Light Up The World Foundation

First, I would like to express the sympathies and prayers of our family to the families and friends of the 15 soldiers previously killed on this mission, and to send our prayers for a full and speedy recovery to all those who have been injured, including our most recent casualties. I know that Nichola would have wanted that.

Thank you all so much for joining us here today. Jason, Victoria, Kate, Sally and I have been just overwhelmed by the public response to this terrible loss of our beautiful wife, sister, and daughter. It was for that reason we invited the media to attend this ceremony as well. There are so many people across Canada and around the world, including especially Nichola’s colleagues in Afghanistan, who are not able to be with us here today. Hopefully they will have the opportunity to see some of this service on the television or the Internet, and know that they are here in our hearts.

We are a family of story-tellers. We sit around the dining table for hours after a meal, with a bottle of wine or some coffee or whatever, and tell stories. This morning I’m going to tell you some stories, but I know we don’t have very long, so as Nichola would say, “come on daddy, spit it out!” So I’ll try.

A couple of months ago, I was asked by the United Nations Institute for Training and Research if I would be willing and able to go to Afghanistan, to run the train the trainers part of a professional development program for senior government officials. I would work for two days, have Friday off because that of course is the day for prayers, and then work another two days. I said I would be honoured to do such work, and immediately e-mailed Nichola – “would you like to meet for coffee in Kabul?” She was at the base at the time, and wrote back saying how my note had made her laugh out loud, and she and her guys were working out how they could persuade her commanding officer that they really needed to go to the capital for something vitally important! If that failed, maybe they could get me a ride on a helicopter down to Kandahar. As it happened, there was a conflict between the dates scheduled for the training and a previous commitment I had made to be at a conference, so I had to tell her that we’d have to defer our date. Today is the Friday we were going to meet for coffee.

I am not sure how one can possibly recount the vibrancy and vitality of someone like Nich. Not Nicky, by the way, always Nichola or Nich. Only one person ever called her Nicky and lived to tell the tale, and that was Lt-Colonel Ian Hope, her commander in Afghanistan. She never had the nerve to tell him that she hated it – “I’ll wait until I outrank him”, she joked. I guess that won’t happen now, so I’ll take it as a father’s duty to pass the message along.

You all know she was born in Papua New Guinea. She was always a fighter. She weighed under four pounds at birth, and of course medical facilities in those days were somewhat rudimentary. Her first crib was a sort of meat locker, made of insect-proof screening to keep the bugs out. Sally and I both knew that if she survived, it would be because she was resilient and strong.

And she was ... resilient, strong, funny, smart, caring, compassionate – she had so many strengths, and lived seriously the motto of the Royal Military College: Truth, Duty, Valour. She was a ball of energy, always on the go, packing everything in – Nichola lived more in her lifetime than many of much longer years.

She was also a true Canadian. We moved here when she was 4 years old, and her first school was in Black Lake, Saskatchewan. Sally and I were teaching there, and one day Sally walked past Nichola’s classroom. All the children were standing there, proudly beating their chests and proclaiming, “I am a Chipewyan Indian!” Including Nich!! She was so disappointed on Treaty Day, when she lined up in the Band Hall with her classmates, but when they all got to the front of the line the Mounties wouldn’t give her the five dollar bill that was received by everyone else.

Nichola lived and worked in every mainland province of this country. As a child, she moved with us from Saskatchewan, to Baffin Island, to Alberta, and to Antigonish, Nova Scotia. After she graduated from high school and then took the Queen’s Shilling, she did basic training at Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu in Quebec, where she met Jay, and they spent four years together at the Royal Military College in Kingston. As a soldier, she lived in Manitoba, spent many months on training exercises at Gagetown in New Brunswick, fought forest fires and conducted avalanche control in British Columbia. She has lived and worked from sea to sea to sea, and the only province or territory she never got to visit was the Yukon. She and Jay were talking of a trip up the Dempster Highway this summer, but then she was deployed to Afghanistan.

Dear Jay. They were both at Basic Training, down at Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu near Montreal, and she knew right away he was the one. Jay was her choice – and it was always her choice. She was a Care Bear of the heart but she was strong of spirit. And in Jason she saw the poised, thoughtful, supportive and articulate young man the whole world has seen these last few terrible days. She loved you so much, Jay, and all Sally and I can do is share her memory with you. You are like a brother to Victoria and Kate, and like a son to Sally and me. Not just in the legal “in law” sense, but more than that. In Kosovo they call it ‘besa’, which is family but beyond family. We are besa.

Nichola was an articulate and passionate individual. At Christmas last year we discussed the role of the military in places like Afghanistan, Iraq, Darfur. She supported the view put forward by Michael Ignatieff in his book, Empire Lite, that military force is required in order to permit the reconstruction of civil society. I disagreed, arguing that education is the key to development for the minority and marginalized peoples of this world, for the poor and the oppressed and those in greatest peril, and that by working with teachers and other community workers we could help them develop the strategies that would be right for their context and would help them achieve their own emancipation. We ought to seek democracy and civil society through Paulo Friere’s notions of a pedagogy of the oppressed.

