A CITIZEN-WARRIOR’S TALE, DEFTLY TOLD BY HIS SON
Many men who served in war talk little about their experiences when they come home. But some men leave behind written memoirs, hidden away in desks or boxes and discovered by their family after they die. Such a man was Louis Wren, whose two wartime journals were discovered in his desk drawer by his wife and his son, Chris Wren, after his death. The war-driven journeys across ocean and desert described in these journals transformed Chris’s life and led him to write and publish The War Diaries of Louis E. Wren, available at Speaking Volumes bookstore in Markdale and at Amazon.ca and Indigo.ca.
When war with Germany began in 1939 Louis Wren, a British citizen, was an engineer aboard an oil tanker in the British Merchant Navy. His first journal describes his voyages through the Mediterranean and the Atlantic, enduring violent storms and mine fields, zig zagging in convoys to avoid U-boat attacks. In 1941 Louis Wren joined the Royal Air Force as a mechanical engineer servicing Wellington bomber engines, and in 1943 he was transferred to the Middle East and North Africa. His second journal describes a three-month journey aboard a troop ship heading for his new posting, including a near mutiny by rowdy troops that he describes with detached humour. The journal also recounts his time spent in RAF camps in Iran and Libya. After the war, Louis and his family immigrated to Canada, settling in Guelph.
Although Chris Wren had no previous experience with historical research, the discovery of his father’s diaries led him on his own journey. He conducted extensive research during several trips to the National Archives in England, and in 2019 he sailed on a container ship from Halifax to Liverpool to retrace the Atlantic convoy routes his father had taken 80 years earlier. The story of the combined journeys of father and son are the heart of Chris Wren’s book. When he started he had no idea of the enormity of the research he would conduct into both his father’s wartime exploits and the war in general – but he regrets not a minute of it.
As a child, Chris saw wartime photos in the family album but learned little directly from his father. One stark story that sticks in his memory, though, is his father’s account of watching sailors leaping into the sea from a burning ship, with no possibility of rescue. A less horrid story had to do with his father’s mates burying beer bottles in the desert sand, pouring gasoline around the bottles: the desert heat would evaporate the gas so quickly it would cool down the beer. Despite his reticence beyond these few stories, Louis was a sociable man with a great sense of humour, says his son – a man whose war years shaped his post-war involvement in both the Air Cadet League of Canada and the Canadian Legion (Louis also served as a school board trustee.)
One of the triumphs Chris experienced in studying his father’s diaries was the realization of how observant Louis Wren was, and how eloquent he was as a writer (including his reflections on religion and philosophy through a citizen-warrior’s eyes.) And Chris was also moved by his father’s empathy for German sailors in U-boats as they were being depth-charged by convoy escort ships – men trapped in the same war as Louis was.
Chris and his sister Melody reflect sadly on the likelihood that their father wrote at least one other journal that has been lost, since there is a two year wartime gap for which Louis left no written record. And Melody says that in light of what they know now, she and Chris regret they never got to know their father better when he was alive.
What would Chris say to his father if he could? “We’re proud of you,” says Chris. “You served your country for six years, you were brave enough to re-settle our family in Canada, and I cherish every moment you shared with me when I was a child.”
Retired now from his career as an environmental scientist and living with his wife, Lisa, on their country property near Markdale, Chris continues to research family and community history, using the skills he learned while exploring his father’s wartime story. His advice to others with a yen for historical research: “Start now. Talk to your elderly relatives and friends and record their stories, even if you’re not writing a book about them.”
Reading Chris’ book, one is left with the distinct feeling that Louis Wren would be as proud of his son’s achievements as Chris is of his father’s vibrant life in wartime and in peace.
Chris Wren will share his book and his father’s story at a presentation at Annesley United Church in Markdale on Wednesday September 3, which is Merchant Navy Veterans Day – a day to commemorate the sacrifices and courage of over 30,000 merchant seafarers, men and women, who died during the Second World War, and to acknowledge the vital role of merchant seafarers in keeping the UK supplied with food and war materiel. Louis Wren was one of them who survived, and whose written account enriches our knowledge of their bravery.
More details of his September 3 presentation at Annesley will be posted closer to the event, and further information can be found on Chris’s website, https://chrisdwren.com
0 comments