CORPORAL ERNEST ALFRED WARDEN
CANADIAN ENGINEERS
16TH SEPTEMBER 1917 AGE 25
BURIED: BRUAY COMMUNAL CEMETERY EXTENSION, DENMARK
This inscription piqued my curiosity, here was a Canadian soldier specifically dying for England, not the King, or the Empire, or Canada but England, why was this. Well the answer of course was not too difficult; Ernest Warden, born and educated in England, had only been in Canada for one year when the war broke out. He, or perhaps it was his mother who chose his inscription, still thought of England as his home. He left his job as an electrical engineer in Toronto in May 1915 and returned 'home' with the 2nd Canadian Contingent that September.
Warden originally served with the Brigade Ammunition Column but early in 1917 transferred to the Canadian Corps Signals Company as a despatch rider, carrying orders between Head Quarters and the front line. A keen motor cyclist he had won many test trials and races at Toronto Motor-cycle Club events. It was whilst carrying despatches on the night of the 15/16 September that his motorbike collided with a lorry. Seriously injured, he died later that day. A comrade in the Canadian Field Artillery told his parents:
"Everyone who came into contact with your son spoke well of him. His officers, and senior n.c.o.'s looked upon him as being a young man of more than average ability, careful of and anxious in the execution of his duties, and of manly bearing and address."