Thomas Digby Wheeler

Rank:

Captain

Unit at enlistment:

Canadian Army Medical Corps

Force:

C.E.F.

Volunteered or conscripted:

Volunteered

Survived the war:

Yes

Birth country:

Canada

Birth county:

Brant

Birth city:

Brantford, Ontario

Address at enlistment:

5 St. Mary's Place, Winnipeg, Manitoba

Next of kin address:

5 St. Mary's Place, Winnipeg, Manitoba

Trade or calling:

Physician

Religious denominations:

Presbyterian

Marital status:

Married

Age at enlistment:

Letters and documents

Miscellaneous

BX June 23, 1916

Ex Brantford Boys of Prairie Now in Khaki – Some Former Citizens Here Who Enlisted Overseas at Winnipeg

Many Brantford boys until recently residing in other cities are serving in the Canadian army. From Winnipeg there has been quite a large number, some of the boys being members of the first contingent.

Walter Wheeler possibly made a record trip. He has been travelling for the Canadian Fairbanks Morse Co. of Montreal for a number of years making his headquarters at Winnipeg and Moose Jaw. He expressed a desire to Lieut. Bruce Campbell (another Brantford old boy who has been general purchasing agent for the same company at Winnipeg) to enlist, providing he could get to the firing line QUICK. They made a little specialty of speed. Mr. Wheeler enlisted as a private, securing a special pass permitting him to spend two days in Toronto, and five weeks from the day he enlisted, he wrote a letter from “Somewhere in France,” at a point where, as he said in his letter, he could hear the “Big fellows talking.” Special mechanical training and a reinforcement draft was the secret of quick transfer.

Bombardier Basil Dennis, 38th Battery, Canadian Field Artillery, another old Brantford boy, has won promotion since landing in England. asil says in his letters that he won his stripes more for efficient “fatigue duty,” than for any special ability in the science of gunnery. However, to those who know him this will not answer as an explanation; as given a fair amount of good luck he will come home with a splendid record.

Lieutenant Thomas Digby Wheeler, M.A., is now on the staff of the Winnipeg General Hospital. He will receive his M.D. degree this summer, and is planning on going overseas immediately, as medical officer. He at present holds a commission in the Manitoba University Corps.

The above are a few of the boys of Brantford birth who are “doing their bit” and there are undoubtedly many more from the prairie and elsewhere, who are now in France, and who on occasion call to mind many happy days and years spent in the old home town and who would be glad to have the friends of years gone by know that they feel the country that they call theirs and the “town that is always home,” is worth fighting for, and that they are DOING IT.