Louis Boyer of Stonewall, Manitoba, enlisted on March 18, 1916, and served as a sapper at Ypres, Vimy, and Passchendaele. He was honourably discharged in May 1919 in Winnipeg, Manitoba. At the time, Aboriginal people were banned from legions and Boyer was Metis. However, he eventually worked as a bartender at a legion in Stonewall.
His kids would ask him why his nose was crooked and his answer was that “A bullet bounced off his nose and killed the man standing beside him.” Not all of his kids believed that story, though. He also told his family that his feet were never dry in the trenches and that he carried a cross around in the trenches and that it saved his life.
He served as a guard at German prisoner of war campus in British Columbia during the Second World War. Two of his sons also served during the Second World War and one was a prisoner in a German camp. They all returned home safely.
He died in 1974.
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.