New Wives

They gathered in London weeks ago, there attended lectures which deglamorized life in Canada. They learned, for example, that ranch life can be and often is woefully drab. They had a rough voyage --some of them in ships that brought German survivors of the Scharnhorst sinking. The Dominion Government paid the fares. At East Coast ports the Red Cross gave advice, emergency money, layettes for newborn babies. Now the 200 English, Scottish and Irish brides and fiancees of Canadian soldiers have scattered across the Dominion to new homes.

Astonishment. They were astonished by the great land. Ration-free clothing, modern kitchens, lack of blackouts delighted them. With memories of peaches at $2.25 each and grapes $5.50 a pound behind them, they were stunned by Canada's food supply. They wanted eggs first, then steaks, then ice cream.

Mary Patricia Chalifoux went to Montreal with her two children to begin a vigil. Her husband, Dieppe-Raider D'Amour Chalifoux, is in a Nazi prison camp.

Maude Curtis, with her small daughter, headed for her husband's home in Mervin, Sask., not as a bride but as a widow. Her husband died in England.

One English bride of a French Canadian who is still overseas was met at Montreal by in-laws. She could speak no French, they no English. But: "This is our son's wife; it does not matter."

Most of the arrivals were happy ones. A typical war bride: Mrs. Jack Sherwood. She met her husband, a gunner, at a hospital dance in Colchester, England, where she was a volunteer nurse, he a convalescent. They were married before he returned to Canada to be mustered out of the Army. Their reunion in Toronto included five-month-old John, whom the father had never seen.

Love and $200. It is not easy for Canadian servicemen, particularly those in the ranks, to marry overseas. They must first save $200 (average base pay: $57 a month). They must also get permission from their C.O.s, then let love's ardors cool for several weeks.

But, since the war's start, all such barriers to wedlock have been surmounted by sixteen thousand Canadian servicemen in Britain.

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