Batteries part of area’s military history

In the early 1920s, First War veteran Major Glidden Campbell of Weymouth was credited with organizing the 52nd Field Battery of the Royal Canadian Artillery in the village with the purpose of local training and as well participation in annual artillery practice camps at Camp Petawawa, Ont.

Local men from the Weymouth area made up the 52nd with a few members from the French Shore and Barton area.

First War veteran Henry Burton of Burtonvale (Weymouth Mills) was one of the first men to join the 52nd at the start and remained with the battery until he re-enlisted at the onset of war in September, 1939.

The government bought Bub Hankinson’s old livery stable behind G.D. Campbell’s general store on the north side of the village and it was turned into an armory.

First War veteran Clare Ruggles took care of the armory that was equipped with four 18-pounder guns. Members of the 52nd met at the armory once a week to train and practice.

Weymouth resident Cliff Campbell said the guns were rigged to fire a 22-calibre shell at targets set up in a sand pit inside the armory.

Campbell was 21 when he signed up in 1932 for a three-year term with the 52nd. Although he started his own trucking business hauling lumber in 1936, Campbell remained a member of the Battery until 1939. “It was the Depression when I joined,” Campbell recalled in an interview. “Work was scarce and this was a chance to make a couple of dollars.”

During his time with the field battery, Campbell trained in Kingston, Ont., and earned his stripes as gun sergeant. “While we were in Petawawa, the basic pay for a private was $1.20 a day with a 10 cent increase for every stripe you earned.”

Field batteries from around the province traveled to Petawawa each summer for the annual training. “Everyone looked forward to the Petawawa trip. It was the only vacation you got.”

Campbell said the 84th from Yarmouth and the 52nd would go across on the boat to Saint John and meet up with the 87th and 88th batteries and travel to Petawawa by train.

In Petawawa, the four field batteries were combined as the 14th Nova Scotia Field Brigade.

Once at the Ontario base, the men were assigned living quarters that consisted of a canvas tent on a wooden platform. “Each morning you had to roll up your blanket, bed roll—which was a straw mattress—and the rest of your equipment,” said Campbell. “It all had to be neatly bundled outside the tent for inspection. “If your bundle didn’t pass inspection, you would catch it from the officer. Things were strict in the army and it would make you or break you,” he explained.

At the gun park the men trained to lay and fire the 18-pound guns. Each man had a job to do and as the gun sergeant Campbell was responsible for the entire service of the gun. “It wasn’t all work,” he said. “One year the whole Weymouth ball team was there and we challenged the other batteries.”

Along with sports events there were gunners’ competitions, ceremonial parades and inspections. And in 1939, the Weymouth battery won the Oland Cup for first place in general efficiency of Nova Scotia batteries.

When war broke out in 1939, members of the 52nd were assigned guard duty at the Yarmouth airport.

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