Lieutenant Colonel A.E. Ings
105th (Prince Edward Island Highlanders) Battalion

What I wish you to arrange is this: Secure an understanding in writing from the Minister of Militia that the 105th shall be kept intact and not be broken up or used as reinforcements for other Regiments at the Front. I want to take the Bn. right to France identically the same as it leaves P.E.I. Ours is the only Province not represented by a Regiment at the front.

 I am not willing to take over a splendid Regiment to England from my own Province, and there be ordered to remain behind with all my senior officers and N.C.O.s and see my men drafted…

(Col. Ings to Premier Mathieson, 21 May 1916)

Albert Ernest Ings was born in Charlestown, Prince Edward Island on 11 May 1866. Ings had been a fourteen-years member of the 34th Light Horse and served as second-in-command of the 6th Canadian Mounted Rifles after the outbreak of war. In December 1915, he received an appointment to raise his own battalion from Prince Edward Island. Feeling ignored in the mobilization of the Canadian Expeditionary Force, P.E.I.  politicians had successfully lobbied for the creation of a separate unit raised from the island province.

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