Newfoundland Regiment Survives the Somme; Does Nefoundland manage to stay an independent Dominon?

Today is the 100th Anniversary of the beginning of the Battle of the Somme in WW1. In the opening battle the main military formation of the small British Dominion of Newfoundland; the Royal Newfoundland Regiment was sent over the top of the British trenches into no-mans land where they were utterly annihilated in a span of 30 minutes by the German Army: "Of the 780 men who went forward only about 110 survived unscathed, of whom only 68 were available for roll call the following day. For all intents and purposes the Newfoundland Regiment had been wiped out, the unit as a whole having suffered a casualty rate of approximately 90 percent" (Nicholson, 2007). For a country with a population of only 250,000 in 1914 that represented a significant loss of the most productive section of the working population (young, healthy males). Compared to the population of modern day Canada (pop 36million), this would amount to the loss 110 000 soldiers in one day (nearly twice the size of the current Canadian Armed Forces). This loss as well as the subsequent losses in WW1 have been blamed for effectively bankrupting Newfoundland and causing Newfoundland to vote away its Dominion status to return to direct British rule and in 1949, with a war-ravaged UK no longer willing or able to financially support the colony, the choice to join Canada as the 10th province. So my question is: if the Royal Newfoundland Regiment had not been deployed at the Battle of the Somme and had survived the war mostly intact would Newfoundland have fared significantly better in the post-war years and manage to weather the Great Depression with its Dominion status intact and eventually devolve into a sovereign country along with the other British Dominions rather than than having to seek direct support from first the UK and then later Canada at the cost of its independence? In short: did the Battle of the Somme singlehandedly destroy the possibility of future Newfoundland nationhood?

Source articles:

http://www.npr.org/2016/06/26/48358...centenary-symbolizes-great-loss-for-canadians

http://news.nationalpost.com/news/canada/newfoundland-beaumont-hamel
 
No. Given the casualties they'd already taken at Gallipoli and the debts accrued financing the RNR, Newfoundland was already doomed to bankruptcy. It was just a matter of time. To make things worse, if they don't lose all those men at the Somme, that ensures that the Newfs get shoved into the meat grinder again, most likely at Passchendaele in 1917. So they still lose at least 1,000 men over the course of WWI, and they still take on a debt that their economy cannot support. The biggest difference in the postwar era is that their day of mourning isn't the first of July.
 
No. Given the casualties they'd already taken at Gallipoli and the debts accrued financing the RNR, Newfoundland was already doomed to bankruptcy. It was just a matter of time. To make things worse, if they don't lose all those men at the Somme, that ensures that the Newfs get shoved into the meat grinder again, most likely at Passchendaele in 1917. So they still lose at least 1,000 men over the course of WWI, and they still take on a debt that their economy cannot support. The biggest difference in the postwar era is that their day of mourning isn't the first of July.

Was the annihilation of this regiment in WW1 a foregone conclusion though? It wasn't like all the regimental formations in the British Empire suffered such appalling casualty rates. I don't think it stretches plausibility too much to suggest that the Newfoundlanders might have got lucky and gotten posted to a quieter section of the front for the majority of the war, maybe they suffer some casualties, but I don't think that they were doomed to be annihilated as they were in OTL. Even front-line shock formations in the British Army, like the Canadian Corps didn't suffer the proportionate amount of causalities throughout the entire war that the Newfoundland Regiment did on that day and they were deployed at the front of pretty much every major British offensive in the last 2 years of the war (including suffering the last combat death of WW1 (George Lawrence Price) 2 minutes before the armistice took effect.
 
