Deseronto Archives

At a meeting held in the Council Chamber of Deseronto Town Hall at 8 o’clock in the evening on this day in 1918, the Council made a resolution in relation to the Kaiser. It was reported in the Napanee Beaver ten days later:

Deseronto Demands Trial of Ex-Kaiser
A resolution to bring the ex-kaiser and others of his ilk to justice was unanimously passed by a standing vote of the municipal council of the corporation of the Town of Deseronto. It reads as follows:
“We, the members of the municipal council of the corporation of the Town of Deseronto, on behalf of ourselves and the citizens of Deseronto, hereby request the prime minister of Canada, Sir Robert Borden, who is to represent Canada at the meeting of the war council, to demand of that war council, on behalf of all those belonging to British and allied countries, whether military or civilians, who may have suffered through the brutalities inflicted during the course of the late war, and which brutalities were undoubtedly instigated by the kaiser and his followers, that all such who are living be brought to the bar of justice in the same manner as any other notorious criminals, to be tried and condemned by such court as the allied war council shall create or designate; and, further, that all those of the German people or their allies who may have been in any way responsible for such atrocities as have scandalized the world during the war be similarly dealt with, so that none may escape.
“And that a copy of this resolution be forwarded immediately to the premier, Sir Robert Borden.”

In the council minute book after the record of this resolution, is an additional motion:

Moved by Coun. Hunt, seconded by Coun. Fox, that the clerk be instructed to have 1000 copies of the above resolution printed for distribution. Carried.

The council members present at this meeting were the Mayor, Ebenezer Arthur Rixen; the Reeve, Thomas J. Naylor; and Councillors Thomas Fox, Milton Hunt, and William H. Richardson.