A TRUE STORY "The Soldier & the Orphan: Separated by Church & War" by Alastair Henry
In conjunction with the Churches, Britain’s Home Children program sent as many as 100,000 orphans as young as 3 years old to Canada. The program ended in 1939.
It’s hard to fathom, but Britain’s Home Children program routinely shuffled British orphans like chattel, “commodities for export,” shipping them to Canada with no regard for their family ties or personal well-being. They carefully erased their birth histories, making it almost impossible for them to later find their families. In fact, many children were orphaned not by death, but by poverty or the shame of being born extra-maritally.
The novel establishes a keen sense of Britain’s use of church institutions in the diabolical scheme, essentially exploiting church morality for its own ends. In this world, an orphanage is, in fact, a “holding facility for children until they were emigrated to Canada.” In conjunction with the Churches, Britain’s Home Children program sent as many as 100,000 orphans as young as 3 years old to Canada. The program ended in 1939.
This straightforward, fast-moving historical novel covers three generations, but it focuses on the lives of Billy and Tommy, working-class twin boys separated at birth in the early twentieth century and reunited by a series of miracles. It begins with Billy contending with critical injuries at a hospital during World War II. When he recovers, he becomes a “rag and bone” man who ekes out a living by recycling the trash of others.
All around Billy, people must endure the insanity of war, poverty, loss, and separation inflicted upon them. But despite all of this, they persist.
And then, through the kindness of strangers, Billy learns that he has a brother. In time, he finds out his brother Tommy works as an indentured dairy farmer in Quebec.
Their birth family’s circumstances, including the twins’ conception outside of marriage and their grandfather’s rigid religiosity, led to their separation—and also to the alienation of their birth mother from her own father.
The boys’ story evokes indignation over such injustices, in which people were (and still are in many ways) regularly treated as less human under the radar. Ostensibly, these things are done in the name of doing “right” by placing the value of money and holy matrimony (and today, citizenship as well) far above the value of human life, blind to the cruelty of civilization.
In plain words with just enough details to flesh out its events, this is a perspective-driven story that emphasizes the influence we all have on one another. Indeed, Billy always remembers his neighbor Irene’s words: “There’s always someone who needs us, Billy.”
Billy and Tommy work toward a reunion, but it is wholly dependent on the kindness of those around them in disclosing crucial information. People’s memories of what happened in previous generations factor in to great effect; they complement the boys’ present, proving crucial to their understanding and eventual healing.
Working toward a joyous, emotive conclusion, The Soldier and the Orphan is a fascinating historical novel in which separated twins are fortunate enough to experience love, friendship, and the power of a neighbor’s kindness to help them reunite and eventually heal.
"THE SOLDIER AND THE ORPHAN: Separated by Church & War" by Alastair Henry, Friesen Press, 2022, eBook $8.99
