The Cleghorn Battlefield Tour is an annual tour hosted by the Laurier Centre for Military, Strategic, and Disarmament Studies. Its existence owes much to the generous support of John Cleghorn, Chancellor of Wilfrid Laurier University from 1996 to 2003. The first Tour began under the leadership of historian and Laurier Professor Terry Copp in 2004 and was a chance for WLU students to experience the battlefields first-hand. The Cleghorn Fellowship pays for the majority of their travel expenses and students are able to spends two weeks in May each year touring historic sites. In 2006, students from the Université de Montréal joined the Laurier students and have done so each year since.
The Tour is an occasion for University students to learn about the Canadian role in the First and Second World Wars.It explores Canada's war through an examination of strategy, operations and tactics on the actual ground and Canada's memory by visiting museums, cemeteries and monuments. Accompanied by scholars from both universities, it is a unique experience for any Canadian. It blends education and remembrance to offer students from Ontario and Quebec the opportunity to examine Canada's wartime history far beyond the scope of textbooks and courses.
Students participate in an ongoing field seminar on the First and Second World Wars. The first half of the trip is spent visiting battlefields across northern France. Battles such as Ypres, the Somme, Vimy, and Amiens are examined. Visiting these sites and the war cemeteries that surround them gives the students an opportunity to learn about the war in a way unlike anything they have encountered in the classroom. The Tour specifically visits the war cemeteries of each of the Allied nations, and Germany too, so that students can see the different ways of memorializing the war outside of Canada.
The second half focuses on Canadian battlefields of the Second World War in Dieppe and Normandy. Students see for themselves the towering cliffs that confronted Canadians in 1942 at Dieppe and follow Canadian soldiers from Juno Beach to Caen to closing of the Falaise Pocket. Time is also spent visiting the other landing beaches from D-Day and other battlefields where Allied soldiers fought to liberate France. Participants visit the Second World War cemeteries for Canadians, British, American and German soldiers and explore the changes and continuities between commemorations of the two World Wars.
As English and French Canadian students tour the battlefield together, their different conceptions of Canada's military history always proves to be a point of controversy and education. Being exposed to radically different memories of the war leaves both groups of students changed by their experience at the Tour's end. The inclusion of the Montreal students marked an important turning point for the Cleghorn Tour. Though its purpose was originally to simply educate young university students on important chapters of Canada's history, it also became a time for young Canadians to learn from each other. Understanding the difference in how Canada's French and English cultures viewed the First and Second World Wars helps Canadians better understand their nation today. The Cleghorn Battlefield Tour is approaching its seventh year and it hopes to continue this exchange of knowledge and memory and strives to not let the history of Canada at war be forgotten.
