Letters to Vimy

Th is story represents the exchange of wartime letters across a century of time and across the Atlantic Ocean between France and Canada. More than a hundred years ago a German shell dropped on Pte. Oscar French on Vimy Ridge in 1917 and ended his adventures in the First World War. A century later his nephew, historian and author Orland French, replies to Oscar's real letters home to his mother and tells him, in his own sardonic style, how the world turned out after the horrific War to End All Wars. Letters to Vimy is an excellent and highly entertaining personal guide to the birth and growth of Canadian nationalism out of that victory at Vimy. Sources abounded for this project, including a memorable conversation with a group of elderly German tourists on the steps of the Vimy Monument.