10/11/2025
We always have something to learn from history
At 6 in the morning on November 11th, 1918, soldiers began to learn that the First World War would end at 11am, but that fighting would continue until then. The last Canadian to die would be a young Maritimer who was killed only two minutes before the guns went silent..
Twenty-five-year-old George Lawrence Price was born in Falmouth, Nova Scotia, but was working on a Saskatchewan farm before he enlisted.
Just two minutes before the guns went silent, Price and four fellow soldiers crossed a bridge into a small Belgian town. A German sniper fired a single shot.
From a house across the street, a young Belgian nurse saw him fall. She ran through the gunfire, helped pull him to safety, and watched helplessly as he died. The time was 10:58 a.m.
In his pocket, his friends found a small velvet maple leaf — now stained with his blood.
Two minutes later, the guns went silent.
George Price was the last Commonwealth soldier to die in the First World War.
More than seventy years later, the people of that same Belgian town held a vote to name their new bridge. The winner:
The George Price Memorial Bridge.
Beneath a small glass case in the town’s school sits that same velvet maple leaf. The plaque reads:
“At the ultimate moment when peace was signed, you fell for us — the last victim of a sad conflict. Thank you, George Price.”
📰 Read the full article here: https://backyardhistory.ca/articles/f/two-minutes-left-the-last-soldier-to-die-in-the-first-world-war
🎙 Or listen to it on the Backyard History Podcast: https://tinyurl.com/two-minutes-to-go
📕 This story is in the book ‘Backyard History: Forgotten Stories from Atlantic Canada’s Past’ which is available at backyardhistory.ca/books
