By DAVE KOSONIC
My grandfather Robert McConkey went from the peaceful village of Priceville, Ontario, to the deadly battlefields of Europe in 1915 as a member of the Canadian Army during WW1 when he was 27 years old.
Fortunately he returned to Canada alive at the war’s end and his story has been passed down through the decades by our family.
My grandfather was known as Robbie by his fellow soldiers. His medals and a piece of shrapnel is all that’s left of him (in photo).
He was wounded during the Battle of the Somme when he lost almost the entire use of his right arm and shoulder when he was hit by German shrapnel. He endured 16 surgeries during the following years at Christie Street Hospital in Toronto.
His wife, Anna, stayed at his bedside each time as he recovered. Medical imaging was very basic in those days so the doctors conducted exploratory surgery while attempting to detect and remove more shrapnel.
I have the final shrapnel fragment that was removed from my grandfather and I look at it as a symbol of the horrors of war and the pain and suffering that so many Canadian soldiers endured.
My uncle Jack McConkey, who recently passed away at the age of 93, had recorded his father’s WW1 experiences and often shared them with me. Apparently after grandfather was shot he laid on the muddy battlefield for about 24 hours before some his fellow soldiers could recover him due to enemy fire and the immense number of casualties.
Despite his wounds my grandfather remained conscious and he told Jack that he overheard an Army nurse discuss where they planned to bury him the next day because they thought he was near death. Apparently that conversation motived grandfather to keep fighting for his life.
I read a letter sent to my grandfather by one of his fellow soldiers a few years after WW1 ended. This man had seen grandfather after he was wounded and he was certain that he was going to lose his arm or die. This former soldier found out that Robbie had returned home to Canada alive and with his arm intact and he congratulated him for being alive.
I was my grandfather’s first grandchild and I was only in his presence a few times when I was about two years old before he died. For some reason I made strange to him and decided that I didn’t like him which apparently upset him greatly. I have always felt bad about that.
Grandfather McConkey operated the post office in Priceville after he returned home and also had a small general store in the same facility. He died of a heart attack at age 63 and the doctors suspected that his heart had likely been damaged by many infections caused by the shrapnel.
He, like the many of his colleagues who never made it home, are heroes in my eyes and that of our family. RIP Grandpa.
