Private George Lawrence Price



Private George Lawrence Price, Last Man Killed in WWI

#256265, 28 Battalion, KIA 10:57, 11 November 1918

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Private Price was born on December 15th 1892 in Kings County, Nova Scotia. As a young man he moved to Moose Jaw, Saskatchewan. He enlisted in the 210th Infantry Battalion (Frontiersmen), Canadian Expeditionary Force (C.E.F.) in Moose Jaw on 15 October 1917 and was enrolled with the 1st Saskatchewan Depot Battalion on 4 December 1917. Subsequently he was transferred to the 15th Canadian Reserve Battalion, 6 February 1918, and then transferred to the 28th Canadian Infantry Battalion, 1 May 1918.

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The 28th Battalion was raised in Saskatchewan and Ontario with mobilization headquarters at Winnipeg, Manitoba, under the authority of G.O. 36, 15th March 1915. The Battalion sailed on 29th May, 1915, under command of Lieutenant Colonel J.F.L. Embury, with a strength of 36 Officers and 1,078 other ranks. The Battalion served in France and Belgium with the 6th Infantry Brigade, 2nd Canadian Division. It was disbanded 15th September 1920 and is perpetuated by the Royal Regina Rifle Regiment.[1]

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15th Canadian Reserve Battalion – Bramshott, England[2]

Private Price completed basic training in Regina and was then posted overseas He embarked from St. Johns, 21st January 1918, on the H.M. Soctian and arrived in Liverpool on 6th February 1918. He was taken on strength at the 15th Canadian Reserve Battalion, Bramshott, 6th February 1918 and subsequently transferred to the 28th Battalion. He arrived in Etaples, France, 2nd May 1918 and eventually arrived at the unit on 1st June 1918.

On 8th September 1918 Private Price was “Gassed” in the Canal-Du-Nord area and sent to the 1st Canadian Casualty Collection Station for treatment and subsequently to the 26th General Hospital in Etaples, France. He was discharged and returned to his unit on 26th September 1918.

Private Price was to be the last battle fatality of World War I. In these last few minutes of the war, at 10:50, just after the 28th had reached the line of the Canal du Centre, Private George L. Price of A Company was shot by a German sniper while carrying out a reconnaissance on the far side of the Canal du Centre. Price, Private Art Goodmurphy, and two others from A Company had crossed the canal and entered the small village of Ville-sur-Haine on the other side to search the house from which a German machine gun had been firing just moments before. The small party of Canadians rushed the house and found the only occupants to be the owner and his family, the Germans having scuttled out the back door just before the Canadians entered the front. The Canadians moved on to the next house where they again found no Germans. As Price and Goodmurphy stepped back into the street, a single shot rang out hitting Price in the chest. Price slumped into Goodmurphy's arms. After he had been dragged back into the house, Price was attended to by the occupants, the Lenoir’s, and a young Belgian girl, Alice Grotte, a neighbour, who seeing him fall, had risked her life to cross the street to come to his aid. Their help was to no avail, and Price died at 10:58 a.m., just two minutes before the “CEASE FIRE”. He was the last Allied fatality of World War I.

As the final moments of the war ticked by, a few desultory bursts of machine gun fire could be heard, and a salvo of shells fell harmlessly near St. Symphorien as the German gunners cleared their guns for the last time. Then there was silence over the whole front. Hostilities had ended and, for the 28th Battalion, the fighting was finally over. Back home in Regina, 8,000 people turned out for a victory celebration in Wascana Park.[3]

On November 12, the Battalion was billeted in the village of Havre, Belgium, with outposts along the Canal du Centre. After the area had been completely cleared of Germans, outpost lines of resistance were replaced by examining posts established at each bridgehead or road crossing the canal. On 14th November 1918, Lieutenants A.N. Severin and R.G. Doorbar took a contingent of 60 other ranks to Mons to represent the Battalion at a review for the Belgian King, and on November 16, the 27th Battalion relieved the 28th from its examining post duties. A unit parade was held and the battalion inspected by Major Simpson. Later, some of the officers went to Mons to attend an evening concert, which had been arranged by the civil authorities of that city. Amid the peace and quiet the normal routine in billets continued until mid November. The troops soaked in baths, were deloused, cleaned clothing, and replaced deficiencies in their equipment. Small box respirators, all gas equipment, and steel helmets were joyously turned in to battalion stores to be sent back to corps headquarters for disposal.

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British War Medal, Victory Medal

Private Price was buried at the St. Symphorien Military Cemetary, Belgium, Plot 4 Row C, Grave 4, 2 Km east of Mons. He was posthumously awarded the British War Medal and the Victory Medal. In an ironic twist of fate he is buried not far from the 1st soldier killed in WWI, Private John Parr, 4th Battalion Middlesex Regiment, 21st August 1914. The history centre “Leon Mabille” at Le Roeulx along with the city of Le Roeulx has erected the “Price” bridge at the place where he fell at Ville-sur-Haine. A plaque dedicated to his memory was unveiled on the 50th anniversary of his death, 1968, by the few remaining survivors of the 28th North West Battalion. It is a small plaque situated on the wall of a house just a stone’s through away from where he fell.

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[1] W.K. Ross, First World War Canadian Infantry Badges (Toronto, The Charlton Press, 1991)

[2] Photo Courtesy - G. F. Goddard Collection.

[3] Stewart A.G. Mein – Up The Johns (Published by – the Senate of the Royal Regina Rifles)

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