Camp Boys / Internment in Canada dossier

Alfred Bader’s internment shirt from Camp I (Île-aux-Noix, Quebec), circa 1940-1941. Bader arrived in Canada on-board the S.S. Sobieski and was interned for fifteen months before his sponsored release on November 2, 1941. After attending Queen’s University, Bader became a noted chemist, businessman and collector of fine art.

– Courtesy Alfred Bader

“The uniform an internee is required to wear is both degrading and unworthy of a civilization that believes in encouraging the individual, rather than treading on his soul. It was disturbing to find distinguished university professors dressed as clowns. The red circle, which is commonly supposed to be a target for the machine guns, is a shabby insult to men who are ready to wear the red cross.”
– Alexander Paterson, “Report on Civilian Internees Sent from the United Kingdom to Canada During the Unusually Fine Summer of 1940”