File [2] - Correspondence Transcripts & Photocopies

In 1993 Suzan Horovitch (née Green) began the task of typing out her uncle Sidney Ofner’s letters, written home to Montreal during his station in Europe in World War II. Sidney Ofner was in Italy when he was killed supporting a trench on January 15, 1944. Suzan Horovitch and her husband Art spent several years compiling into a book the letters as well as official Canadian Forces correspondence regarding Sidney. The Horovitch’s also tracked down and contacted several veterans whom had served with Sidney in order to gather all information possible on his time in the army and his death.

Sidney Ofner was the only son of Alexander and Tillie Ofner, both of Montreal. Mr. Ofner ran a women’s ready-to-wear garment store, in which Sidney also worked. He was a graduate of Strathcona Academy. Sidney enlisted in the Victoria Rifles of Canada in 1942, going overseas in 1943. He was later stationed to North Africa with a reinforcement regiment and then with the Royal Canadian Regiment in Italy in the fall of 1943. Sidney’s sister Marjorie, mother of Leona (mentioned in the letters) and Suzan, saved all of the letters from her brother.