National Composition of a CEF Battalion

[Terry]

I recently received a batch of CEF nominal rolls, and for one unit, the 107th Battalion, someone had taken the time to go through the roll and sort out the country of birth of all 1003 men.

The numbers were: 523 Canada; 257 England; 118 Scotland; 39 USA; 25 Ireland; 7 Iceland; 6 Norway; 6 Sweden; 4 Wales; 2 India; 2 France; 2 Rumania; 2 Africa; 1 British West Indies; 1 Newfoundland; 1 Belgium; 1 Poland; 1 Channel Islands; 1 New Zealand; 1 Straits Settlements; 1 Holland; 1 Bohemia; 1 Germany.

The 107th Battalion was raised in Winnipeg, Manitoba, in late 1915, and reached England on 25 Sept.,1916. It moved to France in January,1917, serving as a pioneer battalion.

It is well known that the composition of the first Canadian contingent in 1914 was overwhelmingly UK-born except for the officers; the numbers shown for the 107th perhaps reflect the changing percentages as the war went on, and also illustrates just how much Canada was, and is, a nation of immigrants.

[Bill Alexander]

Hello Terry, There is still approximately 48% to 52% non-Canadian born enlistments in this battalion. It would be an interesting project to get all of the nominal rolls for the infantry battalions and then calculate the rates. Further, I wonder what the ratios of enlistment were in non-infantry battalions? Would artillery, medical or service corps units have different ratios of enlistment?

As you indicated the number of migrants is astounding.

[jhill]

As a contribution to this, from the data I have abstracted from Attestation Papers, the numbers of British born men in various battalions is currently this:

9Bn 518 of 804 ( incomplete)

51Bn 1132 of 1711

66Bn 813 of 1551

151Bn 552 of 1281

202Bn 360 of 791

218Bn 263 of 866

233Bn 6 of 252

I was a bit surprised that the very early battalions like the 9th and 51st had as few British born men as they did, seeing as the accepted figure is that two thirds of the first contingent were brits. Since the Edmonton area was largely populated by newcomers from the old country I had expected the 9th battalion to be well above the national average.

[marc leroux]

To date there are approximatly 9,800 CEF soldiers in the CGWP database that have the 'country born' field identified. Of these, just over 45% were born in Canada.

You can see the data here.

marc