A message of unity, pride, and remembrance during the Remembrance Day ceremony at the Windsor Cenotaph in downtown Windsor.
Hundreds of people gathered for the ceremony Wednesday morning to pay tribute to all those who are serving or have served in the various branches of the Canadian military in conflicts and wars around the world and those who lost their lives doing their duty.
The speakers included Corporal Jerry Bicigieul, a 94-year-old Korean War veteran, who fought and survived the Battle of Hill 187 in May of 1953, one of the last major battles Canadian forces took part in before the Korean Armistice Agreement. The battle claimed the lives of over 30 Canadians, with dozens more wounded, missing, or captured.
Bicigieul told the ceremony that he was on duty in an observation post when the attack began and saw an artillery shell hit his bunker.
“When I walked through the door, it was nighttime and dark. I didn’t have my flashlight, so I lit a match. What I saw, I don’t get graphic about any of it. They never knew what hit them,” he said.
Bicigieul still goes to speak in schools about his experience and tries to deliver a message to our young people.
“My message to them is that our future and the future of our country are upon them for Canada,” he said.
Silver Cross mother Theresa Charbonneau, whose son Corporal Andrew Grenon was killed on September 3, 2008, in Afghanistan while serving as a member of the 2nd Battalion, Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry, also spoke at the ceremony.
Charbonneau said that we are Canada, and we are proud to be Canada.
“Our veterans gave us the right to say that, and we need to honour them by saying it loud and clear,” she said.
Charbonneau also told the crowd that we have every hope and confidence that people in this country will live a life that our veterans gave their lives for.
“We who feel very strongly about it need to constantly remind people that this is who we are and this is who we are going to stay, and we’re proud to be here,” she said.
This year is also the 25th anniversary of the start of the Afghanistan war, in which 40,000 Canadians served. Veterans Affairs Canada says 158 Canadian Armed Forces members and seven Canadian civilians—a diplomat, four aid workers, a government contractor, and a journalist—lost their lives while in Afghanistan.