Victory Square, Vancouver, British Columbia The war
memorial in Vancouver is a gray granite obelisk,
thirty feet high, at the foot of a gentle slope
in a small park, Victory Square, on nine-tenths of
an acre of green lawn, with ornamental trees and
flower beds. Victory Square is bounded by
Hastings Street, a busy principal thoroughfare,
Cambie, Pender and Hamilton streets and, due to
its central location and keystone shape, has been
styled the keystone of Vancouver, now, 1944, a
metropolis ten miles wide by five deep, of
400,000 people. The Cenotaph was erected by
public subscription in 1924, is of Nelson Island
granite engraved with suitable inscriptions, and
is kept continuously banked high with wreaths of
flowers and adorned with national flags.
The monument has three, not four, sides; one
side faces Hastings Street, the others Pender and
Hamilton Streets, and was designed thus by Major
G.L. Thornton Sharp, architect, town planner, and
park commissioner, to conform to the triangular
shape of the park. It is so placed that, when
approached from the east, it appears in the
distance centrally at the end of busy Hastings
Street. The granite was supplied by the Vancouver
Granite Co., Ltd., and the erecting contractors
were Messrs. Stewart and Wylie; Mr. Stewart died
from the effects of an accident whilst preparing
the memorial. The Vancouver War Memorial
Committee of twenty-four, of which twelve
represented the Canadian Club of Vancouver, and
twelve the Civic War Memorial Committee, the
whole under the chairmanship of F.W. Rounsefell,
Esq., pioneer, and with J.R.V. Dunlop, Esq., of
the Canadian Club, as honorary secretary, were
the public-spirited sponsors. The Cenotaph cost
$10,666.000.
The engraved inscriptions are:
Facing Hastings Street: "Their name
liveth for evermore" and, within a stone
wreath, "1914-1918."
Facing Hamilton Street: "Is it nothing to
you."
Facing Pender Street: "All ye that pass
by."
The first, commencing "Their name",
is from Ecclesiasticus, 44th chapter, 14th verse,
and, the second, commencing "Is it
nothing", from Lamentations, chapter 1,
verse 12. The word, "cenotaph" is
derived from the Greek, "kenos", empty,
and "taphos", a tomb, and means a tomb
in memory of one buried elsewhere, i.e., an empty
tomb.
The ornamentations on the stone include one
long sword and two wreaths, one of laurels, the
other of poppies; both entwined with maple
leaves. A stone replica of the steel helmet, as
used in the war of 1914-1918, adorns three corner
buttresses. A larger wreath of laurels surrounds
the numerals "1914-1918" at the base of
the front. Slots in a receptacle of three bronze
maple leaves hold the staffs of the Union Jack,
the White and Canadian Ensigns, always flying,
which are placed there by the Canadian Legion,
British Empire Service League, and renewed four
times each year.
The Cenotaph was unveiled by His Worship W.R.
Owen, Mayor of Vancouver, in the presence of an
assemblage of 25,000 persons, naval, military and
civilian, and including the Old Contemptibles,
7th British Columbia, 29th Vancouver, 72nd
Seaforts, 2nd Canadian Mounted Rifles, 47th New
Westminster, and 102nd North British Columbian
Battalions, C.E.F., and others, on Sunday, 27th
April, 1924. It was dedicated by Hon. Major the
Rev. Cecil C. Owen, M.B.E., V.D., D.D., chaplain
of the 29th (Vancouver) Battalion, C.E.F.,
"To the Glory of God, and
in thankful remembrance
of those who served their King and Country
overseas
in the cause of truth, righteousness and
freedom."
The 24th Psalm was read by Hon. Lt.-Col. the
Rev. G.O. Fallis, C.B.E., E.D., D.D., of the
Methodist Church, and the music included "O
Canada" (Buchan); "O God, Our Help in
Ages Past"; "Lochaber No More"
(bagpipes); "For All the Saints";
"Last Post" and "God Save the
King". The first wreath, being the tribute
of the Corporation and Citizens of Vancouver, was
reverently placed by Mrs. W.R. Owen, wife of His
Worship the Mayor.
In his valedictory address, Major the Rev. Mr.
Owen said:
"Those whose sacrifices this Cenotaph
commemorates, were among the men who, at call of
King and Country, left all that was dear, endured
hardship, faced danger, and finally passed out of
the sight of men by the path of duty, giving
their own lives that others might live in
freedom. Let those who come after see to it that
their names be not forgotten."
J.S. Matthews,
City Archives,
City Hall, Vancouver, 1944.
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