A Fine Collection of Awards to the Canadian Forces

Family group:

Five: Gunner B. E. D. Kerr, No. 2 Forward Observer Unit (Airborne), Royal Canadian Artillery, who was killed in action in North-West Europe in April 1945

1939-45 Star; France and Germany Star; Defence Medal 1939-45, silver; Canadian Voluntary Service Medal 1939-45, with overseas clasp; War Medal 1939-45, silver, together with the recipient’s Canadian Memorial Cross, G.VI.R., the reverse officially engraved ‘K. 91714 Gnr. B. E. D. Kerr’, with related forwarding card, extremely fine

Three: Hon. Captain & Quarter Master D. Kerr, Canadian Labour Battalion, late South African Constabulary and Canadian Militia, and 94th (New Ontario) Battalion, Canadian Infantry

Queen’s South Africa 1899-1902, 1 clasp, Transvaal (382 Tpr. D. Kerr, S.A.C.); British War and Victory Medals (Hon. Capt. Q.M. D. Kerr), minor edge bruise to first, otherwise good very fine

Three: Staff Nurse C. D. Kerr, Queen Alexandra’s Imperial Military Nursing Staff Reserve

1914-15 Star, erased naming; British War and Victory Medals (S. Nurse C. Douglas Kerr), good very fine (12) £300-350

This lot was sold as part of a special collection, A Fine Collection of Awards to the Canadian Forces.

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Bruce Earle Douglas Kerr was born in Ontario on 29 October 1922, the son of Douglas and Christine Kerr, and was a Fisherman and Logger by trade. Enlisting in the Canadian Army at Vancouver in February 1943, he was embarked for England, where he was attached to No. 2 Forward Observer Unit, Royal Canadian Artillery, a component of 6th Airborne Division, as a Gunner (Surveyor Parachutist).

Having qualified as a parachutist at Ringway, Kerr was landed in Belgium in December 1944, and subsequently participated in the Rhine Crossing. Tragically, however, he was killed in action in Holland on 6 April 1945, in circumstances subsequently described by Captain S. A. Mooney, M.C., in a letter to his parents, from which the following extract has been taken:

‘Your son, Bruce, whom I knew as a good soldier and a fine companion, was killed in action on 6 April 1945, whilst carrying out his duties, with the 100% effort he always gave. It was whilst on a reconnaissance for a better observation post that he was killed.

Our own infantry patrol had reported the enemy withdrawal from several groups of buildings which we had shelled continuously for three days. The Commanding Officer of the 53 (W.Y.) Light Air-Landing Regiment, R.A., came to the observation post which we were occupying, and we decided to reconnoitre the buildings as suitable forward posts, for deeper and better observation.
When we approached the latter group of buildings, I heard German voices from one of the buildings and in the rear of the yard beyond. I ordered Gunner MacKenzie to cover the rear of the yard from the corner of the house and ordered Bruce, who was still at the vehicle 10 yards distant to take cover immediately which he did, behind the vehicle. MacKenzie opened fire on a group of Germans he saw in the yard, and myself and the Colonel, fired into the windows of the house. Bruce, also opened fire with his rifle on the windows of a shed attached to the house. I continued firing and made my way to a position where I could also shoot into the shed, and at about the same time, a machine-gun opened up at point blank range. My position was at the corner of the house, 15 yards in front of Bruce, who was at the jeeps. The Colonel's driver was killed by the first burst, and when your son moved to get a better vantage, he was also hit. I heard him cry out, and drop his rifle, and knew he was hit several more times as the machine-gun continued to fire.

Colonel Eden MacKenzie and myself then jumped into a room through a window which we knocked in. We remained in the house for about eight hours until dark to make good our escape. During seven of these hours the house turned, having been fired by the Germans but, by the goodness of God, the room in which we were hidden remained tenable until we left.

I have been able to think a lot of the job done by your son, and his action in opening fire as he did, secured our left flank; and undoubtedly contributed greatly in preventing the enemy from coming at us, around the corner of the house from that flank.

Bruce was buried the following day by the Padre of the 2nd Battalion, Oxfordshire and Buckinghamshire L.I., when that battalion occupied that area.’

This account of Kerr’s heroic final action, and others received by his parents, was sufficient for his father to make a direct application to the Prime Minister, the Rt. Hon. MacKenzie King, to see if any posthumous recognition might be accorded his son - an unsuccessful application following extensive research carried out on the part of the authorities.

Bruce Kerr was buried where he fell, but subsequently re-interred in the Canadian Cemetery at Holten, Holland; sold with extensive research, including much official correspondence.

Douglas Kerr was born in Edinburgh, Scotland, on 28 November 1879, and served for five years as a Private in a Volunteer Battalion of the Royal Scots prior to earning the above described Medal & clasp for his services as a Trooper in ‘B’ Division of the South African Constabulary in the Boer War (TNA WO 100/271 refers) - accompanying research also suggests additional entitlement to the ‘Cape Colony’ and ‘South Africa 1901’ clasps.

An Accountant and Trustee by profession, he enlisted in the Canadian Overseas Expeditionary Force at Port Arthur in December 1915, and was commissioned in the 94th Battalion, Canadian Infantry, in the same month.

Embarked for England, he was subsequently attached to the Canadian Ordnance Corps, but went out to France in January 1917 as a Captain in the 1st Canadian Labour Corps, and served in that capacity until September of the same year, when he was evacuated with shell shock after being blown up and rendered unconscious by a 5.9 inch shell and then, a few days later, being wounded in the leg after another shell exploded nearby him at Breton.

Discharged as an Hon. Captain back in Canada at the end of 1917, Kerr was persuaded to take up appointment as a Commissioner of the Special Dominion Police in Ottawa early in 1918, but clearly the ill-effects of his time in France were yet past, and he suffered several break downs. He died in Vancouver, B.C., in February 1964; sold with copied service papers.

Christine Douglas Kerr (nee Dale), the wife of Douglas Kerr, entered the Egypt theatre of war as a Staff Nurse in Queen Alexandra’s Imperial Military Nursing Staff Reserve in July 1915, and was later advanced to Sister.