I thought about my hometown province of Nova Scotia’s history of underrated people.
I chose a World War I – Lieutenant-Colonel Charles Bent, commanding officer of the 15th Battalion (48th Highlanders), War Horse Fritz and Mascot Bruno – The Sheepdog.
So many animals died in WWI and WWII who brought glimmers of hope and love within the horrific conditions soldiers endured.
S, 🌻
Fritz & Bruno
The First World War was the last major conflict in which large numbers of animals served alongside soldiers on the battlefield. Millions of horses died, while dogs, bear cubs and other animals became mascots.
Fritz and Bruno, a war horse and sheepdog, hold a special place in local military history. They belonged to Lieutenant-Colonel Charles Bent, commanding officer of the 15th Battalion (48th Highlanders). In 1918, during the “Hundred Days” advance in France, Canadian forces captured a German position, including Fritz, a Russian bay horse, and his German officer. Several years earlier Bruno had been adopted by Canadian soldiers billeted on a Belgian farm, and became the 15th Battalion’s mascot.
At the end of the war, Bent brought Fritz and Bruno home to his farm in Paradise, Nova Scotia, where the companions are buried side by side. A popular and decorated officer, Bent served his country again during the Second World War.From: Hometown Heroes
Bruno – Mascot
It was common practice among the units of the CEF Battalions to adopt an animal as their mascot and in that regard the 15th Battalion was no exception. The regimental history records that on August 2, 1915 while the unit was out-of-the-line in billets at Grande Munque Farm and the Piggeries near Ploegsteert, Belgium:
“Lt Col Marshall took on strength of the Battalion a small, unprepossessing but loyal recruit Bruno, sheep-dog pup – an offspring of casual amours and unknown ancestry – but who became the Battalion’s beloved mascot. His friendship for the Colonel, his loyalty and his long life and adventures with the Battalion, are s story in themselves. Despite his shaggy and flea-populated hide, his instincts for vagabondage and flirtation, he became an outstanding regimental figure and a well-loved and honoured member of the Unit. Out of the line he seldom left the O.C.’s immediate presence…and when the Battalion was in, Pipe Major “Sandy” Keith was his keeper.”
Research over the years uncovered several photographs taken in the late summer of 1915 at Ploegsteert that show Bruno as a puppy with some of the battalion’s officers. On March 25, 1916 Bruno even paraded with the Battalion as it marched past Field Marshall Sir Douglas Haig in the square at Bailleul as they rotated out of the Ploegsteert sector to rear area billets. On May 19, 1916 the Battalion was back in the Salient conducting a frontline trench tour when Lt Col Marshall was killed by a sniper’s bullet as he crossed a gap in the trench line near the railway cutting in front of Hill 60. The Regimental history noted:
“The shaggy Bruno and the Colonel had been inseparable when out of the line. When the Battalion fell-in quietly at 9 a.m. on the morning of May 28th, they looked with infinite sympathy towards the bereaved dog, tail and head dejectedly down, listlessly pacing in and out of the officer’s huts, whining, unable to understand, or, perhaps understanding.”
However, when the former Deputy Commanding Officer, Major Charles Bent took command of the Battalion, he in turn adopted Bruno and a new bond was formed that would last beyond the eventual end of the war. The photographic record next shows Bruno with the Battalion at Noeux-les-Mines, France in mid August 1917 as the unit prepared to take part in the assault on Hill 70. He appears in several group photographs with the Officers and Senior NCOs of the unit and by that time he was clearly as described- large and shaggy. He was also apparently living up to his reputation as an adventurer for several weeks later at Lozinghem he was reported as having gone AWL from the unit.
The Regimental history records; “Lt Col Bent went to visit the officers of a neighbouring unit and on his return Pipe Major Sandy Keith reported: ‘I can’t find Bruno, sir.’ There was great excitement. The Highlanders would have no luck without their shaggy mascot. He had to be found. ‘Where did you last see him.’ ‘Several hours ago’ said Sandy. ‘He was running up the road after a lady dog.’”
The incident was verified by a document found in museum archives – a message sent by the Battalion to the 1st Division APM (Army Provost Marshall) which stated:
“The following is a description of this Battalion’s mascot missing since the 11th. As this dog belonged to the late Col Marshall, and will be given to Mrs. Marshall, when the Battalion returns to Canada, would you please have a good lookout kept in order that it may be returned to the Battalion. “a large Belgian, Bob-tailed sheep dog, dark grey, answering to the name BRUNO, wearing collar engraved “Bruno, 48th Highlanders of Canada”. Last seen near Fosse 10.”
Bruno returned to the unit on his own the night likely drawn back home by the sound of the Pipers playing while the Officers were at Mess. From that point in the war until the Armistice and the Occupation of Germany in 1919 there is no further mention of Bruno although he undoubtedly remained with the Battalion. He next appears in the historical record when the battalion was in Bas-Oha, Belgium in April 1919 awaiting repatriation to the UK and Canada.
A July 19th letter from the Commanding Officer of the 48th Highlanders in Toronto to a shipping agency in the UK indicates that Bruno did not return to Canada with the Battalion:
“I have the honour to request that you will take up the matter of the importation, with the Canadian Military Office in Great Britain, of the marginally noted. This dog “Bruno” was sent from France on the evening of April 28th 1919 but arrived in Liverpool too late to come back with the regiment and is at present in quarantine being held there pending licence from the High Commissioner permitting shipment to Canada.”
