Diary of Allen Erastus Hager
Allen Erastus Hager’s diary begins on 19 September 1918 when the twenty-six-year-old soldier left Witley Camp in Surrey, England, for Dundee, Scotland. From there, he sailed to Archangel (Arkhangelsk), Russia with the Canadian branch of the Siberian Expeditionary Force. The diary consists of a reporter’s notebook bound at the top and measuring 21 x 13.5 centimetres. The gold-lettered title on the black cover reveals the manufacturer as the Kelvin Electrical Company. From September 1918 to June 1919, Hager records the fight against Bolshevik forces as well as his encounters with soldiers of the Allied White Army and with Russian civilians. His 12 November 1918 entry, which records the Armistice, also gives way to unrestrained anger, while his entries of 29 November 1918 and 22 December 1918 give evocative accounts of skirmishes with Bolshevik troops.