Mentoring the Canadian Corps: Imperial Officers and the Canadian Expeditionary Force, 1914–1918

The Canadian Corps of 1918 was not an entirely self-made machine. It needed outside help to develop into the highly effective fighting formation that it became by war’s end. Between 1914 and 1918, the British Army sent scores of officers to Canadian formations, to make up key command and staff deficiencies in the Canadian Expeditionary Force and to train selected officers to take their places. Canadian political pressure ensured that these replacements were Canadian. The product of this somewhat ad hoc mentoring process was a Canadian Corps, commanded and staffed almost entirely by Canadian officers, that could keep pace with any British Expeditionary Force formation on the Western Front.