Janice Cooper dabs her eyes with an orange handkerchief as a chorus of pipe bands play in downtown Nelson.
Cooper's father, James Munro, was among the Canadian soldiers who helped liberate the Netherlands during the Second World War. Eighty years ago, on May 5, 1945, Munro played his own bag pipes in the streets of Amsterdam on the day of Germany's formal surrender in the country.
As Cooper listened to pipers play on Baker Street during a commemorative event Saturday, she thought of her father's service and what the sound of bag pipes means to her family.
“I just kept so choked up when I hear the pipes, it's just crazy. It was such a part of my childhood.”
Approximately 7,600 Canadians died during the eight-month campaign to free the Netherlands, which during the weekend hosted visiting Canadian veterans and pipe bands.
Bill Haire, president of Nelson's Royal Canadian Legion No. 51, was reminded of how Canadian forces were welcomed by the Dutch who at the time were dying by the thousands due to famine.
“Their suffering was terrible," said Haire. "Five years with no food, nothing. I can’t comprehend it. We’re so fortunate, and that’s why we can’t forget it. Right now this world is not so great, but all the more reason to have this commemoration parade to show the validity of the Allies to defeat something so notorious and dangerous to humanity.”
Nelson's Kootenay Kiltie Pipe Band and several other visiting bands from the B.C. interior performed Saturday as spectators waved Dutch and Canadian flags.
Munro, who was briefly engaged to a Dutch woman while stationed in the country, returned home after the war and became a member of the Kilties. He taught current Pipe Major David Hogg how to play, and Cooper recalled how she and her siblings would polish Munro's shoes and pipes before every performance.
“He gave up the pipes in his 70s because he didn't have the breath anymore, but he would have been very moved to be here.”
Garry Meyer was also in the crowd Saturday. An immigrant to Canada, Meyer was just four years old in the Netherlands when the war began and recalled how difficult the famine was on a family with 10 children.
Meyer rarely saw his father Jan during the war. Jan was a member of the Dutch resistance and had the job of assisting Allied pilots.
“He’d find out where a pilot had landed somewhere, where he actually parachuted down and he was safe. And so a farmer covered him, and then [Jan] would take this guy to a fishing boat, and the fishing boat will go to the North Sea and meet another fishing boat from England. And that's how these pilots got back. It was unbelievable.”
In her phone, Cooper keeps an image of Munro that his parents had painted. He's in uniform, with a row of medals lined up at the corner of the frame. The reasons why Canada fought for freedom in the Netherlands, she said, are as vital today as they were then.
"I think it's important to remember and remind us why we are here and living in this amazing country."
