Major General William Antrobus Griesbach
The Loyal Edmonton Regiment was founded in 1915 when the 49th Battalion, headed by then Lieutenant Colonel Griesbach, began recruiting soldiers from the region in response to a shortage of soldiers at the start of WWI. Lieutenant Colonel Griesbach was given command of the next infantry battalion to be raised from Edmonton and area, the 49th Battalion. In December 1915, the 49th joined three other battalions -Royal Canadian Regiment, Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry and the 42nd Battalion from Montreal.
After several months of training, the 49th landed in France and moved to the front to start fighting, a grueling saga that lasted for three years. The Battalion earned ten battle honours, including an honour for one of its bloodiest fights, the Battle of Passchendaele, in October 1917. Twenty-one officers and 567 soldiers went into battle and only 145 survived. Of the 4,050 men who served with the 49th in France and Belgium, 977 died and 2,282 were wounded.
After WWII the 49th Regiment became formally affiliated with Princess Patricia’s Canadian Light Infantry. Troops from The Loyal Edmonton Regiment remain active in this capacity and have supported Canada’s peacekeeping efforts since the 1950s.
During World War II, Griesbach was made Inspector General of the Canadian Army for Western Canada, and was promoted to the rank of Major-General. He retired from that position in 1943.
In his civilian life, William Griesbach was a lawyer, an Alderman, Edmonton’s youngest Mayor and later served as a Member Of Parliament and a Canadian Senator. In 1906 he married Janet Scott McDonald Lauder who played an important role in the history of Edmonton. Janet was Edmonton’s first telephone operator and a major public figure for charity and community activity. Fiercely committed to her husband, she joined his unit overseas during WWI, serving as a nurse.