Greeting Cards

In 1945, a loving son sent this Valentine's Day card to his mother, Mrs. George Laidlaw in Ingersoll, Ontario. Likely sent from Italy given the illustration inside, the card conveys all the love and well-wishes of a son keen to return home after service overseas. 

This stamp produced during the First World War depicts the death of British nurse Edith Cavell, renowned and admired for helping save the lives of hundreds of soldiers. She was executed by German forces in occupied Belgium on October 12, 1915. Her death was memorialized in several mediums, including the stamp featured here. 

While stationed in the Mediterranean, artilleryman John S. Thomson sent this V-Mail Christmas card to Mary Thomson (presumably his sister) back in Toronto. 

Holiday warm wishes sent out from the H.M.C.S. Captor II in Saint John, N.B. by Dick Bickley. 

During the Second World War, the transport division of the Canadian Red Cross contributed in driving and servicing motor vehicles and providing First Aid. This holiday greeting card features a message of health, friendship, and good news, and a popular illustration also found in other cards such as "The need for blood" which can be found here in the Wartime Canada website. 

The return of peace in 1918 was a momentous occasion - so momentous that special commemorative greeting cards were printed and sold.

At Christmas 1917, this soldier wrote that he was "Still Going Strong." Did he survive the war?

This hospital unit was established in Dundurn, Saskatchewan, in September 1940, and went overseas early in 1942. Glen's card to his mother was written a few days before the Canadian raid on Dieppe.

To take advantage of a sales opportunity, this enterprising manufacturer may have simply taken a prewar birthday card and embossed on it the crest of the Royal Canadian Air Force.

Jim Taunton of Verdun, Quebec, was spending Christmas 1940 in uniform, after enlisting in the Black Watch in Montreal.