Last hebdomad , we Capricorn were lie in the shade , chewing cud . When I mentioned I ’d blogged about the wartime feat ofWilliam de Goat , King NeptuneandSergeant Bill , my daughterEmonysaid , “ What about Nan ? She was a wartime wedge , too!”“She ’s a wartime heroine , Darling River , not a hero ” Bon Bon told the missy . She sigh and gave me The Look . “ It ’s just like a sawhorse to only note male . ”So , to mollify my category and for all of you female readers , here is the story of Nan , a brave girl goat from Canada who served in World War I.Nan , then send for Celestine , was purchased by a soldier of the Canadian Expeditionary Force ’s 21st Battalion while the battalion was in Brockton , Ontario . She served with the man of the twenty-first Battalion from its mustering in 1914 through its demobilization in 1919 . During that time , 3,328 men of the 21st Battalion were kill , spite or went wanting in action ; only 106 of the unit of measurement ’s original soldiers — and Nan — entered Germany at the end of the war . Like Sergeant Bill , Nan gain the 1914/1915 Star , the British War Medal and the Victory Medal for her heroism at the front . When it came time for her battalion to move , Nan watched for the men of the Quartermaster ’s Detachment and Transport plane section to fix her a comfortable dapple on one of the general armed service wagons ; then without instigate she hop on board , ready for deployment .
On the Battalion ’s style to the Battle of Somme in France , the social unit ’s Transport Officer decided the soldier put too much of their fourth dimension and effort caring for Nan . He betray her to a Gallic woman for 20 franc . When Nan ’s boy discovered she was go , they were so horrified and outrage that the sale was annul and Nan returned to her shoes in the ranks . Nan saw action in many of the same conflict in which Sergeant Bill suffice . And on one not - so - unlucky Friday the 13th ( in December 1918 ) , she was the first Allied mascot to cross the Rhine River .
Nan ’s secretive brush with death , however , came at warfare ’s end when her men unloaded her at Southampton , England . It was against British Board of Agriculture regulations to bring an animate being into England from a strange country . Nan , the Board assert , would have to be slaughter or behave back to France . Her friends object , allowance were made , and after three hebdomad in strict quarantine , she board the Cunard lining , Carolina , along with the men of the 21st Battalion and departed for Canada .
Nan spent the relaxation of the summer at Mowat Hospital , cared for by Piper William Nelson . A penis of the new disbanded 21st Battalion , Nelson was a former sheepman from the Orkney Islands ; he ’d been Nan ’s especial caretaker in France and was her close friend . In the gloam , she move to the Royal Military College in Kingston , Ontario , where she lived for the rest of her solar day .
On September 22 , 1924 , at the right older eld of 12 , Nan was euthanized due to failing wellness . Her head was sent to be mount and now resides in the Princess of Wales ’ Own Regiment Museum in Kingston . The rest of Nan was buried with full military honor in Cataraqui Cemetery in Kingston .
Emony ’s right , Nan was as much of a military hero as any of the other goats who serve well .
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