The Story of John McCrae

On November 30, 1872, John McCrae, Canadian soldier and poet, was born in Guelph, Ontario, son of Lieutenant David McCrae and his wife, Janet Simpson McCrae. He was a man of high principles and strong spiritual values. He has been described as warm and sensitive with a remarkable compassion for both people and animals.

John McCrae began writing poetry while a student at the Guelph Collegiate. He joined the Highfield Cadets at 14 and at 17 enlisted in the Militia field battery commanded by his father. He graduated from Guelph Collegiate at 16 and was the first Guelph student to win a scholarship to the University of Toronto. After three years at University he was forced to take a year off due to severe asthma. This illness recurred throughout his life.

During his year off he was assistant resident master at the Ontario Agriculture College, teaching English and Mathematics. It is reported that he also fell in love with a friend's 18 year old sister, but he was dealt a bitter blow when she died  shortly after they met.

While training as a doctor he was also perfecting his skills as a poet. At University he had 16 poems and several short stories published in a variety of magazines. In 1898 John McCrae received a Batchelor of Medicine degree and the gold medal from the University of Toronto Medical School. He worked as a resident house doctor at Toronto General Hospital from 1898 – 1899, he interned at John Hopkins Hospital, Baltimore, and later served one year with the military  during the South African War.

Dr. McCrae served in a number of hospitals and other medical roles – and as an avid outdoors man, he was invited to serve as expeditionary physician when the Governor General Lord Grey journeyed by canoe from Norway House on Lake Winnipeg to Hudson's Bay.

When World War 1 erupted in 1914, John joined up. He was appointed a medical officer with the 1st Brigade of the Canadian artillery, Rank of Major and second in Command.

John MaCrae died January 28, 1918 and is buried in Wimereux Cemetery, in France. Before he died, he had the satisfaction of knowing his poem had been a success. Soon after its publication, it became the most popular poem in World War 1; it was translated into many languages and used on billboards advertising the sale of the first Victory Loan Bonds in Canada in 1917.

In part because of the poem's popularity, the poppy was adopted as the Flower of Remembrance for the dead of Britain, France, United States, Canada and other Commonwealth countries.

Today people continue to pay tribute to the poet of “In Flander’s Fields” by visiting McCrae House, the limestone cottage in Guelph, Ontario where he was born. The House has been preserved as a museum. Beside it are a memorial cenotaph and a garden of remembrance. The symbolic poppy and John McCrae's poems are still linked and the voices of those who have died in war continue to be heard each Remembrance Day:

“Take up our quarrel with the foe

To  you from failing hands we throw

The Torch; be yours to hold it high

If ye break faith with us who die

We shall not sleep, though poppies grow

In Flander's Fields.”

We shall remember,

Ruth Fenner, Provincial Historian, British Columbia Women's Institute