An additional series of Great North Western telegrams between Lt Col Bent in Pugwash NS and Lt Col Darling in Toronto show that Bruno was successfully shipped from the UK, paid for by the Officers of The Regiment, and reunited with Lt Col Bent. When Bent relocated from Pugwash to a fruit farm at Paradise in the Annapolis Valley, Bruno went with him. At some point they were joined by the Battalion’s war horse ‘Fritz’ who had also been shipped home from France. In 2012 when the Bent family attended the 48th Highlanders Officers Annual Mess Dinner in Toronto, Colonel Bent’s son Donald recalled that as a young boy his father would ride Fritz through the apple orchards with Bruno – a staunch guardian of the property – running alongside.
Not long afterwards, the family found a photograph of trio in the orchard which they forwarded to the 15th Battalion Memorial project. Donald also recalled that his father had been greatly stressed when the mascots eventually grew old, frail and in Fritz’s case Col Bent had to personally shoot him, as a veterinarian had not been available.
When Bruno eventually also passed, he was buried alongside Fritz on the farm. For Col Bent, both animals must have been living connections to his war years, his beloved 15th Battalion and to all the men he served with and led.
5th Battalion Officers in rear area billets near Ploegsteert May 1915. The Officer front right is then Major CE Bent Holding the recently adopted puppy Bruno.
5th Battalion Officers in rear area billets near Ploegsteert May 1915. The Officer front right is then Major CE Bent Holding the recently adopted puppy Bruno.
Bruno (centre) poses with the Officers of the 15
From: Memorial Project
Fritz – War Horse
On August 29, 1918, following it’s successful offensive at Amiens earlier that month, the Canadian Corps was preparing to assault a section of the formidable Hindenburg Line line known as the Drocourt-Queant Line. The 15th Battalion was assigned the task of taking a strong forward position near Hendecourt called ‘The Crow’s Nest’ which blocked the Corp’s advance and denied them secure ‘jump-off’ positions for the main assault against the D-Q Line. It was here that story of Fritz, the 15th Battalion’s ‘War Horse’ would begin.
At 4:50 AM in the pre-dawn darkness of September 1st, 1918, behind a rolling artillery barrage, the 15th Battalion assaulted The Crow’s Nest and the adjacent Chateau Wood. Despite numerous machine gun nests , the two assault compnaies quickly overwhelmed the German defenders. By daylight Captain Richard Samuel and No. 2 Company had secured the Crow’s Nest and Capt Gordon Winnifrith and No. 4 Company had cleared Chateau Wood. As the positions were consolidated German artillery and sniper fire felled a number of Highlanders and the enemy mounted several desperate counterattacks to try and retake the position. Calling in effective artillery fire, the 15th Battalion held the ground and by early evening the Crow’s Nest and Chateau Wood were securely in Canadian hands.
Just after nightfall a mounted German artillery Officer and his orderly came riding up the road into the 15th Battalion’s position and were promptly captured by Captain Winnifrith and men from No. 4 Company. The War Diary records that the German Officer’s battery had been located on the Crow’s Nest and having just returned from leave he apparently was not aware that the position had changed hands. So the Officer, his orderly and the horse – described as a “splendid dark bay typical of the cavalry mounts captured from the Russians in the east” – all became prisoners of the 15th Battalion. Captain Winnifrith was killed in action several weeks later at the Canal du Nord but the Commanding Officer, Lieutenant Colonel Charles Bent adopted the horse which had been appropriately named ‘Fritz’.
Fritz remained with the battalion for the remaining months of the war, the march to the Rhine in late 1918 and the Occupation of Germany at Engelskirchen in January 1919. There are several period photographs of Fritz taken when the battalion paraded in Germany when the Regiment’s Colours arrived from Canada. The majority of the horses used by the Canadians were disposed of in Belgium prior to repatriation but senior Officers were permitted to keep their mounts. Battalion Part 2 Daily Order # 22 dated March 25, 1919 records that Fritz departed Bas-Oha, Belgium for England with the Commanding Officer’s groom 27783 Private Lawrence O’Keefe.
To-date no records have been uncovered with details of Fritz’s journey to Canada but the regimental history states that the horse and Bruno, the Battalion’s Belgian sheepdog mascot, were both reunited with Colonel Bent on his farm in the Annapolis Valley at Paradise, Nova Scotia.
Many wartime photographs exist of Bruno but it was not until 2011 that period images of Fritz were uncovered. That year the 15th Battalion Memorial Project Team was able to locate surviving members of Lt Col Bent’s family who still lived on the family farm in Paradise, Nova Scotia. From an old trunk in the home of his grandaughter Carol O’neill, emerged many items that had belonged to LtCol Bent. Among these treasures was the only known photograph of Fritz, the war horse of the 15th Battalion. It is a splendid photograph taken after the war in the farm’s apple orchards that shows LCol Bent astride Fritz with Bruno alongside. According to the recollections of Lt Col Bent’s son Donald, his father and Fritz were a common sight in the farming community riding through the family’s apple orchards with Bruno, the loyal and fierce guardian of the property, running alongside. In time when they died, Fritz and Bruno were buried side by side on the family farm.Subsequent archival research uncovered two more photographs of Fritz taken in Engelskirchen, Germany in 1919. From the battlefields of The Eastern and Western Fronts, the adopted Belgian sheep dog and the captured German war horse were finally at home in the peaceful Annapolis Valley of eastern Canada. Three wartime comrades home from the trenches.
In 2012, Lieutenant Colonel Bent, Bruno and Fritz were commemorated on the newly erected ‘Forgotten Heroes’ memorial in the Veteran’s Memorial Park in Bass River Nova Scotia. In 2017, they were featured in ‘A War Horse Comes to Nova Scotia; Stories of Veterans and Animals of WW1’ by author Dave Whitman.
From: Memorial Project