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The Newfoundland economy had already recovered by WWII and was recovering at a faster rate then either Canada or the United Kingdom's economy afterwords. Newfoundland's loss of independence was not a foregone conclusion, but something that took, even when held in the most optimistic light, what amounted to 15 years of backroom deals between London and Ottawa, and several forced referendums to make happen. Newfoundland can survive as an Independent Dominion even after the suspension of Responsible Government as long as people who at the very least were not known for having outright contempt for Newfoundland in general put in charge of running the Commission of Government. Avoid that and Ottawa doesn't have as much room to bargain with Britain's war debt over Newfoundland sovereignty. Otherwise, if you assume that the results of the second referendum were not entirely fabricated, which is generous, you can simply remove any one of the issues faced by the anti-confederates in the later campaign (get rid of the sectarian rumors that Protestants and Catholics were voting certain ways, for example) and the Anti-Confederates win with a solid and decisive majority (though then Britain would probably force us to have a third referendum anyways, but that's something I can't properly speculate on). The Victory of the pro confederation camp, even if you ignore over ten years of conspiring between the Governments of the Dominion of Canada and the UK (including the withholding of information from Newfoundland politicians of any new resources found in the Dominion, namely a large deposit of Iron ore in Labrador), it still took two referendums, sectarian manipulation, outright dishonesty, relying on rural outports populated by politically disconnected and largely illiterate people, and a campaign stuffed with funds from Canada that no homegrown Newfoundland movement would be able to keep up with to happen.

As for the idea that Newfoundland was doomed from Gallipoli onward, I can say with full confidence that this was simply not the case, by any stretch of the imagination, sure the war effort itself was already a massive tole on the tiny dominions already rickety economy, but the first July Drive is absolutely what pushed it over the edge. Newfoundlands economy was largely seasonal and based on the food fishery and resource extraction, the loss of so many young men in such a short period of time was absolutely devastating; never mind that the Great Depression rendered salted cod absolutely worthless, to the point that we were donating a fair chuck of it to relief in Canada. RCAF Brat does however make a good point about WWI as essentially a meat grinder, the Royal Newfoundland Regiment is still likely to come out very badly bloodied, but I have my doubt's that it would have been to the same degree that the First July Drive left it.

Another option is simply to put someone in charge of the commission of government who is sympathetic enough to move to forgive the debt, which would not be particularly hard. To quote Winston Churchill on the matter; “We ought to deal generously with the Newfoundlanders, the amount required only a drop in the ocean of our liabilities".

So to put it shortly, yes, not only is the narrative of Newfoundland as hopelessly backwards and doomed for failure a complete and total fabrication, but there are several other, much less dramatic turning points that could have prevented Confederation for Newfoundland. That said, it is however likely that Newfoundland could have taken a similar fall in the Great Depression (given the state of the fishing economy, and the rampant corruption in parliament and the merchant classes). This however is more likely to either end with a return to Dominion Status, or in Newfoundland becoming a British overseas territory.
 
Timely thread 'cus it helps us remember our dead.

The Battle of Beaumont Hamel killed off a generation of Newfies.
Keep in mind that neighbouring Commonwealth regiments suffered 80 percent casualties at Beaumont Hamel and Gallipolli.
ANZAC Day is still a bitter day of remembrance in Australia and New Zealand.

Stripped of so many young men, the Newfy economy never recovered beyond a subsistence level: fishing and forestry.
By the 1960s, the Newfy cod fishery had been reduced to the same desperate level as the modern Somalia fishery: too weak to chase off foreign poachers from Poland and Portugal. It is amazing that so few Newfies turned to piracy.
Hah!
Hah!
Though one or two Newfes did run a little rum to quench the thirst of American hypocrites during prohibition.

Newfyland also lacked the skilled man-power to claw its way out of the Great Depression. With more young men, Newfies might have been able to get into the shipbuilding .... iron smelting .... and other heavy industries.

Thanks for the Newfy side of the referenda. Meanwhile, Canadian history books say that Canada "bought" Newfy votes with welfare, pogie, transfer payments,etc.

WI the Royal Jamaican Regiment suffered similar losses during WW1?
Would Jamaica have been forced into the Canadian Confederation?
 
Newfoundland might still have survived as an independent Dominion after WW1 with the same amount of causalities if not for the fact that it's government was rotten to the core. Throughout it's entire run as an independent dominion the Newfoundland government was extremely corrupt, it was not uncommon for members of the legislative assembly to be arrested for taking bribes or taking advantage of there position by giving government contracts to companies which they owned or had a share in. If that had been the case then the government might have been able to pay some of it's debt. You could also have the Amulree commission suggest that Britain forgive Newfoundlands debt and maybe have the British government appoint someone to oversee the Dominion's finances for a period of time to make sure they are managed correctly.
 
Corrupt?
How does that distinguish Newfyland from the next dozen Latin-American kleptocracies?

