After a year or two of caring for Susan Anna’s grave, I became curious about her origins.  I did what any 21st century researcher devoted to truth would do.  I went to the Oracle of All Things Known and Registered in the Universe: Google.  There, listed like the castings of the I-Ching, were thousands of links to the query, Who was Harry Crerar?  I found it hard to believe – as I do when I ask the I-Ching to take responsibility for my life decisions – that the answer would be so simple.

Harry Crerar was a Canadian General.  Henry Duncan Graham “Harry” Crerar served in the Canadian military and is remembered by critics and admirers alike as “mediocre,” “dour,” “colourless,” as well as “competent.”   This finding was somewhat hard to reconcile with the little seemingly abandoned gravesite.  On the other hand, soldiers were remarkably transient and even high-ranking military men, in wartime Canada, were not likely to remain in any one city for long.  Searching further, I connected with a military history writer, Paul Dickson who had published a biography of Crerar.  Impulsively, I wrote to Dickson asking if Susan Anna was a child of Harry and Verse Crerar and told him of my time spent caring for Susan Anna grave.  I received a reply almost immediately.  I’m guessing he doesn’t get many requests about Crerar as unique as mine.

Dickson confirmed that Susan Anna was indeed their child but that he had only referred to the “death of a newborn child” and “personal difficulties of 1933” in the book*.  The family, it seems, was intensely insular and Harry particularly private.  Harry married Verse (actually “Marion Verschoyle Cronyn” and considered a stunning beauty) in 1916 accompanied only by one friend who witnessed the ceremony.  They went on to have three children, Margaret (Peg), Peter, and Susan Anna.  Margaret was a bright spot in Crerar’s life as he struggled with the losses in the battles in the Somme, remained close to both parents, and acquired a PhD in Chemistry later in life.  Peter was born in 1922, joined and left the military, had a strained relationship with his father, and lived the latter years his life in a veteran’s hospital in Toronto.  There is little suggestion that anyone outside the immediate family even knew of Susan Anna.

After her death, Harry’s ambitions cushioned him and he pushed on for promotions which eventually lead him to become endeared to the Queen of the Netherlands for his role in the liberation of Holland (hence all our tulips!) and later aide-de-camp of then-Princess Elizabeth for her coronation.  It was different for Verse.  She and Peter left for England in 1933 where Peg was in boarding school.  The only hint of the grief Verse endured was in Harry’s letter commenting that she “had not been feeling well” when they arrived but bounced back quickly as family life took hold.  Eventually, the Fates gathered them all up to settle in Ottawa where things appeared happy and content with the usual dollop of military-influenced parenting.  Harry died in 1965; Verse and Peg too now are deceased.  Dickson couldn’t tell me where they were buried (perhaps in Southern Ontario or Toronto where Peg lived) and, in the absence of similar family names around her grave, I realized that Susan Anna was alone.

And then one day, in that strange way dots have of connecting, I realized that Crerar might be buried in the military part of the cemetery.  Expecting a long and tedious search through the miles of uniform white headstones, I went determined to read each headstone.

It was the first grave.  A few hundred yards from Susan Anna.  He’d been there all this time.

Thank you for practicing,

Genju

*These quotes were not accessible in the book online when I first researched the Crerars and I only had Dickson’s comment via email.

There’s a beautiful cemetery near my office, about a kilometer away, with a botanical garden and beautiful Interfaith chapel.  Strange as it may seem I love taking my friends there for a picnic, which was how it was first introduce to me.  Sitting by the koi pond, sharing sandwiches and salads with a neighbour who worked in town as well, I fell in love with the huge trees, hosta beds, and day lillies.

Later, when I ran out of daring friends, I used the winding paths for my outdoor runs and winter walks.  If I got the pace right, I could cover most of the trails in my 45 minutes of gasping.  Sometimes when Frank would run with me, I reminded him that slowing down in more ways than one would likely delayed our journey to the be the next headstone.

The cemetery is the resting place for many notable Canadians, Prime Ministers, hockey legends, and kingmakers.  There are also military and police members who lie there, many from decades ago left by their families who have long since moved on.

A few years ago, at the end of one of my runs, I stopped to rest on a grassy slope across from the hosta gardens.  Beside me, covered with weeds and overgrowth, was this little gravestone.  It marks the grave of Susan Anna, infant daughter of Harry & Verse Crerar, born 20 May 1933 and died 14 June 1933.  I cleaned away the growth and weeds, brushed off the stone and sat back in wonder at this little life that barely lasted 25 days.  Not even long enough to become “beloved daughter” of Harry & Verse, not even long enough to warrant more than a descriptive with a categorical word: infant daughter.

Over the months, I wrote stories in my head about who they were.  1933 in Ottawa would have seen the 16th season of the Ottawa Senators before they left for 58 years, Cyrville Road was a potato-growing field, there was an increase of 850% in case load at the Ottawa Welfare Bureau, and the charitable organization that would become the United Way was founded.  I imagined Harry as a slight man, likely a labourer who eked out a living working in a bakery or driving a trolley.  Verse, of course, stayed home, holding her grief and sorrow tight to her bosom while making meals, caring for her other children, and cleaning the house.  Or perhaps, they had left Ottawa, the area being to burdened with poor pay and sad memories of their lost child.  I imagined that if Susan Anna had a sister (I never thought she would have a brother), she would now be in her 70’s.  Greyed and slight with a stoop in her walk, she may still come by the grave to remember her sibling whom she never knew or only knew fleetingly.

My breath caught and my heart tightened each time I walked or ran past the little marker.  There were never signs of anyone’s visit and its carved words seem to fade more and more.   I became frightened that, in time, Susan Anna would fade unwitnessed into history.  So my visits became more than an adjunct to my activities.  I took the time to rub the lichen off the gravestone, clear the base of grass and weeds, and chatted with little Susan Anna, bringing her up-to-date on all the wondrous changes in the world since she entered and so quickly left it.  Sometimes, I even tried to explain that her parents and family loved her and perhaps were constrained in how that love could manifest.

I think I spoke as much to reassure Susan Anna that she had been loved as I did to reassure me.

… tomorrow: truth be told

Thank you for practicing,

Genju