Stewart, Private William Russell (A/11256)

Service highlights

A Life and Service Remembered

William Russell Stewart was born in Stratford on August 27, 1918 and trained into a working life early. After finishing school, he worked as a mechanic at the Canadian National Railway shops in Stratford. When WWII began, he enlisted for overseas service with the Perth Regiment on September 19, 1939, and remained with the regiment until his death.

He sailed for England with the battalion on October 6, 1941. Two years later, on October 26, 1943, he embarked with the Perths for Italy and landed at Naples on November 8. After a short stay at Afragola, the battalion moved north to Altamura, where days were filled with hard preparation: exercises, live firing, and the repetitive discipline meant to turn training into instinct.

Even in wartime, Stewart’s letters still carried the tone of home. Writing to his wife back on Queen Street in St. Marys on September 20, 1943, he told a story with the blunt humour soldiers sometimes used to keep worry at bay:

It is an ordinary kind of moment, funny on the surface, but it does something official records cannot. It shows his voice, and it shows the effort to sound normal for the people waiting at home.

Just 3 months later in early January 1944, the Perth Regiment was ordered forward to gain battle experience with the 1st Canadian Infantry Division. The week that followed was tense, full of final checks and quiet routines. One small detail from the period captures the human side of those days: Stewart likely attended the Protestant church parade on Sunday, January 9, 1944, where the padre preached a line meant to steady men who knew what was coming: “I the Lord have called thee; I will keep thee.”

By January 13, the regiment was concentrated near Ortona, and detailed orders came down for an assault scheduled for the morning of January 17. The plan demanded everything: cross the Riccio River at first light, then drive forward to the Tollo Road along the heights of the Fendo Ridge. It was a battlefield geometry that offered no easy choices, down into the valley, through the river, and up the far side under fire.

H-Hour was to be at 5:30 a.m. The attack met fierce resistance almost immediately, and the battle quickly fractured into chaos under determined opposition. By day’s end, after less than twelve hours of fighting, the battalion was forced back to its start line with heavy losses. Somewhere in that valley, Private William Russell Stewart was killed on January 17, 1944. Veterans Affairs Canada

He was buried in Italy at the Moro River Canadian War Cemetery, grave IV. B. 2. Veterans Affairs Canada His name was carried at home, commemorated in St. Marys on the WWII plaque on the south wall of the St. Marys Town Hall, and remembered among the Perth Regiment’s fallen. Veterans Affairs Canada+1

Major battles and operations

  • Italian Campaign (arrival and preparation after landing at Naples)
  • Ortona sector operations (January 1944)
  • Assault across the Riccio River toward the Fendo Ridge (January 17, 1944)

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