Quick as a flash she punctured my professorial balloon. “You can’t do that when the bad guys run things, dad”, she said, “they just shoot you. You have to have peace and good government in order for the rest to happen. I do what I do so you can do what you do.”

As always, she was right. But through her death in combat, killed by people who were apparently hiding in or near a school, perhaps we can bring these two elements together, and make some meaningful tribute to her life and death.

Today we announce the establishment of the Captain Nichola K. S. Goddard Memorial Scholarship, an endowed scholarship to be tenable at the University of Calgary and which will be matched through the University.

Eligible applicants will be drawn from one of three groups. They may be citizens of Papua New Guinea, the place of her birth; they may be from the First Nations, Inuit, or Métis peoples of Canada, in whose company she spent so many of her formative years; or they may be citizens of Afghanistan, the place of her death.

Contributions should be directed care of the Faculty of Education at the University of Calgary.

Nichola truly was one of a kind, but she was also one of three sisters, and they loved each other dearly. Whenever she came home they would go out together, walking the dogs up at Nose Hill, shopping at MEC, reading shared books, telling stories, laughing together. Victoria and Kate are strong together, helping each other in this time of pain, and I would like to thank their friends who have rallied round and come here to support them in these darkest days. Indeed, we thank all our families, friends, colleagues, and everyone who is here today, or has contacted us, or has written notes to the newspaper ... we have been overwhelmed at your love and support.

Ours has become a very public grief, and I don’t think there’s much we can do about that. But I would urge you to remember our beautiful girl not just as a soldier, not just as the first Canadian woman to be killed in combat, but as a person with passion, one with a great enthusiasm for life. On New Year’s Day she persuaded Kate and Jay to join her in a charity swim – in the Irish Sea! Not just a dip, but a swim. Victoria volunteered to be their coach and hold the towels – she has always been the smart one. Anyway off they went, rushing down the sand at Aberdaron in North Wales and diving under the waves with all the other participants, while the rest of us stood laughing on the beach. Mind you, what else would you expect from the woman who came back from three weeks of winter military exercises in Shilo, and immediately dragged Jay out for a weekend of winter camping up at Riding Mountain National Park.

She had an infectious sense of humor. When we were living in Edmonton, we had to drive her across the city three nights a week for ski training. One bitterly cold evening as we were driving along, she suddenly said “it’s about minus 17, I think I’ll use the blue wax”. We got to the changing sheds at the park and the coach had the big thermometer out, sure enough it said minus 17. I didn’t think much of it, until the next week. “It’s about minus 11,” she said, “I’ll use green wax tonight”. Sure enough, down at the shed the thermometer said minus 11. As we were coming home I asked, “how do you do that?” “Oh it’s easy dad,” she said, “you have to look at the consistency of the exhaust smoke from the others cars, and which way it refracts when it hits the pavement. Then you can calculate from the angle and density of the exhaust how cold it is. We learned it in school.” Oh, OK, I said. This went on for a couple of weeks, she was always accurate to within two or three degrees. We all tried it, but failed dismally, no matter how hard she made us describe the exhaust fumes of the cars in front of us. Then one Sunday we were all going out for an afternoon ski somewhere, and as we drove along she said “It’s minus 24, I don’t think we should go for long today”, and suddenly Sally, looking out of the car window, burst out laughing, for she too had seen the digital thermometer on top of the old brewery!

She was also strong in her beliefs, especially of right and wrong. On her trips home to Antigonish and Calgary she often visited schools, and talked about life at Royal Military College. There were lots of stories, of course, and every now and then she’d drop to the floor and do 30 push-ups, which impressed even grade 9 boys! Once she told a group about the importance of the memorial arch at RMC – how you march under it when you arrive, and four years later you march out again at graduation, but at no other time do you pass underneath the arch. “Why not?” someone asked. “Because you don’t”. “But you must have sneaked through, at night when nobody was looking?” “No,” she said, “you don’t.” It was not even an option to her, to consider doing something that was wrong. She took that strength and resolution with her on her mission.

And now she’s home.

I would like to talk briefly about the home coming, because there has been a lot of discussion about the manner in which this was arranged. The Prime Minister has decreed that the ramp ceremony at CFB Trenton should be a private, family only affair, with the media banned from the base and being forced to watch from behind the fence. It certainly was a very emotional time for us, the family, and we appreciated being surrounded by Minister O’Connor, General Hillier, and so many other military personnel, many of whom knew our girl personally. However, I cannot support the privacy decision. There was room on the tarmac for a military videographer and a still photographer, and they did not intrude on our grief. I can see no reason why a shared feed arrangement could not be made, with one television camera and one press photographer allowed at the ceremony and instructed to keep within a certain area. I find it troubling that the privacy decision means that we are keeping the press outside the wire, where the bad guys are. I would like to think that Nichola died to protect our freedoms, not to restrict them.

