As Canada's Navy approaches its centenary year in 2010, the time is right for a retrospective look at some of the individuals who have played an influential role in shaping its past - and by extension, its present and future.
Individuals like Henry William Bruce, who in the 1850s was instrumental in starting the first on-shore base for Britain's Royal Navy (RN) at Esquimalt, BC (now the home of Canada's navy on the West Coast). Esquimalt was part of a worldwide network of coaling stations vital to the Royal Navy's defence of the British Empire.
Bruce's long career spanned the days of sail as a boy seaman in Nelson's navy to the emergence of Canada's fledgling navy on the west coast.
Without the tenacity of Walter Hose, it is debatable whether Canada's Navy would even exist today, much less be on the verge of celebrating its first century. Rear Admiral Hose fought many battles to ensure the survival of the fledgling Royal Canadian Navy (RCN), in his words "the Ugly Duckling" of Canadian National Defence.
Hose's pivotal part in developing a strong navy, and a strong force of naval reservists, recontentcolumns an important legacy.
Described as a "terrier" by one naval historian for his uncompromising defence of the naval service, Percy Walker Nelles (later Admiral Nelles) was hand-picked by Walter Hose to be his successor as Chief of Naval Staff. Nelles had enjoyed a brilliant career in the RCN (he was the youngest Commodore First Class on the British Empire Navy List), and like Hose, he continued the battle to strengthen and expand the navy. In spite of apathy from outside the service and frustration within, he never lost sight, in the pre-war years, of what he believed to be the Canadian Navy's destiny. When the Second World War came, the plans he carefully laid and nurtured were transformed into reality.
CFB Esquimalt Naval & Military Museum acknowledges the contribution of these important figures, and their significance in establishing and sustaining Canada's Navy.
