Identity area
Type of entity
Authorized form of name
Parallel form(s) of name
Standardized form(s) of name according to other rules
Other form(s) of name
- J.J. Claxton
- Jim Claxton
Identifiers for corporate bodies
Description area
Dates of existence
History
James Joseph Claxton was born in Ireland on August 22, 1910 and immigrated to Canada as a teenager. Despite a love for his adopted country, he never forgot his Irish roots. In 1941, he joined the Irish Fusiliers of Canada (Vancouver Regiment) where he was able to serve the British Commonwealth along side his many Irish-Canadian compatriots. The following year, his regiment was deployed for active overseas combat in North Africa, Italy and North Western Europe. At the end of World War II, Claxton returned to British Columbia where he explored this province by settling for a time in Kamloops, Kelowna, Salmon Arm and finally Burnaby. He owned a jewellery store in the New Westminster area for several years in which he showcased his extensive collection of Royal Irish Constabulary badges and ephemera. Claxton was an active leader for the Salmon Arm Boys Scouts of Canada group, and was a member of both the Irish Fusiliers Association and the Toc H (an international charity and membership movement that emerged from a soldiers' club in Belgium during World War I). He also served aboard the M.S. Columbia III (ca. 1960) – one of the last ships then maintained by the Anglican Church’s Columbia Coast Mission. This mission provided religious, medical and social services to remote coastal settlements, logging camps and First Nations communities along the inner coast from 1905 to the late 1960s. James Joseph Claxton passed away at the Royal Columbian Hospital, New Westminster at the age of 86. He was cremated and buried at sea off the northern tip of Vancouver Island at Cape Caution.
Places
Legal status
Functions, occupations and activities
Mandates/sources of authority
Internal structures/genealogy
General context
Relationships area
Access points area
Subject access points
Place access points
Occupations
Control area
Authority record identifier
Institution identifier
Rules and/or conventions used
Canadian Council of Archives "Rules of Archival Description" (revised 2008)
Status
Level of detail
Dates of creation, revision and deletion
Language(s)
- English
Script(s)
Sources
“Toc H” located at http://www.toch-uk.org.uk/index.html (accessed April 18, 2011); “Irish Military Diaspora” located at http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irish_military_diaspora (accessed April 18, 2011)
“Irish Regiments of The British Army” located at http://irishregimentsofthebritisharmy.webs.com/apps/photos/photo?photoid=28452208 (accessed April 18, 2011). “Remembering Columbia’s Glory Days” by Jeanette Taylor published in the “Columbia River Mirror” (Oct. 20, 2006) located at http://www.porthardy.ca/siteengine/activepage.asp?PageID=21 (accessed Nov. 17, 2009).