Over the past few days, many of you have received the letters she wrote just before she died. Every time she came back in to Kandahar she received bags and bags of mail, letters and care boxes. She replied to every one with a personal note. It took her ages, but she felt it was right, to recognize those who had taken some trouble to think of her while she was so far, far away. In fact, so many people sent her stuff that she asked Sally to try to cut down on the number of boxes that were coming in! Apparently on the previous mission, when they had spent nearly a month at a forward operating base out in the mountains, there was a mail delivery. Her men joked that there was one helicopter for the mail, one for escort, and a third for Nichola’s stuff! When she got back to Kandahar the last time, there were 76 boxes waiting for her at the airfield. These were from people all over Canada, some who knew her, some who didn’t, many who knew her through one of Sally’s various networks. Nichola distributed the newspapers and magazines among her men, shared the treats that were sent, and only jealously guarded her drip dry underwear, which she could wash clean again and dry overnight.

One other comment about the manner of her death. It has brought our family together, to support and hold each other close. It has reintroduced us to people from whom we have not heard in years. It has introduced us to many whom we have never met, but who wanted to share our pain. One old friend sent me this poem, which he wrote some time ago but which he felt was appropriate at this time. I would like to share this with you:

Through her death, Nichola has touched a chord in everyone’s heart. We have had so many letters, cards, e-mails, they have poured in from all over the world. This story was on the front page of a newspaper in Vanua’atu, for heaven’s sake, along with places like Kosovo, Australia, Serbia and Montengro, New Zealand, Great Britain, Finland, the United States, Slovenia, Papua New Guinea, Lebanon ... everywhere. Ambassadors and Ministers of State, friends, colleagues and acquaintances, people who knew her, people who know us, all moved to write or call. We thank you all so very, very much.

I would specifically like to thank the Governor General, the Prime Minister, Minister of National Defence, Minister of Indian and Northern Affairs, and Chief of the Defence Staff. These are all busy people. Mr Harper called both Jason and Sally and I, independently, and we had good conversations. Minister O’Connor called Jason immediately after Nichola was killed, phoned the family while we were in Toronto this weekend, and came out to Trenton late at night for the return ceremony. Minister Prentice and his wife visited us at home, and spent time talking about our girl and her dreams. General Hillier was at Trenton as well, and was very kind in his words of praise for Nichola, and for her potential career in the Army. The family also received telephone calls from the Governor General, and from so many more. Thank you to everyone for your support.

Nichola loved her work. She was a good soldier, and she died a soldiers’ death. We have had the privilege of talking to Army personnel in Afghanistan, and of course there has also been a coroner’s examination. We do not want a public discussion, but we do want to stop some speculation. So what do we know? She died on the 17th of May, at 6.55 in the evening, although the actual death certificate will say May 18 as it took some time to get her back to Kandahar for the official statement. Yes, she was caught in an ambush. Yes, she died instantly. And yes, her face was unmarked – that beautiful smile is going to her grave. And let us please also offer our thanks to her colleagues in A Battery of the 1st Regiment, Royal Canadian Horse Artillery, and all other Canadian, Afghani, and other coalition soldiers who were there, who responded to her death with great vigor and imposed an almost Biblical wrath on those who were responsible for it. We thank you for that.

Indeed, we cannot say enough about the support we have received from both the Canadian Forces and the University of Calgary throughout this past week. From General Hillier and President Weingarten on down through both organizations, you have all been so generous with your time, your resources, your support. I will single out for special praise my Dean, Dr. Annette LaGrange; Captain Tim Haveman, the Assisting Officer from the First Regiment RCHA at CFB Shilo; and Ms. Colleen Turner, Director of Communications at the University of Calgary. Thank you all so very much.

And so now we move on, although our worlds will never be the same again.

Her death has been full of serendipitous symmetry, fearful yet somehow appropriate. She died on my birthday, today is Artillery Day, and two days ago – one week after her passing – we received a letter she wrote on her birthday. In closing, I would like to read an extract – these are her words.

My darling girl, you have already made a difference, you are still part of something so much bigger than yourself, you have humbled us all. One of your friends told me that she thinks Canada has now been divided into two groups of people – those who knew you, and those who wish they had. There could be no better epitaph.

Farewell, Nichola, first born of three beloved daughters.

Farewell, Nichola, much loved wife.

Farewell Nichola, sorely missed sister, cousin, grand-daughter, niece.

Farewell Nichola, grieved by so many family, friends, colleagues, and strangers around the world.

Yours was a short life, but a good one. You had so much promise, so much potential, and the world is a far lesser place with your passing. You wore your uniform so proudly, and from the earliest days of RMC had wanted to serve in the First Regiment. So now, as your journey continues, we remember the words on the cap badge of the Artillery beret: