We Lived In Danger: From True Prairie Boy to Royal Regina Rifleman: A Western Canadian's WWII Memoir

“We Lived in Danger" -- a December 2023 Midwest Book Review “Reviewer’s Choice, Small Press Bookwatch” award winner -- written in 29,000 words and 33 photos unveils -- in the tradition of American author Tom Brokaw’s “The Greatest Generation” -- a rare, fascinating, and deeply personal story about -- a small-town prairie boy from Saskatchewan Canada – Victor Hepburn Small, who enlisted in 1942 at age 18 -- "to fight the Germans. Every living body did the same thing” and serve his country during WWII.

Published by his wife after “Vic’s” passing in 2021, this remarkably unique anthology recounts with firsthand authenticity and in vivid detail examples of the willingness, camaraderie, courage, and preparedness needed to ready a soldier for combat. Vic’s transcribed, word for word “Blue Bombers” leave letters -- lovingly preserved in his family for over 75 years -- are gripping and eloquent. They reveal incidences of his military training in Alberta and British Columbia, Canada; his crossing the pond from Halifax to Britain with 15,000 other Canadian soldiers on the deck of Cunard Line’s Queen Mary; his training as a flame thrower and as a mountain climber in Wales; his acceptance into officer’s training and his graduation from Sandhurst Royal Military College, December 1944; his serving in the European Theatre from 1943 to 1945, and with the Canadian Army of Occupation in 1945.

Not unlike many Canadian soldiers -- Vic kept his film camera strapped to his side from Canada to Great Britain, and to Holland, and to Germany -- and so, left behind an emblematic photo collection for his memoir, delicately captioned by hand. “We Lived in Danger” is truly a tribute to the undeniable resolve of Vic’s generation, a rare, historic fingerprint of an analytical, light-hearted, yet curious young Canadian man extending his view of the world around him, and finally, an insight into the heart-breaking reality for soldiers of war back then, and the few WWII veterans left today.

In a review of “We Lived in Danger: From True Prairie Boy to Royal Regina Rifleman. A Western Canadian’s WWII Memoir” written by Waterloo University Professor Geoffrey Hayes he said: “This book may be one of the last memoirs of a Canadian veteran of the Second World War. Victor Small believed his story was worth telling. With the help of his family and other historians, it certainly was”. Upon receiving a Recommended Citation, Professor Hayes review of Vic’s memoir was published in “Canadian Military History”, 33.2, Article 14 (2024).

**MIDWEST BOOK REVIEW**
“Deftly edited by Joanna Small and published posthumously, "We Lived In Danger: From True Prairie Boy to Royal Regina Rifleman: A Western Canadian's WWII Memoir" is a impressively compelling, exceptionally informative, and truly memorable contribution to our expanding body of WWII Histories, Biographies, and Memoirs. While especially and unreservedly recommended for personal, professional, community, college, and university library collections, it should be noted for students, academia, military history buffs, and non-specialist general readers with an interest in the subject that "We Lived In Danger: From True Prairie Boy to Royal Regina Rifleman: A Western Canadian's WWII Memoir" is also available in a paperback edition and in a digital book format.”