| while away from home. In 1911 he had returned to New Brunswick and was living with his wife at her parents home. With the outbreak of World War One Hartley re-enlisted as a Private (No. 69281) at St John, New Brunswick, on 7 December 1914 with the New Brunswick Regiment. His Attestation papers list his wife’s address as 708 Tremont Street, Boston, Massachusetts so it is possible that they had again move to the U.S. or that his wife had decided to reside in Boston while Hartley was overseas. Here Hartley was listed as being 5 feet, 9 inches tall with blue eyes and brown hair. He deployed to Europe with the 26th Battalion, Canadian Expeditionary Force (second contingent) leaving St. John on June 13, 1915 aboard the troop transport S. S. Caledonia. The “Fighting 26th” spent some time in England training prior to its arrival in France. In France Hartley took part in Second Battle of Ypres (22 April – 25 May 1915) and Festubert (15-25 May 1915). It would be at Mount Sorrel (June 1916) that Hartley would see his final action. On 16 June he was reported missing in action after having last been seen in the “trenches near Maple Copse”. Like so many of the tens of thousands of other men during the War he simply disappeared and was never seen again. He would remain officially missing in action until 2 June 1924 when his status was officially changed to “presumed to have died”. This notice was sent to his wife Annie who was still living in Massachusetts – now on Copeland Street in Roxbury. Hartley would have qualified for the 1914-15 Star along with the British War and Victory Medals Today the “Maple Copse” mentioned in Hartley’s casualty report is the site of a small and seldom visited Commonwealth Graves Commission cemetery that holds the remains of about three hundred British and Canadian troops. The location was used as a cemetery during the war and its graves where destroyed on several occasions and many of those graves remain unidentified to this day. Given that this location is where Hartley French vanished in 1916 it is quite likely that he rests with his fellow fallen Canadians after all. While he has no known grave Hartley B. French is memorialized on the Menin Gate Memorial (panel 26-28) at Ypres, Belgium as well as on page 88 of the Canadian First World War Book of Remembrance. |
| Above: A rather sad looking Private Hartley B. French of the 2nd Canadian Mounted Riflemen in a photograph probably taken just prior to his departure for South Africa in 1902 during the waning days of the Anglo-Boer War. He is wearing the Stetson hat that came to typify Canadian forces that served in South Africa and is outfitted for mounted duties. He also wears a rose pinned to his tunic which may have been a token from a family member or another loved one. Mounted Photograph 5 1/2 Inches by 7 1/2 Inches (14 cm x 19.5 cm) Unidentified Photographer St John, New Brunswick, Canada c. 1902 |
| Above: The two inscriptions on the reverse of the photograph identifying the sitter as Hartley French. |
