[written by Donald Campbell MacKechnie]

As Christmas 1944 approached, the war was drawing to a close,
not only in Europe and the South Pacific,
but also on the chill, storm-tossed reaches of the North Atlantic.


For over a year, I and my fellow Canadian crewmen aboard HMCS GROU
had been prowling the bleak, lonely sea lanes
from the Bay of Biscay to Vaenga Bay,
along with other ships of Escort Group Number 6.


Now, as the great day neared, it began to be certain we'd be spending it at sea ---
something nobody wanted.
For a fleeting moment we thought we'd gotten a reprieve,
being sent to Milford Haven on Christmas Eve.
Any elation was short-lived, as we quickly oiled ship and put out to sea again,
everyone dejected and with upper deck watches
muffled like pandas against the biting wind,
and the damp, cold snow.


Then, word filtered down from the bridge and spread quickly through the crew ---
we'd be out for New Year's Eve as well!


Still later, Captain Howard Dupont (RCNR), spread the word that
he wasn't any happier about things than we were.
And, come hell or high water, when we did get in,
we'd have a combined New Year's Eve and Christmas Party we'd not soon forget.


Nor have I forgotten that celebration, late though it was,
in now-troubled Londonderry, Northern Ireland,
where we finally docked on the 4th of January 1945.


We tied up alongside another ship from our own Escort Group and,
wonder of wonders, found several huge bags of mail awaiting us.
In one of those bags was a parcel
that turned the entired celebration Captain Dupont had promised us
into the most memorable Christmas of my life!

One of the Coders, a brash and youthful type from Central British Columbia, had received a real, genuine, dyed-in-the-wool, grown-in-BC, diminutive, less than two-foot high, fir Christmas tree! Completely decorated yet!!

Small, but bushy, with carefully, lovingly packed tinsel garlands
and fragile bulbs in red, green and blue,
together with red and green paper ropes and gently shimmering silver foil icicles ---
the tree was regarded with everything from awed reverance to raucous ridicule.


But, carefully mounted on a forward mess-deck table
by the cautious ship's carpenter, Jack Holmes,
the tiny, gleaming symbol of HOME had the place of honour
during the Christmas dinner that followed our daily tot of rum.


Cooks who had spent weeks fighting the pitch and roll of a ship at sea
to turn out three reasonably decent meals a day,
now used tender, loving care to produce a meal
worthy of the Captain's combination seasonal celebration.
It was all there ~
--- the turkey, the dressing, the cranberry sauce, the pudding ---
plus two bottles of beer for every man aboard,
courtesy of the ship's officers!


Later, after the beer was gone,
and the only remnants of the meal were audibly contented sighs,
various crew members began craftily digging into personal lockers and ditty bags,
and presently, long-concealed hoards of a variety of happy water appeared.
Conviviality reigned supreme, where the young Coder's tree stood firm,
representing Christmases past, present and future.


One by one, in pairs, crew members from other mess-decks came,
diffidently, casually,
to see the real, genuine Canadian Christmas tree.
The younger ones came first, then the older men, and those with families,
and finally, the hard cases;
those who had joked crudely about the tiny tree only a few hours earlier.
Many stayed, talking quietly, comparing notes from home,
with faraway looks in their eyes and
still-to-be-realized dreams in their silent glances
at the small, brave, gaudy tree.


I don't remember who started to sing.
It doesn't matter.
Someone, almost certainly influenced by both the rum and the tree, began it softly . . .
"I'll be Home for Christmas".
The final words of the song came out in silent accord as men sang
" . . . in nineteen forty-five", rather than " . . . if only in my dreams".


As someone started the next song,
still another remarked that the ship tied up alongside owned a piano.
It took a moment to sink in.
Even then it wasn't a concerted rush ---
more of a purposeful adjournment to see what might be done.
In the next quarter hour,
minor miracles of engineering and physical prowess were wrought
and shortly, a growing band of rum-fuelled carollers surrounded the 'borrowed' piano!


As afternoon edged into evening and voices swelled,
several crewmen tried their talents at the piano.
Eventually, by acclamation, a tall, ruggedly burly Stoker,
Danny Greenfield, had it all to himself.
He played beautifully!
Tenderly caressing the keys on the soft notes of "Silent Night"
and joyfullly leading us through "Hark the Herald Angels Sing" . . .
and what seemed like a hundred others.



We were a strange gathering of men when we joined GROU, yes.
And a well-knit, competent crew, most of whom had been aboard for over a year.
But on this one day, we were a family.
And I'm sure it was all because of a few strands of gaudy paper
and some tiny, gleaming bulbs, and glinting strips of foil,
decorating a tiny BC fir tree.


They added up to something dear,
something from home,
something so carefully decorated, so gently and lovingly packed,
that it survived 7,000 miles of Navy-rough-handling ---
and made us, for one special Christmas, a family.


The young Coder's aunt,
a tiny, white-haired lady who was just turning 70, long widowed,
almost totally blind since an accident in her teens,
had put lots of love into a Christmas gift for her brother's only son.


That gift made my Christmas Day --- January 4th, 1945 ---
an occasion I don't think any of us aboard HMCS GROU will ever forget.


I was that young, and fortunate Coder.
Mrs Annie Campbell, my aunt, died May 6 1959 in Kamloops BC, at the age of 83.
I remember that wonderful Christmas so well !

This remembrance was written by my father and with his permission, I share it with you !

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