Tom Longboat had a lot to lose when he joined the army in 1916.
An Onondaga from the Six Nations Grand River Reserve in Ontario, Longboat was a world champion long-distance runner. In 1907 he won the Boston Marathon in record time, and two years later triumphed in the world professional marathon championships at Madison Square Garden in New York City.
His athletic career was thriving. Nonetheless at the age of 29 he set it all aside and went to fight in the chaos that was Europe during the First World War.
Longboat was just one of the estimated 15,000 Aboriginals, including Inuit and Métis, who served in the Boer War of 1899, the First and Second World Wars, and the Korean War. Of these, more than 500 lost their lives.
In both world wars, Canadian aboriginal soldiers were part of every major land battle and campaign, and earned many medals and decorations. Some excelled as snipers and reconnaissance scouts, drawing upon their traditional hunting and warrior skills.
Tom Longboat was able to put his prowess as a runner to good use—he became a dispatch carrier with the 107th Pioneer Battalion in France, running messages and orders between units.
Most aboriginal recruits served in the army because Canada’s navy and air force had race restrictions. Although natives were not obliged to join the armed forces, enthusiasm was such that some reserves became almost depleted of young men.Many of them struggled afterwards because they weren't prepared to go back to that same subservient role that was expected of them at that time and I think it was a difficult homecoming.” — Scott Sheffield
As with non-aboriginals, the reasons natives so eagerly joined up were many and varied. But for some communities it may have been a “culturally driven thing,” says Scott Sheffield, a historian at the University of the Fraser Valley in British Columbia.
“Some of the Plains First Nations had strong warrior traditions and those had become impossible to sustain with the onset of the reserve era in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Many hundreds of Plains First Nations men were able to enlist and serve in the First World War and maybe recapture or sustain some of those warrior traditions.”
There’s also no doubt, Sheffield says, that some Aboriginals—living at the time in a society where racial prejudice was very real in their daily existence—enlisted out of a desire to prove themselves.
A member of Manitoba's Brokenhead Ojibway Nation, Prince was one of Canada's most decorated soldiers. A hero of both the Second World War and the Korean War, he was one of the few non-Americans ever awarded the Silver Star, an American decoration for gallantry in action.
One of Prince’s legendary feats of bravery occurred in the summer of 1944 when he walked across miles of mountainous terrain deep behind German lines in southern France to locate an enemy camp, going days without food or water. He reported back and led his brigade to the encampment, which resulted in the capture of more than 1,000 German soldiers.
But Prince returned from Europe to a country where Aboriginals were not deemed citizens and didn’t have the right to vote. To add insult to injury, aboriginal veterans had to fight another kind of war when they got home in order to receive the same benefits and assistance as white veterans were given.
Coming home was also problematic for many because they had been treated as equals while in the army—they were accepted and respected. And while training in England aboriginal soldiers could go to a pub and have a beer with their comrades, something they couldn't do in Canada where status Indians were banned from any place that served alcohol.
In addition, life back on the reserve was controlled in large part by Indian agents, many of whom ruled with an iron fist, says Sheffield.
“A lot of veterans didn't want to take that any more. Many of them struggled afterwards because they weren't prepared to go back to that same subservient role that was expected of them at that time and I think it was a difficult homecoming.”
This may explain why, after the start of the Korean War, many Aboriginals who had fought in Europe re-enlisted.
“When Korea broke out, the first contingent that was recruited to go overseas in 1950 had a large number of Indian soldiers,” says Sheffield, who is conducting a study on the comparative wartime and post-war experiences of the indigenous peoples of Canada, the United States, Australia, and New Zealand.
Aboriginal women also contributed during WW II as nurses tending the sick and wounded soldiers. They also helped raise funds to provide medical supplies and comforts for the troops, and served in non-combatant roles in the women’s branches of the forces.
Tommy Prince did two tours of duty in Korea. By the time the war ended, he walked with a noticeable limp from a previous knee injury and was discharged from the army with a disability pension. Sadly, he descended into alcoholism and poverty and died, anonymous and virtually alone, in 1977 at the age of 62.
As for Tom Longboat, he was wounded twice during his time of service and was once ‘missing declared dead,’ but he survived the war and returned to Canada. He died in 1949, also at the age of 62. He is a member of the Canadian Sports Hall of Fame and the Indian Hall of Fame.
