 20th Battalion’s war diary notes that “our own guns fired several rounds of shrapnel into the Crater (sic), wounding 11 of our men.”(15) Struck by friendly fire, a piece of shrapnel embedded 4 inches above his right ankle developed tetanus, taking William Carl out of action for a few months.(16) He was back to the front by October, 1916 for the resumption of the Battle of Ancre Heights in the mission to capture Regina Trench during the Somme Campaign.(17)
William Carl was a decorated soldier. Promoted to sergeant for the voyage to England, he opted to revert to back to the rank of corporal in May 1915. In 1917, however, he accepted the promotion to sergeant, later becoming a Company Sergeant-Major in charge of the distribution of supplies, ammunition, and responsible for assessing the wounded. He was awarded the military medal for bravery in the field in February 1918. He was promoted to Warrant Officer II Class, and he was awarded a subsequent bar to his military medal for further acts of bravery during the Hundred Days Campaign that ended the war.(18)
It took the Government of Canada many months to return soldiers of the Great War home to their families. The ravages of Spanish Flu across the country, perilous Atlantic crossings during the winter, economic recession, and failing infrastructure were all causes for the delay. William Carl didn’t return to Canada until July of 1919 but, unlike 59 544 Canadian men and women, he did return home. Two of his uncles, his mother’s younger brothers Ernest and Oliver Berry were not as fortunate. (19)(20) While away, his wife secured an apartment for them to live in with their son Bill. As the story goes, after one night’s sleep William Carl was not satisfied with the apartment and took the separation allowance sent to his wife when he was overseas and purchased a home for them at 1146 3rd Avenue West. Angered by the one-sidedness of his actions, Jessie claimed to never like that house though they both lived there until the end of their century-long lives.
The Life of Jesse (Cairns) Fraser
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| Jessie Cairns Fraser, aged 100 |
Jessie Cairns was born November 15th, 1890 in Derby Township. Part of the Niagara Escarpment, Derby’s rivers and waterfalls, old growth forests, and flat to rolling landscapes were first inhabited by, and are home to, many indigenous peoples including the Huron, Algonquin, Chippewa, Ojibway, and Potawatomi.(21) The beauty and bounty within the Georgian Bluffs attracted European settlers as early as 1842. The families of Jessie’s maternal grandparents, the Whites and the McArthur’s, were among these early settlers.(22)
Childhood & Early Life
Jessie Cairns was the daughter of Catherine White (b. 1863) of Sydenham township and Thomas Cairns (b. 1862), who immigrated to Canada at age three with his mother.(23) Her father is believed to be a lay-minister who travelled often. Census records from 1881 to 1921 record Thomas Cairns as having many different jobs. As a teen, he worked as a farmer for Alexander Fairbain, the man who employed his mother, Isabella, as a servant whom he married in the twilight of his life. When his children were babes, he worked as a sailor. Though their father was a Presbyterian, Jessie and her siblings were raised Baptist on account of the time spent with her maternal grandmother Mrs. Robert (Catherine McArthur) White. The Cairns’ children spent a lot of time with both their maternal and paternal grandmothers and sometimes even lived with them. Jessie had three siblings: two older brothers Alexander and Thomas, and a younger sister Catherine. The family eventually moved to Saskatchewan while Jessie remained in the Owen Sound area. She briefly moved out West to live with her family while pregnant with her first child, returning to Ontario after his birth. Her sister Catherine lived with Jessie and William Carl in Owen Sound while working as a housekeeper before marrying Arthur Shute, a Great War veteran partially blinded by a gunshot wound.(24) The couple was affectionately referred to as Auntie and Uncle by Jessie and William Carl’s many children and grandchildren. Jessie and Catherine remained close their entire lives.
Work Life
As a young woman, Jessie was employed as a dressmaker. In 1911 she earned $350, which was the same amount as her father’s earnings as a labourer in Owen Sound, but almost half of what her brother, Alexander, earned as a liveryman.(25)
Motherhood and the World Wars
After raising a child on her own while her husband fought for King and Empire and keeping her children fed, clothed and healthy during the Great Depression, Jessie bid farewell to her four sons as they answered the call to fight fascism and defend liberty in the Second World War. Bill served in the Army Signal Corps, Joe was a soldier in the Army, Howard was in the Navy, and Bob was a stoker in the Merchant Marine. By miracle, they all returned home to her at war’s end.
Family Memories
William Carl and Jessie Fraser are remembered by family for their gardening, love of baseball, and staunchly independent ways. The Frasers had a large garden behind their house on 3rd Avenue. Dug with a round shovel, the garden’s black earth was tended with care. They grew the delicious plums and raspberries along with many varieties of flowers. There was always a hot cup of tea and biscuits for a visitor.
Reading was important to the Fraser family. William Carl proudly donated $100 to the Owen Sound’s Carnegie Library when it was being built. Opened February 3rd, 1914, the Carnegie library, which still stands across from the Sydenham River near the heart of the city, played an important role in the Fraser family as William Carl and Jessie’s children could often be found there reading and studying.(28) Likewise, their grandchildren frequented the library, a tradition they too have passed on.
As avid baseball fans, many family Thanksgiving dinners were hijacked by the World Series. Both William Carl and Jessie, enjoyed watching the Blue Jays on the television set in the front room. No ball game was complete for William Carl, however, without his pipe and a glass of whiskey. Not for Jessie, though. She was a strict teetotaler.
William Carl enjoyed surprising his grandchildren with his daring nature. Having spent much of his life climbing telephone poles for Bell, he enjoyed demonstrating his skill no matter what age he was. As a wireman he had excellent balance and would leave his grandchildren astounded as he walked along the top edge of the wooden fence at his daughter Phyllis and her husband Elgin Hutchinson’s farm when he was in his eighties.
As a pair, they could not be deterred when determined to take on a task whether it be shovelling ice off the roof of the house or teetering atop a stack of books piled on a chair while hanging curtains well into their nineties, they used their wit and charm to justify why they needed to be taking on such chores in their advanced years.
Together they loved their family and treated their children and grandchildren to simple indulgences whether it be giving out quarters for treats at the corner store, potato chips warmed up on the stove, or fresh vanilla ice cream from MacNeil’s dairy across the street.
End Notes
(1) While on his birth registry, his name has been recorded as William Carroll Fraser all further documentation including the family anecdotes of his descendants refer to him as William Carl Fraser.
(3) https://www.saugeenojibwaynation.ca/about/nation-to-nation/treaty-history/
(4)https://www.ghosttownpix.com/ontario/intros/arkwright.html
(5)William Lauder Fraser was born March 10,1859 in St.Catharines, Canada West (Ontario) to Thomas and Jane née Lauder Fraser. William and his wife are buried at Zion Cemetery in Hepworth, Ontario.
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