Column: Here’s to Reg and all the veterans who served

It has been five years since Reginald Wise died at age 97. Reg served with No. 40 Commando, a British Royal Marine unit, and fought in the European theatre of the Second World War. The Cloverdale resident was proud of his wartime service. The writer describes him as a man of substance who added value to the world and enriched the lives of those he met.

The writer was thinking of Reg while visiting the newspaper’s former office in Cloverdale. The Cloverdale Reporter once operated from an old blacksmith’s building near 56A Avenue and 176 Street, built around the time of the First World War. The writer recalls meeting Reg there: he pulled up outside the office and spent about 10 minutes trying to parallel park, looking as if he were playing bumper cars. The then 95-year-old eventually parked and came in to say hello. An hour later, he was still there, talking mostly about history, but also about soldiering and the mental trauma that affected him and those who serve.

That conversation led to the writer’s first article about Reg, “Surrey veteran talks about the emotional side of war,” published in 2019. Wise discussed how post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) affected him and what he had done to cope. A close friendship followed. Reg often visited the office, and the writer went on to write more stories about him and his Second World War service against the Nazis. The writer also interviewed him at home. Wise was still living alone at 97 and stopped driving only at 96. Near the end of his life, his mind remained sharp.

Reg once described a frightening Royal Marines advance on Nazi positions in Albania. The memory stayed vivid for the writer, who could still imagine tracer fire and flares lighting the night sky. On another occasion, Reg, himself a sniper, recounted an exchange with a sniper in Italy. He had a gift for building suspense, punctuating each rising moment with “bangs,” “zips” and “dings.” The writer expected the story to end with a heroic effort and Reg winning the day. Instead, neither sniper hit the other, and they carried on with the war. The writer says Reg told things as they were, and people accepted him for who he was.

The writer still thinks of Reg. He gave the writer a small white cross he had made to commemorate veterans, along with a painting he created of the Vimy Ridge memorial to honour the sacrifices Canadians made in the Great War.

The burden of PTSD drove Wise to paint; it became his therapy. At times, he suffered bouts of depression and could not work. For years, he did not talk about the war or address the mental trauma it caused. He once told the writer that, while downtown, a large truck passed and he caught a strong whiff of diesel fumes—tanks run on diesel—then collapsed in the street, transported back to a moment of intense pain.

When he was discharged from the commandos in 1946, Wise’s mind erased the names of “all the chaps” in his unit, both those who died in the war and those who survived. He could not remember the names of any school friends back home either. “I didn’t know why,” Wise told the Reporter in 2019. “But one day, I just couldn’t remember anyone’s names anymore.” Decades later, his psychiatrist told him his brain had repressed those names at the same time as it repressed his traumatic memories.

The writer describes Reg as a gentle man who concealed the pain and trauma of serving in history’s greatest conflict, yet was as approachable as the kindest friend. He lived through the conflict and helped bring down the Nazis. He was one part of the Allied wheel as it rolled across occupied Europe, but a larger-than-life part in the writer’s eyes.

The writer says they will think of Reg this Nov. 11, along with everyone who served their country and everyone who made the ultimate sacrifice. The column closes: “Here’s to ya, Reg!”

Reginald Wise series:

“Surrey veteran talks about the emotional side of war”: https://cloverdalereporter.com/2019/11/10/surrey-veteran-remembers-the-war-and-its-emotional-toll-on-soldiers/

“Cloverdale resident, and Royal Marine, Reginald Wise revisits Battle for Sarande in WWII”: https://cloverdalereporter.com/2020/11/05/cloverdale-resident-and-royal-marine-reginald-wise-revisits-battle-of-sarande-in-wwii/

“Cloverdale veteran observes 79th anniversary of Dieppe raid”: https://cloverdalereporter.com/2021/08/24/cloverdale-veteran-observes-79th-anniversary-of-dieppe-raid/

“Cloverdale WWII veteran passes away”: https://cloverdalereporter.com/2021/11/02/cloverdale-wwii-veteran-passes-away/

“COLUMN: Reg Wise, remembering a friend”: https://cloverdalereporter.com/2021/11/11/reg-wise-remembering-a-friend/