Hugh B. Brown, counselor in the First Presidency to David O. McKay (pictured here as a young man in his Canadian uniform), often drew on his experiences in the Canadian military during World War I while speaking in General Conference. Here is a story he told in April, 1969:

… I have had a little experience in that field [military service], and I think I would like to tell you a story with relation to it, a story that may be not so well known here in the United States because it happened in Canada.

First, I think I would like to say to the young men who are listening and who are present that I wish you would cultivate a sense of humor.

In the army while in the first world war, one of our boys who was a pretty good fighter was challenged in England to a fight. This young man, our Mormon boy, had the habit of smiling all the way through a fight. One of the men whom he was pitted against was champion, and during the fight he said to his attendants between rounds, “I can’t lick that guy unless I can knock that grin off of his face.” He was not able to do it. That smile represented a courage of cold steel, and the Mormon boy won the battle.

Now as to the story: In 1906 the government of Canada passed a law that was known as the Militia Act, comparable to the home guard here. They sent out into all the provinces a call for men to take training preparatory to what Lord Roberts said was sure to come, a world war. A young man was sent to Cardston to recruit some of our men. This young fellow was the son of a prominent military man. He had been raised with a silver spoon in his mouth, evidently. He was one of those fellows who had a jaunty mustache and a little swagger stick, and he wore a monocle, a one-eye glass. He was a most objectionable fellow in the eyes of our young men. In fact, his monocle reminds me of another story.

I was standing one day between Picadilly Circus and Leicester Square talking to an American officer during the first world war. We saw a man coming down the sidewalk with his hat on one side, swinging a swagger stick, a Charlie Chaplin mustache, and a monocle. I said to the officer, “I wonder why those fellows wear a one-eye glass instead of two.”

“Well,” he said, “I’ll tell you. A guy like that can see more with one eye than he can comprehend.”

Well, such was the man who came out to recruit the Mormon boys. He spent two weeks in Cardston. He was sent out to organize a squadron of mounted men. He did not get one recruit during that two weeks. A lot of them came in and responded to his call, but did not sign up. He went back to Ottawa and reported the Mormons were disloyal and ought to be expelled from Canada.

The member of parliament from our district at that time was W. A. Buchanan, who knew our people very well. The matter was taken to the floor of the parliament, and considerable agitation was whipped up. Mr. Buchanan arose and said, “If you will allow some of their own men to become officers, you will get all the Mormon boys you want.”

The government finally accepted his recommendation, and they sent word out to President Edward J. Wood to appoint some men to go and take training, which he did. I happened to be one who was called in by President Wood and called on a three-year mission, to go to Calgary and take training as a militia officer.

While I was in training, a young Mormon boy came into the camp. He was awkward. He was not educated very well, but he was a young Mormon boy who had been taught to live the gospel. After one parade, when he had gone through everything backwards, he was called by the captain to come into his office. The captain said, “I have noticed you, young fellow. You are from Cardston, aren’t you?”

He said, “Yes, sir.”

“You are a Mormon, I suppose.”

“Yes, sir.”

“Well, I just wanted to make friends with you. Will you have a glass of beer?”

“Sir, I do not drink liquor.”

The captain said, “The — you don’t. Maybe you will have a cigar then.”

He said, “Thank you, sir, but I do not smoke.”

The captain seemed much annoyed by this, and he dismissed the boy from the room.

When the young man went back to his quarters, some of the lesser officers accosted him angrily and said, “You fool, don’t you realize the captain was trying to make a friend of you, and you insulted him to his face?”

The young Mormon boy answered, “Gentlemen, if I must be untrue to my ideals and my people and do things that I have been instructed all my life I should not do, I’ll quit the army.”

When the time came for the final examinations in that camp, the captain sent this young man down to Calgary from Sarcee Camp to do some work for him, and they were having examinations while he was gone. When he returned the captain said, “Now you go in the other room there, and I will give you the list of questions, and you can write your examination.”

He went in and returned and said, “Sir, all the books we have studied are there on that desk. Surely you don’t want me to write my examination there where I can turn to those books.”

The captain said, “That is just what I do want. I know from my knowledge of you that you will not open a one of those books. You will be honorable, you will be honest, and I trust you.”

Well, that young man, while overseas later on in the war, was sent for by his captain, who had then become a lieutenant colonel, in response to a call from general headquarters for the best man he had in his battalion. They had a special mission for him to perform. They said, “We don’t care anything about his education or his training. We want a man who can’t be broken when put under test. We want a man of character.” The lieutenant colonel, his former captain, selected and assigned this young man who had the courage to stand before him and say, “I do not smoke. I do not drink.”

I cite that as a type of thing that happens sometimes in military life, and because Brother Packer spoke of the military, it reminded me of it.

Well, at the end of the training period we organized a squadron and took them to Calgary in the years 1912-14, when, as you know, the first world war broke out, Canada and England having been in the war for some years before the United States came in. Our Mormon boys made a great name for themselves, both in Canada and overseas.