Surviving bombs, gunfire and high voltage, wartime dispatch rider celebrates 101st birthday in Caledonia
Running messages on a motorcycle in a war zone is not usually a good career choice for someone who wants to live to a ripe old age.
It's a highly dangerous road of artillery and mortar shells, gunfire, and booby traps. A lot of dispatch riders with the Royal Canadian Corps of Signals in the Second World War never made it home.
And after 10 months of surviving dangers with the 2nd Infantry Division after D-Day in the Second World War, you'd think Corp. Hugh Patterson would look for a safe line of employment as a civilian in Caledonia.
But no. As well as working as a part-time farmer, he made his living as an electrician for more than 40 years. He climbed a lot of hydro poles and fell off a few of them. One time a pole broke and it sent him flying.
And what is it that they say? Plumbers get wet when something goes wrong. Electricians get electrocuted. He's certainly taken a few shocks over the years. One time a circuit exploded, and it burned off his eyebrows, damaging his eyesight.
Yet somehow Patterson survived bombs, gunfire, falls and high voltage - not to mention raising a family of nine children with his wife Barbara (who died in 2005) - and is set to celebrate his 101st birthday on Friday (DEC. 30).
I guess I have good genes and a lot of luck," he says.
How about healthy living? Well, not exactly. He says he smoked until the age of 75. It was a habit he picked up during the war.
Patterson is among the last of the Greatest Generation. With surviving Second World War veterans now in their late 90s or over 100 years of age, we're close to a point when there will be no one left from the war. We need to reach out to listen to their stories while we still can.
The 31 Signal Regiment in Hamilton knows of no other surviving Second World War dispatch riders from this area besides Patterson.
The Royal Hamilton Light Infantry is aware of only three living Riley veterans from the war (two of whom came forward over the past year).
The Argyll and Sutherland Highlanders have two known WW II veterans. One of them - Pte. Tony Mastromatteo - attended November's Hamilton garrison parade of veterans and cadets that is held each year as part of Remembrance Week ceremonies.
DRs, as they were often called, were especially targeted by enemy forces because they carried important messages that were too sensitive to send by wireless or telephone transmissions. Shooting a messenger, or capturing one, could lead to sensitive information being divulged. Or at least an important communication could be disrupted.
Dispatch riders were told to burn their documents if they found themselves in danger. If captured they were to say only their name, rank and serial number. They wouldn't be able to talk about what they were carrying, because they were never told what was inside the sealed envelopes.
Patterson grew up on a farm in the Caledonia area and as a youngster developed an interest in building crystal radios. He was a big fan of Nikola Tesla. He read Popular Mechanics Magazine. He was fascinated by radio and he and a friend learned Morse code together," his daughter Theresa (Tess) Campbell says.
After the war broke out in 1939, he joined the Hamilton Signals, a reserve regiment that provides communication support and information systems for the Canadian Army. In June 1942 he went on to join the regular army to become a dispatch rider. As a teenager he had a motorcycle and was very comfortable riding one. After training in Orillia and Kingston he headed overseas in December 1942.
Prior to D-Day, he ran messages in England. He was transported to France, as part of a reinforcement contingency, a week after the D-Day invasion on June 6, 1944. From there, he travelled all over France, Belgium, Holland and Germany doing hundreds of message runs. The trips were done mostly by motorcycle, by himself, but at times a jeep was used.
Dispatch riders had to have good intuition and a sense of survival," says Tess, who is working on a book about her dad's life. They had to get the message through no matter what. It could have been mail or a top-secret document. It was put in your bag, and you didn't know."
Hugh says he worked behind the battlefront but there was always mortar fire and shell fire." When the explosions got too close, I took evasive action. I'd try to find cover, or I'd get off my motorcycle and get behind it."
He managed to avoid being hit. But in October 1944, he had a serious accident with his motorcycle. He tore up his legs and dislocated his shoulder. He received medical attention but refused to go to hospital. He put his shoulder back in place himself and after a few days he hobbled out on the road to hitchhike to his unit in Brussels. Within a short time, he was back to work doing a dispatch run to France. He managed the clutch and accelerator by lifting and lowering his still-injured legs with his hands.
Tess says her dad - who became legally blind in recent years - always made a special effort to attend veterans' events to pay his respects to fellow soldiers who paid the supreme sacrifice. He travelled to Europe for the 25th, 30th, 40th, 50th, 60th, 70th and 75th commemorations of D-Day.
And yet, Tess says, In all my years growing up he never bragged about going to war. He never told stories about it. Only if you asked him would he tell you some little thing ... It took decades for him to open up and share."
A celebration for his 100th birthday last December was put off for six months because of COVID. A party for about 100 people was held in July at the Caledonia Legion.
For his 101st birthday this year, a more modest gathering of family and close friends is planned at Tess's home. It will be small gathering for someone who lived a big life.
Final bell for city centre
The Hamilton City Centre on James Street North will close its doors for good on Saturday (Dec. 31) and the big bell on the clock tower will ring a little earlier than previously planned to commemorate the occasion.
The bell, that was the subject of a Dec. 13 Flashbacks column, had been silenced for many years because of complaints from neighbours. But mall managers wanted to clang it one more time. The original idea was at midnight on New Year's Eve. But now it's been decided that sounding the bell at the closing time of 5 p.m. to coincide with the closing.
Owners of the property plan to demolish the mall and build a four-tower condominium project in its place. The clock and bell will be removed and placed in storage with plans to install the historic components in a new, smaller clock tower that will be part of the multi-year condominium project. The clock and bell were originally part of Hamilton's City Hall on James Street that stood from 1890-1961 before the components were repurposed as part of the Hamilton Eaton Centre in 1990 that eventually became the City Centre.