The Virginia enterprise. [volume] (Virginia, St. Louis County, Minn.) 1893-19??, 1915-04-02
PATS
REGIMENT ! ]! | HAS
Fn'EPERSoNNEL
London Daily. Chronicle Says All
Members of Canadian Bat
talon Are Medal Vets.

The London Daily Chronicle has
the following on the camp of the
P. P. c. L. l. at Winchester before they
left for the front:
"Why is it we are here, ready for
the front, while the rest. of the Cam
adams are still on Salisbury Plain :?
Because we are all trained men. It's
lesson for the Old Country"
Thus spoke brawny Scottish non-
com. in Princess Patricia's Canadian
Light Infantry, otherwise "Pat's
Pets," a splendid battalion, 1,100
strong.
It is significant, but not surprising,
that this battalion should have pre-
cedence over the remaining $4,000
Canadians. The battalion is COM
posed entirely of men who have seen
service, many of them active service.
It has the largest percentage of
war-ribboned men in the British
army, for something like 80 per cent.
claim one medal while quite a num-
Der can show several. One has ac-
tually five medals, beginning with
che Zulu medal of 1879.
There is hardly a regiment or unit
in the British army which is not re-
presented in tn ebattalion. They are
many Of them ex-non-coms. who have
emigrated on discharge, and on the
outbreak of the war they came hot foot
from all parts of the Dominion, from
Halifax in the east to Vancouver on
the west.
In the sergeants' mess may be
seen scores of township pennants
which were worked by the ladies Of
Canada and given to the men on
their departure.
.Strathcona's Horse, Of South A.
rican fame, is also we'll represented,
and from the States, too, there came
recruits, men with service in the U. S.
cavalry, artillery and infantry, all
eager. as they term Il, to "have a
GO at the Kaiser = ~s-'
Nor is Australia left out, and
worthy of note, there are two Beers,
who fought against us in the S. A.
war. Says one Of them (he has the
biggest chest measurement in the
battalion): "Once we fought against
you, but now we fight with you."
A big Scot, Stewart Paterson, a
member of the Rhodesian Mounted
Police, who knows Africa "from the
Zambesi to the Cape" is one of the
non-coms. He had been on furlough
in Canada three weeks when the war
broke out. He Immediately applied
for and got a years leave, and
promptly enlisted in the P. P. c. L. I.
This will be his third campaign. He
is "hard case." So is Jim Lee of
Toronto, late of the Queens West
Surveys, another non-com. Says a
comrade of him: "West Africa
couldn't kill Jim, 50 we're sure the
Kaiser can't"
Armourer Sgt--Major Hoad, though
SO years Of age, is one of the tough
est lien in the battalion. This will
be his fifth campaign. The first of
his four medals is for the Egyptian
war of '82, when he was a troop
sergeant-major in the Royal Irish
Dragons Guards.
From Saskatoon comes one of the
marvels Of modern surgery. This is
Sergeant Dudley Ward, of the Am
bulance detachment. He served in
the S. A. war in the Queens West
Surrey Regiment, and he was ter
ribly shattered by Boer she'll. The
doctors considered him a hopeless
case, but with a wonderful constitu.
| ton he nullified the doctors pro.
phecies, and from being a hopeless
case he has recovered to join the banG
of "hard cases" as the members of this
/ joyful battalion style themselves. Mo-
all the suffering caused by that Boe1
shell could keep Ward back. I be-
lieve he was well known on tn,
Rugby football field in the nineties.
i There are several other individ
uals of note of which the battalio,
is proud. They will! tell you will
gusto that they have as comrade Jacl
Munro, who fought Jeffries and Jacl
johnson.
They also refer proudly to thei
bulldog mascot. "No goats for us,
they say, but most Of all they boas
o ftheir huge 17-hands mule, dubbe'
''The Kaiser" They say he is a fin
worker and beggar to think, an
"you can tell when his brain is work
ing by the cock Of his ears"
Then there is their band Of High
land pipers. This band puzzled re
cruiting officer in a. distant town
; ship, so he wired to headquarter!
piper band wishes TO enlist in bod.
: Will I enlist them.'' With brevit
worthy Of Napier came the. repl!
"Will you not?" ~.
|; The battalion claims to be as f
as any in the British army, and
is an absolutely independent uni
! Its squipgnent, even 70 bootlaoss, u,
-. IL.