First Nations vet honoured more than 50 years later
- Carmen Pauls Orthner | November 11, 2016
*****
A First Nations soldier has finally been honoured for his military service – more than five decades after his death.
On March 23, 1916, after walking from the Little Hills reserve near La Ronge to Prince Albert, 18-year-old Joseph Halkett enlisted in the Canadian army. He joined the 107th Overseas Battalion, and served in the First World War for three years before returning home.
Halkett died on May 24, 1956, but for the next 55 years, all that marked his grave in the Lac La Ronge Indian Band's cemetery near La Ronge was a small, weathered stone, reading simply, “Was At War”.
The injustice of that tiny marker, especially in contrast to the tall white headstones honouring other soldiers buried in the same cemetery, prompted some of Halkett's descendants to seek a proper memorial for him – and on Aug. 16, that wish was finally granted.
That afternoon, a strong, cool wind lifted through the poplar and birch trees lining the road leading to the Lac La Ronge band cemetery, as a group of approximately 50 people started off on a Walk of Honour in Halkett's memory.
The crowd – with Halkett's now elderly son Douglas in front – gathered in a semi-circle beneath the tall, thin pines surrounding the grave, where the old stone had been placed at the base of a brand-new, specially commissioned war veteran's grave marker. “Accept this monument, which we place in the memory of our departed brother,” prayed Gary Smalldon, one of two presiding clergymen.
After the formal funeral liturgy, four northern Aboriginal war veterans shared reflections, placed red poppies on the headstone, as did Halkett's first cousin once removed, Albert Ross, who remembered his late relative both as a leader and as a man who liked to joke and was always easy to talk with.
Related:
- National Métis Veterans’ Memorial Monument now engraved with veterans' names
- SFNVA looking to recruit younger generation, continue providing support
- Aboriginal war veterans tell their stories at U of S roundtable
“The Last Post” was played, and then a moment of silence – broken first by sirens, then the cry of a raven, but at last just the soft shush of wind – was observed, followed by “Reveille”. The vets each laid a red poppy on the headstone and saluted, and words of blessing were said by the clergy before the crowd dispersed.
Douglas Halkett's daughter Grace Bell began an e-mail campaign five years ago in hopes that her grandfather's military service would be properly recognized by the federal government. After the service, she said that she's very pleased that her father and her aunt – Halkett's last two remaining children – could at last see their own father honoured in this way.
“He served our country, and he had an unmarked grave. And to me, it wasn't right,” Bell said. “I did the groundwork, and I'm glad that this has come to be – that rightfully, he now has a war veteran headstone.”