Lieutenant #3030361
Strathroy Cemetery Plot C.24.18.b / lat. 42º 56.785′ N / long. -81º 38.145′ W
John Richard White was born in Forest, Ontario on December 25, 1886. He had a married sister, Lilly Levitt, living in Forest. His mother and father were both deceased when he enlisted.
He was single, a Methodist, and a steam engineer at the time when he enlisted on January 3, 1918, in London, Ontario. Pre-enlistment he was in the 27th Regiment (3 months) and the 149th Regiment (18 months). He enlisted with the 1st Depot Battalion, W.O., Toronto’s 4th, then was with the Canadian Machine Gun Depot when he arrived in France. He then moved to the 2nd Battalion and joined his unit on December 10, 1918, in the field.
He served in France but probably saw no “battle action”. He was returned to England, and then to Canada. He was discharged on May 25, 1919, at no. 2 Depot in Toronto. On the Officers Declaration paper, he was a lieutenant.
Between May 25, 1919, and December 29, 1932, when he died, he lived in Strathroy. The cause of death is recorded as hypertension and arterial sclerosis. In April 1923, he married Anna Pearl (Cooper / Jervis). His wife is buried beside him (1981). Her marker is the flat, ground-level stone to the left of the family monument.
His “FamilySearch” death record indicates he was a Stationary Engineer. A stationary engineer “operates, troubleshoots and oversees industrial machinery and equipment that provides energy in various forms. It would be a likely guess that he was employed at one of the furniture factories then in operation in Strathroy, possibly the Middlesex Furniture factory which was located on Canaan Street.
[This image is from the collection of Museum Strathroy – Caradoc.]
The following documents are available online at the Canadian Government website. The source of the birth, marriage and death certificates was FamilySearch. The Ontario death record is different than the Federal Government’s data. His death was, in fact, December 29, 1932, and he was 46 years, 4 days old at his death.
