PRIVATE JOHN THOMAS JARDINE
8TH BTTN CANADIAN INFANTRY
11TH NOVEMBER 1916 AGE 20
BURIED: VILLERS STATION CEMETERY, VILLERS-AU-BOIS, FRANCE
Mrs Robina D. Duncan of Waskada, Manitoba, Canada, chose this inscription. It's not been possible to discover who she was or how she knew John Jardine but it sounds as though she did know him because of her choice of words, "he thought it was his duty.
Jardine was born in Edinburgh in 1896 where in 1901 his father, Thomas, was a building contractor's book keeper. There is no sign of the Jardines in the 1911 census, were Thomas and his wife Agnes dead or had they emigrated to Canada?
Jardine served with the 8th Battalion Canadian Infantry and was killed on the 11 November 1916 in all probability when the 8th Battalion helped take Regina Trench during the Battle of the Ancre Heights since the action is one of their battle honours.
The final line of the inscription, 'he died that we might live', with it conscious reference to Christ's sacrifice, comes from 'Hail! - and Farewell!' in a collection of verse by John Oxenham entitled 'All's Well' Some Helpful Verse for These Dark Days of War. John Oxenham was the pseudonym of the novelist, poet and hymn writer William Arthur Dunkerley. During the war his self-published poetry sold hundreds of thousands of copies and provide the source for more than one headstone inscription.
They died that we might live, -
Hail! - And Farewell!
- All honour give
To those who, nobly striving, nobly fell,
That we might live!
That we might live they died, -
Hail! - And Farewell!
- Their courage tried,
By every mean device of treacherous hate,
Like King's they died.
Eternal honour give, -
Hail! - And Farewell!
- To those who died,
In that full splendour of heroic pride,
That we might live!