All Herbert Rogers wanted to do serve his country. But the Canadian army didn’t want him. Deemed too old at 48, the medical doctor was rejected when he attempted to enlist in 1914. Undeterred, he travelled all the way to London, England, to petition for a right to join the fight.

It worked. In September 1915 he was finally commissioned as a lieutenant in the Royal Canadian Army Medical Corps.

Born in Peterborough, Ontario, Rogers attended McGill University’s medical school, graduating in 1898. Prior to the war, he practiced in British Columbia, at Chemainus and Victoria. He served in France until 1917, when a severe illness forced his return to Canada. In March 1918, he married nursing captain Edith Jane Stewart of Montreal, a member of the RCAMC, had served with Rogers in France.

The couple moved back to Victoria, where Roberts became Resident Medical Officer of the Royal Jubilee Hospital. In 1923, the couple moved to returned to Chemainus, where Rogers took on the role of Medical Superintendent of the newly enlarged hospital. During this period, he developed his own x-rays and made his own prescription drugs. Rogers retired in 1936 and returned to Victoria. He died ten years later at the age of 80 years. Edith died in England in 1975 at the age of 93 years. Both were laid to rest in Ross Bay Cemetery in Victoria. Their only son Henry Stuart Rogers saw action during the Second World War.

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