The Premier of Newfoundland and Labrador Andrew Furey took part in an event yesterday recognizing four exceptional public service employees who were presented with the Public Service Award of Excellence, the highest award a government employee in that province can receive.
One of the recipients was Greg Walsh, the director of archives and provincial archivist at The Rooms, the province’s largest public cultural space and where the provincial archives are held.
Mr. Walsh was the lead archivist in a project that was essential to the Department of National Defence and the Canadian Armed Forces’ Casualty Identification Program being able to identify the remains of First World War soldier Private John Lambert of the Newfoundland Regiment.
Private Lambert died in 1917 from wounds sustained in action at the Battle of Langemarck in Belgium. His remains were the first of a Newfoundland Regiment soldier to be identified through DNA.
A year of research
In April 2016, four sets of human remains were discovered during an archaeological dig near Ypres, Belgium. Military identifiers discovered with the remains indicated that three of the soldiers were British and one, by the “NFLD” shoulder badge was a soldier of the Newfoundland Regiment.
Military records confirmed there were 16 Newfoundland Regiment soldiers who had fought in the vicinity, with no known grave.
Mr. Walsh spent a year researching the 16 soldiers. He explored a variety of archival sources and collections, including birth, marriage and death records, census records, newspaper records, phone books, Ancestry, FamilySearch, attestation papers and nominal rolls, phone books, Canada411, Facebook, Google, yearbooks, group photos of the regiment, and obituaries,
In the end, Mr. Walsh was able to find living relatives for 13 of the 16 soldiers, and the Department of National Defence then acquired DNA samples from the soldiers’ relatives.
The DNA results positively identified Private Lambert of St. John’s.
Mr. Walsh was also instrumental in acquiring one of the most significant collections that the Provincial Archives of Newfoundland and Labrador has under its care – the records of the International Grenfell Association.
In both the professional and personal sides of his life, Mr. Walsh is a passionate promoter of Newfoundland and Labrador history and culture.
The three other recipients of the Public Service Award of Excellence were William G. David and David Legge for transportation and infrastructure and Deann Spurrell for municipal and provicial affairs.
Read more about Private Lambert’s remains being identified in the CBC report, Human remains found in Belgium in 2016 identified as Newfoundland Regiment member.
