Letters From the Front

Dated: September 12, 1916

GRATEFUL FRIEND TELLS OF BRAVERY OF CALGARY MAN

Winnipeg Soldier Relates How Gunner G. F. Dowdell Saved His Life

How Gunner G. F. Dowdell, who, before enlisting, was an employee of the P. Burns company in Calgary, bravely rescued a comrade who was buried alive after the explosion of one of the big German shells, is related in a letter which his parents have received from the latter from Wharncliffe hospital, Sheffield, England.

"I was wounded," writes this comrade, who is Gunner Mills, a Winnipeg man, "through a shell blowing up our dugout and burying me alive.  Your son and I were all alone in the dugout at the time.  He was partly buried himself, but managed to get himself free and dug me out.  It was only through his courage and faithfulness to me in the face of what looked like certain death to both of us, for the place was being heavily shelled, that I was saved, for just as he dragged me out another shell blew up the place."

"I thought that it was hopeless, and wanted him to spare himself, but he would not leave.  In this he measured up to the supreme test of love, in that he was willing to lay down his life for his friend.  I wrote the major about it as soon as I was able to do so, and he has promised that at the proper time he will not forget it."

Gunner Dowdell enlisted in Calgary in November, 1914, and as a member of the battery that had its headquarters at Lethbridge has been through some of the heaviest fighting on the western front.  He has a large number of friends in Calgary, who will be interested to hear of his action in rescuing a comrade in the face of extreme danger.