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THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 91, 1940

In the Great War Canada's navy was a negligible factor. ..At the beginning of the present war it wasi not generally anticipated that it would play an important part. But in coastal, convoy and foreign service, it al ready has established a tradition of which Canadians have every reason to be,proud,' It has grown greatly, and it will in, due time be augmented by 'Canadian-made destroyers and :perhaps Canadian-made cruisers . Hon. Angus Macdonald, minister of the navy, told the House of Commons this week that the Canadian navy, at present consisting of 155 ships and a personnel of 13,273 (1,774 at the war's beginning), will have 100 more ships and 10,000 more men a year and a half from now. Canada, with its coastlines east and west, has long had important sections of its people who made their living by "going down to the sea iii ships"-and to' the- Great Lakes which are really inland seas . It is natural that such a country should lend itself to the development of a navy manned by men of particular aptitude for naval duties . As a great trading country, Canada is interested, in the merchant trade of peacetime as well as the naval and merchant services so important in war. It is interesting to find, therefore, that the Canadian naval college which is to be established to train men for the navy may, after the war, be adapted to the training of men for the merchant marine: The war promises . not only to establish Canada as an important post-war centre of civil aviation; but to increase materially the extent of her peacetime shipping. In the meantime the navy and merchant ships are making a vital contribution to the winning of the war ; the naval units in their various functions which include the convoying of the merchant ships, and the merchant ships in the transportation of food and munitions of war to the Mother Country, Hon: Angus Macdonald, himself a,maritimer,

Canada's Expanding Navy

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is doing a fine job as naval minister,,aEd his address this week was not only informative, but, in its tribute to British courage, eloquent and inspiring . In British cities bombed by Nazi -airmen, he said, flags can be seen flying over ruined homes, "many of them the humble dwellings of the poor." The occupants, "forced to see their homes destroyed, their perfonal possessions gone, sometimes members of their , families- maimed or killed, dug themselves out of the wreckage and at once planted above it the flag of Britain." Said Mr. Macdonald : . "That act seems 7 to me symbolic: They plant that great flag there, not only-to defy Hitler, not only to encourage the weak and inspire the faltering Among . themselves, but also as an emblem of hope and of prophecy ; and the hope and the prophecy- : are this: that just as the flag of Britain rises over the physical ruins of some of its homes, so out of the wreck and welter of this war there will arise a greater Britain, a Britain strengthened and stiffened ,, by its heroic struggle, a Britain which will lead the world into better and fairer ways of life, not for one class or group, but for all people:" In winning, through to that goal, the navies of Britain and. the dominions will play their glorious part.,

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