838531 Pte. Peter Hamilton was born in Donaghadee, County Down, Ireland, on September 5th, 1898. Emmigrating to Canada he was living in Owen Sound and working as a sailor when he attested to the 147th Battalion there on January 13th, 1916.
Peter would have been billeted locally over the winter until the unit left for centralized training in the spring of 1916. During his initial training Peter had run-ins with the military establishment, being fined and demoted after making the rank of Lance-Corporal.
The 147th Battalion mobilized in Owen Sound in May 1916 to finalize the administration and organization of the unit, just prior to their departure for Camp Niagara later that month. As the conditions in this Camp were wanting the unit moved to the new training facility of Camp Borden in late June.
In September, the unit received their orders to proceed overseas. While en route for Halifax there was an outbreak of diphtheria and they were detained in Amherst, Nova Scotia, for over a month. The unit finally sailed for Great Britain, on November 14th 1916, aboard the SS. Olympic.
On January 1st, 1917, the 147th Battalion ceased to exist when it became the nucleus for the 8th Reserve Battalion, whose task it was to supply reinforcements to the 58th Battalion and the 4th C.M.R. Peter was taken on strength of the 4th C.M.R. on March 7th, 1917.
Surviving the Battles of Arras and Hill 70, Peter was wounded by a gunshot wound to the left arm on October 26th, 1917, during the first day of the Canadian Corps assault at the Third Battle of Ypres: more commonly known as Passchendaele.
Peter had his Blighty! Medically evacuated through Casualty Clearing Station 46, to No. 2 Canadian Military Hospital in Canterbury, England on October 31st, as invalided Peter was posted to the 2nd. C.O.R.D. the same day. He was moved to No. 16 Canadian General Hospital, Orpington, on Novermber 16th, though he was discharged from there on December 4th, 1917.
Going via the 1st C.C.D. in East Standing, Peter was taken on strength with the 2nd C.O.R.D. in Shorncliffe on January 29th, 1918. Still under the auspices of the 8th Reserve Battalion, Peter was transferred to the 3rd Reserve Battalion on February 15th, and thence back to the 1st C.O.R.D. in Witley on April 12th.
In the midst of that, Peter also suffered jaundice, in March 1918, as well as contracting another more unsocial disease; all of which amounted to the fact that he never returned to the 4th CMR or in fact saw front line service again.
838531 Private Peter Hamilton, returning to Halifax, from Liverpool, on the SS. Lapland, was struck off strength of the Canadian Expeditionary Force on April 12th, 1919.
Credit and many thanks go George Auer for the above biography.