Or a mighty bunch of US states or Canadian provinces, for that matter? From what I've read for my TL project over at Pre-1900, the corruption was no different than what we had here in Rhode Island at that time. The big problems, rather, were the debt and sectarianism (which even for the time, when compared with neighbouring separate school systems in Ontario and Quebec, was a little extreme). Preferably even no Newfoundland Railway, though that has the problem of condemning more people to poverty and increasing the influx of off-island emigration. So there's more variables that need to take account of.
 
I wonder how far a Cold-War era independent Newfoundland would have gotten? Obviously in terms of Newfoundland's defense policy, it would have been folded into NORAD during the Cold War and largely be just an extension of US an Canadian defense territory, but assuming it's continued independece through the Cold War, you have to wonder how Newfoundland would have survived the Cod stock collapse; In OTL that really devastated the Newfoundland economy, and that was with the province receiving large transfer payments (largely from the tax base in Ontario and Western Canada) to keep it afloat. If Newfoundland had to go through the cod collapse alone, without Canada to bankroll it, I wonder what would have happened then (could it have faced an IMF default? Would it eventually become a territory of Canada or the US?)? Furthermore, how would an impoverished Newfoundland have managed to keep the hordes of illegal European fishing vessels (with false bulkheads for storing illegal hauls and nets with extremely fine mesh) from devastating the Grand Banks even further throughout the 1990s (In OTL the Canadian government eventually deployed the Coast Guard and the Navy to seize the EU vessels and a shooting war nearly broke out with Spain -See: Turbot War- until the EU and Canada signed an agreement which forced reduced fishing quotas on all parties)?
 
but assuming it's continued independece through the Cold War, you have to wonder how Newfoundland would have survived the Cod stock collapse;

St. John's would probably find a way to manage that, for sure.

In OTL that really devastated the Newfoundland economy, and that was with the province receiving large transfer payments (largely from the tax base in Ontario and Western Canada) to keep it afloat. If Newfoundland had to go through the cod collapse alone, without Canada to bankroll it, I wonder what would have happened then (could it have faced an IMF default? Would it eventually become a territory of Canada or the US?)?

Depends on the existing state of finances at the time and how much the politicians wanted to industrialize Newfoundland. Paradoxically, throughout history the more the Island industrializes or even goes for commercialized agricultural development (which doesn't really work in much of the place, where the soil barely covers enough nutrition for root vegetables), the more dependent it is on the fisheries. Eventually a balance needs to be achieved between St. John's and the outports (and in the case of the latter without destroying that bastion of traditional culture, as Smallwood and other politicians did with many outport settlements).

Furthermore, how would an impoverished Newfoundland have managed to keep the hordes of illegal European fishing vessels (with false bulkheads for storing illegal hauls and nets with extremely fine mesh) from devastating the Grand Banks even further throughout the 1990s (In OTL the Canadian government eventually deployed the Coast Guard and the Navy to seize the EU vessels and a shooting war nearly broke out with Spain -See: Turbot War- until the EU and Canada signed an agreement which forced reduced fishing quotas on all parties)?

The Iceland model of national defence, perhaps?
 
I wonder how far a Cold-War era independent Newfoundland would have gotten? Obviously in terms of Newfoundland's defense policy, it would have been folded into NORAD during the Cold War and largely be just an extension of US an Canadian defense territory, but assuming it's continued independece through the Cold War, you have to wonder how Newfoundland would have survived the Cod stock collapse; In OTL that really devastated the Newfoundland economy, and that was with the province receiving large transfer payments (largely from the tax base in Ontario and Western Canada) to keep it afloat. If Newfoundland had to go through the cod collapse alone, without Canada to bankroll it, I wonder what would have happened then (could it have faced an IMF default? Would it eventually become a territory of Canada or the US?)? Furthermore, how would an impoverished Newfoundland have managed to keep the hordes of illegal European fishing vessels (with false bulkheads for storing illegal hauls and nets with extremely fine mesh) from devastating the Grand Banks even further throughout the 1990s (In OTL the Canadian government eventually deployed the Coast Guard and the Navy to seize the EU vessels and a shooting war nearly broke out with Spain -See: Turbot War- until the EU and Canada signed an agreement which forced reduced fishing quotas on all parties)?

Could Newfies try offshore banking and maintain open registries?
 
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