Private George William Williams was born December 16th, 1873 in Norfolk, England to James and Eliza Rosanna Williams (Ancestry.ca). His sister, who for reasons yet to be discovered, seems to have gone by the name Mrs. Ethel Beatrice Kett on census papers, by Mrs. Ivy Margaret Kett on George’s next of kin documents, and by Mrs. Ivy Ethel Kett on her gravestone, apparently came to Canada first, and was followed by George shortly thereafter. Both Ivy/Ethel and George ended up living in Churchville; Ivy/Ethel was married to Peter Kett and they had two daughters: Thelma and Betty (source: findagrave.com). George was single and worked as a “Bushman”. 

              Back in England Williams had served for two years as a private with the 8th Norfolk Regiment, and when Canada declared war, he quickly volunteered his service with the 109th Battalion out of Victoria and Haliburton, but was rejected on the grounds of being legally blind in his left eye. On April 30th, 1917, however, at age 43, George was drafted into the Canadian Forestry Corps through the Toronto Forestry Draft (source: Library & Archives Canada). The Canadian Forestry Unit was created at the request of Britain in early 1916. Britain was experiencing an extreme shortage of timber, building supplies, etc. and the CFC was their answer. More than 25 000 people served in the Canadian Forestry Corps, and thousands of these were people who had previously been rejected from service due to physical disabilities like Private Williams (source: Yeoman of the Woods by Cameron Bartlett). Williams was stationed in France where he was likely supplying timber for the construction of trenches, shelters, hospitals, etc. He did this until the end of the war, and went home to Canada in July of 1919.  Once Williams returned home, his paper trail seems to have completely dried up. There seem to be no records of address changes, census mentions, no newspaper articles, no details on his death or where he was buried.