The Fighting Newfoundlander: A History of the Royal Newfoundland Regiment.

Olaf Uwe Janzen is a history professor at the Memorial University of
Newfoundland.

This is a reprint of the official history of the Royal Newfoundland Regiment, originally commissioned by the Newfoundland government and published in 1964 to mark the fiftieth anniversary of the formation of the regiment. It has long been out of print.

The author of the book, Colonel Gerald W.L. Nicholson, was an experienced military historian. For many years he served with the likes of Colonel C.P. Stacey in the historical section of the Canadian army, eventually becoming the director. Upon his retirement in 1962, he plunged immediately into the history of the RNR, completing the tome in an astonishing two years. The focus of the book (11 of 15 chapters) is very much on the regiment’s military experiences from its formation in 1914 through service in Gallipoli (1915), its near-destruction at Beaumont Hamel (1916), and its subsequent service until it was disbanded in 1919. The political, social, and economic implications of Newfoundland’s war effort are not discussed (compulsory service gets one page reference in the index). Yet Nicholson was careful to provide a context, beginning his story of Newfoundland’s “unmilitary people” early in the 18th century, when British regulars were first stationed in Newfoundland, and providing a succinct yet colourful narration of the events of that century and the next. An epilogue touches briefly on the regiment’s rebirth in 1949 as a militia unit within the Canadian army. Newfoundland’s overseas military service during the Second World War received separate treatment in More Fighting Newfoundlanders, which appeared in 1969.

The Carleton Library edition of The Fighting Newfoundlander is almost identical to the original, apart from a fine, additional introduction by David Facey-Crowther. The black-and-white maps are crisper than in the original, but the decision to reproduce the several fold-out colour maps from the 1964 edition in black-and-white as well is regrettable, for they have lost much detail and clarity. Nevertheless, the reappearance of this work is a very welcome one, and the publisher is to be commended for making it available once again.