Wikipedia

Gudrid the Far-Travelled an icon among Norse women

STORY BY STEPHEN J. THORNE

Viking women played essential roles in war and peace, but it’s unlikely any got around as much as Gudrid Thorbjarnardóttir, better known as Gudrid the Far-Travelled.

Born in 10th century Iceland, Gudrid sailed into the unknown aboard rudimentary longships, crossing the North Atlantic eight times, then trekking across the European continent and back again.

She journeyed across Iceland, and to Scandanavia and North America, where she gave birth to the first European born in the New World, Snorri Thorfinnsson, nearly 500 years before Christopher Columbus was credited with discovering the Americas.

READ MORE

More from Front Lines

• The sinking of U-111 by the British anti-submarine trawler Lady Shirley
• Politics, racism and colonialism: Awarding the Victoria Cross
• No VC for Jess Larochelle, says military

© JOHN DANIEL MAHONEY, LIBRARY AND ARCHIVES CANADA—PA142439

The Story behind the Canadian Navy’s “Black Tot Day”

STORY BY PAIGE GILMAR

“Yo-ho-ho and a bottle o’ rum!” goes the age-old shanty “Dead Man’s Chest.”

The iconic tune, which first appeared in Robert Louis Stevenson’s novel Treasure Island, could surprisingly be more fact than fiction in the Royal Canadian Navy.

Before Canada’s navy was established in 1910, Britain’s Royal Navy set the trends for much of life at sea.

READ MORE

More from Military Milestones

• Louis Riel: a Métis freedom fighter
• The Laurier way: Canada’s first French Prime Minister
• Heroes of the House: the 1916 burning of Parliament

Learn more

Most popular on Legion Magazine

• Afghanistan veteran recounts brutal battle
• One Martyr Down: The Untold Story Of A Canadian Peacekeeper Killed At War
• The 1943 battle in the Italian mountains