During the First World War, physicians from the West Indies made important contributions to the Canadian War. They provided vital health-care services in Halifax. Let’s meet three of those physicians.
Dr. Grant Mahabir
The photo of Kenneth Grant Mahabir was included in the photograph of Dalhousie University medical gradutates. Research says that Dr. Mahabir was born in Trinidad in the British West Indies in 1890.
Shortly after returning to Nova Scotia, Dr. Mahabir enlisted in the Canadian Army Medical Corps, and by February 1917 was described in his Attestation Papers as Lt. Mahabir. His first posting was to Shorncliffe Military Hospital in England, where he was a member of the Hygiene Unit.
During the next 20 years, Dr. Mahabir carried on a large medical practice in Halifax and had his own stable of thoroughbred horses. He died in Halifax in 1941 at the age of 51.
Dr. Clement Ligoure
Dr. C Courtenay Ligoure, a native of Trinidad, was included in an announcement in the Acadian Recorder on March 26, 1917 that he had opened a medical office in Halifax. Dr. Ligoure had graduated from Queen’s University in Kingston, Ont., in 1916 with his MD and CM degrees.
Dr. Ligoure is remembered as one of the heroes of the Halifax Explosion because he opened his hospital to the injured and worked tirelessly to treat and care for them on the day of the explosion and for many days and nights thereafter. During the First World War, Dr. Ligoure was a strong supporter of the No. 2 Black Construction Battalion and also served as the editor and publisher of the first Black newspaper in Nova Scotia, the Atlantic Advocate.
Dr. Frederick B. Holder
Dr. Frederick B. Holder is from Caribbean who established a practice in Halifax in 1922. He was born at Georgetown, British Guiana, and received his medical education at McGill and at Queen’s University, from which he graduated in 1919. He took a deep interest in the affairs of his community, serving as one of the founders and chairman of the Coloured Education Centre.
More to this story at https://www.yourdoctors.ca/blog/health-care/black-drs-hfx
