Bertrand Weatherill was born in Oil City, Lambton County, on November 8, 1895, the son of Robert Weatherill (born in Toronto) and Laura Louisa (nee Keating, born in Oil Springs) Weatherill, of Wyoming, Ontario. His siblings included Helen Eskelly (born 1888) and Robert James (born 1889). Bertrand’s father Robert was a merchant in Oil City before engaging in a brokerage business and still later in fruit farming. Father Robert died on his farm in 1899 from the effects of food poisoning. Mother Laura would remarry in December of 1907, to John Palmer Jarmaine.
Bertrand, a bachelor, left his job as a banker and enlisted on September 7, 1915 in London, Ontario. His enlistment papers also recorded that he had one year prior experience with the Queen’s Own Rifles, Toronto. Bertrand became a member of the Army, Canadian Infantry, Central Ontario Regiment, 58th Battalion, with the rank of Corporal. One year after enlisting, on September 17, 1916, Bertrand Weatherill would lose his life while fighting during the Battle of the Somme, France. Bertrand Weatherill would later be officially listed as, Previously reported Wounded and Missing now for Official purposes presumed to have died. Twenty-three year old Bertrand Weatherill has no known grave. He is memorialized on the Vimy Memorial, Pas de Calais, France and was awarded the Victory Medal and the British War Medal. Bertrand’s name is also included on a World War I memorial tablet in St. Paul’s Anglican Church, in Toronto, along with the names of 75 other men of that church who died during the Great War. On the Sarnia cenotaph, his name is inscribed as C. Weatherill.
SOURCES: A, B, C, D, E, F, L, N, 2C, 2D, 2G