Selfless-serve

Community-minded Second World War veteran eager to lend a hand wherever, whenever he could

By: Malak Abas

When asked to describe his father, Bill Hughes hesitates. He says he’s been asked the same question before and he had difficulty then, too.

"You know, I’d need a book to describe my dad. Really, I truly would," he says.

After some thought, he settled on one word: service.

"My dad, that’s what he was all about. With his service to his country, with his service to his community; he was a huge lover of his community and a helper of his community," he says.

Harold Edgar Hughes died on Valentine’s Day at the age of 95.

He was born in Transcona on Sept. 19, 1924, grew up there with his six siblings, and eventually raised his children there, too. When he was 19, he served for 18 months during the Second World War within the Royal Canadian Naval Volunteer Reserve as an engine room artificer aboard the HMCS Lanark, holding the rank of petty officer.

He spoke of that time rarely, but warmly, Bill says.

"Even in his last two years of life, if you started to talk to him, the memories that came back to him were all about the Navy," he says.

"It was all about his service, and I’m talking about the Navy when he was 19 years old and he was in the service. It’s funny that that was such a profound part of his life that he just kind of never let it go.

"He never talked about it very much; we didn’t find a lot of things out until just recently because he wasn’t a man to talk. He was in the war, as many young men were at that time, but none of them ever really wanted to talk about it afterward."

Even so, Harold remained connected to his naval roots for his entire life. He was a member of HMCS Chippawa for much of his adult life and was a proud volunteer for the Naval Museum of Manitoba for 25 years, where he spent much of his time restoring naval artifacts — that’s where Claude Rivard met him.

Rivard, the curator for the museum, knew Hughes for the entire 25 years and says he was remembered for hard work and an easygoing attitude.

"He was not the kind of guy that would give you a hard time about anything, but if he thought that we weren’t doing things right, he’d let us know," Rivard says. "He wasn’t shy."

Hughes’ work as a machinist reflected his lifelong devotion to both the naval service and metal work.

"He took a lot of pride in what he did at the museum, and, quite frankly, we were just as happy to have him," Rivard says.

Besides the volunteering he did for the museum, it was the small things Harold would do here and there that defined his good nature, Rivard says.

"He used to watch for the sales flyers," he says. "Whenever there was coffee on sale close by where he lived... he was our coffee guy; he used to bring it in. That was basically his gift to the museum, so to speak. His donation, in addition to his time."

Small acts of service to his friends, family and community defined Hughes’ postwar years. He worked as a mechanical technician for the Canadian Grain Commission until he was 75.

Even his hobbies, Bill said, often went hand-in-hand with a bit of help. Case in point was his love of hockey.

"He played hockey all of his life and was a very good hockey player at one time, and he did that with his kids... and he did that with his grandkids," Bill says.

The family lived in Transcona and played hockey at Pirates Community Club where, Bill says, his father coached and helped maintain the centre’s facilities, flooding and cleaning the rink.

Hard work was a central moral ground in Hughes’ life. His interest in mechanics meant he would spend time fixing his neighbours’ vehicles, and his love for the church meant if he was shovelling outside his home, he would head to the Transcona Memorial United Church and shovel its walk, too.

"When he sold his house, just to give you an idea of what kind of guy he was, he literally had a machine shop in his garage from what I understand, and when he sold his house and moved out, we inherited every screw and nut and bolt they had in the place," Rivard says.

"I could probably open a hardware store because of it."

Hughes had to end his time volunteering at the museum about three years ago, after the death of Marjorie, his wife of 64 years. The museum ended up having to hire two people to do the work he did, Rivard says.

"After he stopped coming to the museum, we missed him a lot. And, quite frankly, we would kind of let the metal work go astray or go, not like Harold would want it to," he says.

"And we’d say to each other, ‘Well, we’ve got to get this back to where Harold’s standard was.’"

Hughes is survived by much of his large family, which includes Bill and his other sons Alf and Phil, his sister and brother and grandchildren, great-grandchildren and one great-great-grandson.

While Bill would need a book to describe his father, there were are moments that stick out in his mind more than others.

When Bill was 19 — the same age as his father when joined the Navy — he decided he wanted to build a cottage.

"So, I came home one day — I was still living at home at the time and so I didn’t even have a house then — and I said, ‘Dad, I want to build a cottage.’

"The first thing my dad said is, ‘When do we start?’ That’s just the kind of guy he was."

malak.abas@freepress.mb.ca

Twitter: malakabas_