In a corner of Toronto’s Prospect Cemetery, a collection of granite headstones stand in a broad lawn shaded by tall, old trees.
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collection → stand → trees
Most bear the maple leaf logo that identifies them as fallen warriors of the First World War.
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that → bear → War
On a gentle autumn afternoon last week, Helen Williams walked among them, stopping to scrape lichen from the stone.
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Williams → walk → stone
The Commonwealth War Graves Commission is responsible for caring for 15,000 such graves at nearly 3,000 Canadian sites.
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Commission → care → sites
Until recently, tending them meant dispatching staff all over the country, including 10 provinces and the Yukon, a strain on both the commission’s budget and the country’s environment.
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tending → tend → budget
So the commission put out a call for volunteer grave tenders, spreading the word through social media and chapters of the Royal Canadian Legion.
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commission → put → Legion
Spokeswoman Katrielle Ethier says the program has been a “resounding success.”
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program → say → ?
Since it started last year, more than 600 people have stepped up.
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people → start → ?
Like sons and daughters caring for the resting place of a beloved parent, they look after the graves of long-dead warriors, scrubbing their headstones and trimming the weeds around their plots.
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they → care → plots
Ms. Williams, 59, joined the program last year, just after her husband retired from the Army.
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husband → join → Army
Richard Williams, a signals officer, served for 36 years, doing stints in Haiti, Afghanistan and Norway, as well as numerous Canadian posts, eventually rising to the rank of lieutenant colonel.
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Williams → serve → colonel
The couple, married now for close to 40 years, visited war graves around Canada and the world as Mr. Williams hopped from place to place.
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Williams → marry → place
They were moved by the painstaking care that went into memorials such as those near Juno Beach in Normandy, where Canadian forces came ashore on D-Day, and at Beaumont-Hamel, where soldiers of the Newfoundland Regiment were mowed down in the Battle of the Somme.
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soldiers → move → Somme
The couple wanted to help make sure that fallen soldiers buried at home in Canada got the same measure of respect.
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got → want → respect
Ms. Williams was assigned 20 graves in Prospect Cemetery, which spreads north of Toronto’s St. Clair Avenue West.
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which → assign → West
Mr. Williams got the same number in Mount Pleasant Cemetery, the lovely oasis in North Toronto where people come to walk and bicycle.
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people → get → Toronto
He says the work gives them the chance to honour those who gave their lives and to “make sure they’re remembered in some way, shape or form.”
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they → say → way
These Canadians made the “ultimate sacrifice,” he says, and we need to “reflect on that every time we get a chance.”
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we → make → chance
His wife adds that, because Canada never suffered foreign occupation during the world wars, it is sometimes hard to remember why deaths like these matter.
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deaths → add → these
Visiting the graves in Prospect and other places like it remind us.
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Visiting → visit → us
“When we learn from history,” she says, “sometimes we can avoid making the same mistakes.”
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we → learn → mistakes
Ms. Williams brings a knife to cut away the turf that encroaches on the headstones and a dishwashing brush and plastic scraper to remove the moss, lichen and dirt that accumulates on the grey granite.
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that → bring → granite
She uses a special app on her phone to document and report any bigger issues.
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She → use → issues
If the inscription on a headstone is becoming too worn to be legible or a marker is listing and threatening to fall over, the commission will send professionals to make things right.
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things → become → professionals
Tending the graves of her 20 warriors, she often wonders who they were, what they did and who they left behind.
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they → tend → who
She also thinks of the times when her husband went out the door to do his job and how she and her children worried whether he would be coming back.
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he → think → job
What was originally called the Imperial War Graves Commission was founded in 1917.
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called → call → 1917
Throughout most of history, the bodies of those who were killed in battle lay where they had fallen, unmarked and unremembered except by those who loved them.
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who → kill → them
After the mass slaughter of the First World War, the war’s victors decided that that must change.
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that → decide → War
Prodded by a visionary Englishman, Fabian Ware, who had served in a wartime ambulance unit, they set up the commission with the goal of honouring all of those who died, regardless of their rank.
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who → prod → rank
It combed the battlefields for bodies and reburied those that could be recovered, memorializing them in the lush cemeteries with rows of neat tombstones that have come to symbolize the scale of the loss.
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that → comb → loss
Today, the commission oversees 23,000 cemeteries and memorials around the world, paying tribute to 1.7 million casualties of both the First and Second world wars.
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commission → oversee → wars
To keep those graves in good condition, it relies on an army of inspectors, masons and gardeners.
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it → keep → inspectors
Most of the more than 60,000 Canadians killed in the First war lie in Europe.
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Most → kill → Europe
By agreement, the bodies of those who died overseas were not repatriated to their home countries.
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who → die → countries
But thousands lie in Canada, too.
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thousands → lie → Canada
Some sustained wounds or contracted illnesses during the war and died after coming home.
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Some → sustain → war
Others died while training in Canada.
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Others → die → Canada
Still others perished at sea.
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others → perish → sea
Six out of 10 commission sites consist of just a single grave, like that of Lieutenant Roy Leslie Rogers, who died in 1919 and is buried in a small cemetery in Oxbow, Sask.
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who → consist → Oxbow
…and 17 more, not listed.
The Aporia
