Of the 65 million servicemen and women who were mobilized worldwide, 8.5 million had been killed. Canada’s share was over 60,000 dead, a heavy cost for a young country. During the 1920’s, as the full cost of the war sank in, memorials and cenotaphs began to appear in most countries.

In Canada, hundreds of villages, towns and cities established their memorials in prominent places. In 1922, Canadian Pacific Railway unveiled a memorial statue as a lasting tribute to those of its own work force who had volunteered and died.

Three copies of the winged angel carrying a fallen soldier were commissioned, as well as thirty copies of a bronze memorial tablet.

During the First World War, over 11,000 CPR employees had volunteered and 1,116 were killed.