George Leslie Scherer joined the 48th Highlanders in Toronto in January 1916. He first saw action at Vimy Ridge then at Hill 70, where he was awarded the Military Medal for staying in the fight after he was told to go back to the dressing station after being wounded in the hand. He received the bar to the Military Medal for leading his Lewis gun section across open ground under machine gun fire during the Amiens Battle, August 8th and 9th 1918. Soon after, Scherer was wounded in the shoulder at Crow’s Nest and Drocourt-Quéant Line. He was taken out of action to recover in England until the war ended.
After the war, Scherer returned to Ridgetown, Ontario, married, and had two daughters. He worked at the New York Central Railway as a young man and later was appointed rail agent in Muirkirk, Ontario. He died of a heart attack at the age of fifty-six.
Do you have an ancestor who served in the Great War? Submit their story and it could be included on this Great War Album website.