Lieutenant-Colonel E. Pearson

&
Major A.L. Tosland

Ontario Regiment

Both appointments come in the nature of promotions to the Oshawa Military Officers who have had many years of experience in Military Work, and their many friends in Oshawa wish them the best of success in their new posts.

(Oshawa Daily Times, 31 Dec 1940)

Born in Winchester, Hampshire, England on 18 September 1897, Edwin Pearson was a General Motors office clerk in Oshawa, Ontario when he enlisted in the 116th Battalion under the command of Lieutenant-Colonel Sam Sharpe in January 1916. After the battalion deployed to France in February 1917, Pearson rose through the NCO ranks. A year later he was recommended for a commission and rejoined the 116th as a lieutenant in September 1918. Twenty years later he was appointing commanding officer of the militia regiment which perpetuated the 116th.

Col. Pearson. Courtesy of Rod Henderson, Ontario Regiment historian

In the 1920 reorganization of the Canadian militia, the 34th Ontario Regiment, one of the county’s oldest continuous military formations, became the Ontario Regiment. In 1936, it mechanized nominally as a tank regiment despite the Canadian militia’s meager inventory of armoured vehicles. Commanding officer since December 1936, Pearson oversaw general mobilization in September 1939 but nearly a year later was transferred to staff duties with No. 2 Military District (Toronto) headquarters. Command of the Ontario Tanks, which would be later re-designated the 11th Army Tank Regiment  in the newly formed Canadian Armoured Corps, passed to Major Alan Leslie Tosland.

Born in London, England on 7 April 1897, Tosland served in the British Army during the First World. Commissioned in the Royal Warwickshire Regiment in November 1914, he survived the battles of the Somme and Ypres. He suffered a gunshot wound at St. Quentin in March 1918 and earned the Military Cross. He relocated to Canada after the war, joined the Ontario Regiment, and became adjutant then second-in-command.

Tosland held command of the Ontario Tanks only briefly until the appointment of Lieutenant-Colonel G.Y. Masson, formerly of the Essex Regiment, in December 1940. Tosland went on to and administrative post with the Armoured Corps. The local press reported that the reassignment of Pearson and Tosland came “in the nature of promotions,” however, the postings meant they would not go overseas with the battalion, soon to be re-designated the 11th Army Tank Regiment.

By 1945, Pearson became rehabilitation officer with General Motors to assisting veterans with re-employment. Tosland, who had been promoted lieutenant-colonel in 1943, ended the war with the adjutant-general’s branch at National Defence Headquarters in Ottawa. He was then elected president of the Ottawa branch of the Canadian Legion, and retired from the civil service in 1961.

Pearson died in Oshawa on 8 September 1968 while Tosland passed away in Calgary on 27 November 1981.