Private John Cuicuilete
3106697
Born Bailesti, Romania 1897
Living in Indianapolis, Indiana, USA
Enlisted in the CEF in Jan 1918
Served with the 116th Battalion
What motivates a man to give up on his dreams and offer to give up his life for a cause? Of course we know all the standard reasons…’For King and Country’, ‘Duty’, ‘Honour’, ‘Freedom’ and ‘Liberty’ …and cannot forget ‘because all me mates were going and I didn’t want to miss out on all the fun’ or ‘because all me mates were going, really I cannot really stay here by myself’. However, what motivates the man who travelled all across the world to seek his fortune, thousands of miles from his homeland who at the time was not even an active participant in the conflict? What motivates a man to place his life into the hands of a country that prior to the war he doesn’t appear to have even visited? This appears to be the story of a one Private John Cuicuilete.
Private John Cuicuilete story began far from Canada in a small town situated in the south-west of the Eastern European country of Romania. Romania or translated from the original Latin meaning “citizen of the Roman Empire”. Just for that name origin story is enough to prove that Romania does not get enough props as that is pretty cool. Instead of its’ ancient origins, most people know of the country as the place where Nosferatu or Dracula lives. His home/castle is located in the northern state of Transylvannia and from my understanding is propped atop a mountain and has a driveway lined by heads stuck to the tops of sharp pointy sticks. Back to John…he was born on Christmas Day in a village called Bailesti. The population of the village at the time of his birth was about 1500. Details are not yet been uncovered, however it appears that John immigrated to the United States and landed in Indianapolis, Indiana.
From his quaint pastoral beginnings in a speck of the town in a rural portion of Romania John soon found himself in a city that was known as gateway to the west…the rapidly expanding city of Indianapolis. This move provided John with loads of opportunity and adventure. To be a 20 yr old lad landing in this spot must have felt to him like he won the lottery. However, there are some parts of this story that we know that we don’t know. By the fall of 1917 there was no mysteries about what was going on in France and Belgium. It was a virtual bloodbath…from Ypres to the Somme to the Battle of Arras and then Passchendaele or Third Ypres, the tallies of the dead continued to pile up. Yet…for the most part the dead included those from British or French origins. Why would John be motivated to enlist? And to travel all the way to Canada to ensure he can get to the front faster?
John’s homeland, Romania, has an interesting and wholly tragic war story of its’ own. While Romania had an allegiance with its’ neighbour, Hungary, the nature of the agreement was that it would only support them militarily if Hungary was attacked. However, as Austria was the aggressor in their fight against Serbia and with Hungary immediately joining in based on their alliance agreements with both Austria and Germany, this gave Romania an ‘out’ and allowed them to sit ‘out’ the war. As the events of the war proceeded and the years passed by, both England and Russia aggressively worked to entice Romania to their side. In 1916, Romania jumped onboard Team Entente and send their armies north to fight the Hungarians. Romania had a few things going for it when it joined the war. First, it had lots of men that they could put into arms. Second…wait, there was no second. Romania was an impoverished nation with an inexperienced, weak military armed with comparatively old and ineffective weapons. Their primary challenge was that their opponent, Germany didn’t suffer from any of these issues. They were an expert, talented army who had been fighting with success for two years and armed with some of the most modern, effective weapons known to man. The result of the ensuing conflict between the two sides in Romania are staggering. With less than a year of fighting, Romania suffered over 550,000 casualties. If compared against the Canadians who participated in almost all of the battles of the Western Front, we lost only 240,000 casualties. The KIA figures are even more lopsided…Romania lost 250,000 soldiers along with 300,000 dead civilians. Canada, on the other hand, lost approximately 61,000 dead. 4 to 1. From Private John Cuicuilete’s hometown of Baileski, 156 men died while fighting the Germans. 156! For John that would mean his brothers, uncles, cousins, school age friends, neighbours…they would almost all be victims of the war. From this perspective, the numbers are truly staggering and leaving us no question about one’s motivation to enlist, fight and seek revenge.
Thus, as we look down the long queue of men lined up to put their pen to paper and enlist with His Majesty’s forces, we can now better understand why a young 20 yr old lad from Romania was amongst the volunteers. Packed away in his satchel, practically containing everything owned would have been some dog-eared letters informing him of catastrophic losses that his hometown endured. That was all the motivation the young man needed. John’s ‘war story’ is rather short and unfortunately also rather uncomplicated. He enlisted on Jan 31st, 1918 in Toronto. Just over a month later he was walking down the gangplank in Liverpool and was soon learning how to shoot a firearm, bayonet a sack hanging from a post and obey the odd command or two. On the 24th of August, John was transferred to the the 116th Battalion. The unit was just about to participate in a series of attacks east of Arras where they were ordered to liberate a town called Boiry Notre Dame. John, still as green of a soldier as one can get, survived this first introduction to the war. However, a few weeks later the battalion participated in the drive to bypass the Canal du Nord and then clear the nearby city of Cambrai. Two full companies of soldiers were wiped out as the 116th tried to take a fortified trench in the village of Ste. Olle. John would not survive the assault. It was the 29thof September 1918. He is buried near where he fell at Ste Olle British Cemetery.
John did his bit and the magnificent memorial situated in the centre of the town of Baileski, Romania honours the loss of 156 of their sons who fell in the war. The memorial should be amended to 157 sons.
Remember him.