WW1 CEF 1st Canadian Pioneer Division collar/sweetheart.

The 1st Canadian Pioneer Division, serving from March 1916 to February 1917. Pioneers weren’t infantry in the conventional sense; they were a hybrid of soldier and combat engineer, doing the construction and labour work that kept a division fighting:

• Digging and maintaining trenches

• Building and repairing roads and duckboard tracks

• Constructing dugouts, gun pits, and defensive works

• Often working under fire, close to or in the front line, unlike rear-area engineers

What happened to it: In February 1917 the battalion was withdrawn and its role handed to the 107th Pioneer Battalion, which took over as the 1st Division’s pioneers. The 1st Pioneers were then converted and became the 9th Battalion, Canadian Railway Troops.

Wider reorganization: By early 1918 the whole pioneer-battalion structure across the CEF was scrapped. All surviving pioneer units, including the successor 107th, were absorbed into the Canadian Engineers, folded into the 1st Canadian Engineer Brigade. Of nine pioneer battalions raised or converted during the war, only four ever served in the field at any one time, reflecting how the model was seen as administratively awkward, with pioneers formed by the Engineers but under divisional command.

Serving on the Western Front , attached to the 1st Canadian Division sometime between late 1915 and early 1917, the men were doing the dangerous construction and trench-maintenance work that pioneers were known for, before either transferring out or joining the Railway Troops when the unit was redesignated.