263866 Spr. Angus Duncan Sutherland Canadian Expeditionary Force 169th Detachment Railway Troops Canadian Engineers from:Kindersley, Saskatchewan, Canada Angus Sutherland signed up with the Canadian Expeditionary Force of the Canadian Army. He was born in Winnipeg, and was living in Saskatchewan as a 22 year old man when he joined the army on the 6th of June 1918. Sapper is the same as the rank of Private, and pertains to Engineering and Construction troops. After training in Canada, he departed for England. The role of the Railway troops was the maintenance and construction of the Railways in France and Belgium. It has been estimated that each mile of the Western front in France and Belgium, required 2000 lbs of food,ammunition,equipment,and supplies each day. This made the Railway system essential to supply the logistics of the war effort.
On 26th of September 1918, Angus Sutherland left Quebec from Montreal on board a civilian owned troop transport ship, the S.S. City of Cairo. During the voyage most of the 1057 soldiers contracted the Spanish Flu. The same level of illness occurred onboard the other two ships being used by Canada as troop transportation. In the case of The S.S. City of Cairo, 34 soldiers died of the Spanish Flu during the voyage.
On October 11th 1918, the ship arrived in Plymouth,England. Angus had become ill with influenza along with 250 other soldiers on the ship. 137 of the 250 soldiers had to be carried off the ship on stretchers because they were unable to walk. Angus Sutherland was immediately sent to a Ford Military hospital in Devonport. He stayed at the hospital for 27 days.
On 9th of November 1918, when he was well enough to leave hospital, Sutherland was sent to Woodcote Park, a convalescent hospital. Woodcote is located in Epsom, Surrey. Before the war, Woodcote was a private country club owned by the Royal Automobile Club. During WWI, the the UK government commandeered many private clubs for the war Effort.
Angus made a full recovery. However, by the time that he was ready to join the war effort, an armistice had been signed on 11th of November 1918. Angus Sutherland remained in England until 6th of June 1919. This was typical for many Canadian Soldiers to have remained in England following the war, since there was still work to be done repairing the infrastructure destroyed in the war.
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