sent by Charles M. McCabe

Black Watch Friends:

It is with deep regret that I notify you of the sudden death of Gloria Sellar, widow of the late BGen (Ret) Gordon H. Sellar, on Thursday, 30 October.

Gloria had been diagnosed with liver cancer just a few days before her death. I know that this will be a complete shock to many of you who saw Gloria in apparent good health in Stellarton in early September where she assisted several of you who are suffering from medical conditions related to Agent Orange.

A memorial service is being planned however details have yet to be announced. I will pass this information as soon as possible.


Nemo Me Impune Lacessit

1926 – 2008

On Thursday, November 6, Gloria died suddenly and peacefully of cancer at Kingston General Hospital. Born in Calgary, her major influence was a Grandmother who taught her how to: do carpentry, raise chickens, teach herself music and painting, cater large banquets and love animal husbandry. While riding in the foothills, she met a handsome young fellow who, within a few months mailed her a marriage proposal for a wedding after his graduation from Royal Military College and just before his departure for the war. The wedding (immediately after her 17th birthday) began a 62 year partnership with Gordon Sellar.

Gloria spent the war driving 18 wheeler trucks on the Alaska Highway, singing and dancing for troops in the Birks Jewellers Show, and, like most other girls, waiting and praying. Gordon returned and, except for his time in the Korean War, they were never apart. Gloria became a home maker and supporter of his career moving regularly around Canada, to Great Britain, Europe and Ghana. She maintained an active, engaged life raising three children, acting in community theatre, fund raising for the cancer society, riding, volunteering and painting.

In 1979, the arrival of a pack of English Fox Hounds and five horses at their Kingston farm dominated her life for most of the next 25 years. Gloria loved the animals and tended the hounds like a mother. The Frontenac Hunt Hound Pack was nurtured into one of the finest in North America with many prizes and championship hounds. Gloria became a joint Master of the Hunt and continued judging hound shows for the Masters of Fox Hounds North American Association until 2008.

Brigadier-General Gordon Sellar died from the tactical use of Agent Orange in 2004. In his honour, Gloria, on her own, aggressively pursued recognition for the many veterans whose lives were also profoundly affected by Agent Orange. Within weeks, she gained national attention – newspaper chains, CBC, CTV, BBC, and NBC joined in. Sitting on the resulting ministerial study group, she oversaw the ultimate compensation process for her vets. As an Honorary Member of the Black Watch Association, she continued to help sick veterans while she dealt with her own illness.

Gloria is survived by daughter Susan Rahn (husband Jim and Emily), son Rodney Sellar (wife Dawn and Madison) and daughter Robin Sellar (sons Adrian and Sean).

Her wish was cremation. A memorial service is planned at the Royal Military College, Currie Hall, Kingston, for 11:00 AM, Saturday, November 29. A reception and light lunch will follow at the mess.

Donations to the cancer society in lieu of flowers would be appreciated.

A storybook life, well lived. Many people will miss her.

Tribute in the Ottawa Sun

Vets lose ally

Gloria Sellar helped win compensation for victims of Agent Orange


By GREG WESTON

When we first met at her home in Kingston on a dreary spring day, Glora Sellar was a 78-year-old grandmother recovering from cancer surgery just months after the death of her husband and soul mate of more than six decades.

In short, few would have imagined this otherwise demure widow was about to set aside her own daunting challenges to fight for thousands of desperately ill Canadian veterans and their families.

Unknown to the public on that day in 2005, Gloria had already won a huge battle, albeit with a bittersweet ending.

For almost 15 years, her soldier husband Gordon had struggled with an increasingly debilitating form of leukemia, the highly decorated Canadian brigadier-general reduced from robust to bed-ridden to his death in 2004.

Long before he died, Gloria had been showering doctors and the military with evidence that her husband's illness may have been linked to the U.S. military's spraying of deadly Agent Orange herbicide on the Gagetown, N.B., army base where he commanded the Black Watch regiment in the 1960s.

Implausible as it seems today, the Americans were invited to bomb the Canadian base with the poisonous chemical to test it for use in defoliating jungle during the Vietnam war.

By the time Gen. Sellar became ill, the U.S. government had long provided compensation to more than 10,000 Vietnam vets, accepting the link between various cancers and exposure to Agent Orange.

COVERED UP

But in Canada, the military spent 40 years covering up the poisoning at Gagetown and its deadly effects on soldiers stationed there.

All that changed when Gloria Sellar finally won her landmark decision in the late summer of 2004. Or so it seemed.

While Veterans Affairs had finally accepted a "causative relationship between Agent Orange exposure" and Gen. Sellar's fatal leukemia, no such consideration was extended to the thousands of other soldiers who had served under his command at Gagetown.

Despite her age and her own debilitating bouts with cancer, the amazing woman they just called Gloria spent the next three years lobbying politicians in Ottawa, and helping families in the Maritimes where many of the surviving Gagetown victims still live.

On the frequent occasions we spoke, the tireless octogenarian was always somewhere on the road helping vets, never at her home in Kingston.

"It's really not very much," she said with her hallmark modesty the last time we spoke. "I am just trying to be helpful to some wonderful people who are very sick."

She was right about that.

In the three years since we published her first interview, hundreds of former Gagetown vets have come forward with horror stories of life-long health problems sounding all too similar to those who fought in the jungles of Vietnam.

Hundreds more are already dead.

Finally, on Sept. 12 of last year, Gloria was in the front row at a packed media event near Gagetown to hear Veterans Affairs Minister Greg Thompson announce $90 million of federal compensation to the victims of Agent Orange poisoning.

Even then, at 81, Gloria was far from finished her mission.

Over the past year, she continued to travel wherever there were vets she could help, whether it was in making their compensation claims, or simply bringing comfort to the afflicted.

This Remembrance Day, there are no doubt hundreds of vets and their families paying a special tribute to a very special Canadian who served her country with dignity.

Gloria Sellar died suddenly last week of cancer, herself a victim of the horrible Gagetown tragedy.

She had told everyone not to worry; it was just the flu.

She was 82.

It is with regret of reading of Gloria passing, I have never meet this Lady but have heard of her and the work she has done for all of us, Gloria will be deeply missed, may she rest in peace.

Charles

Gloria Sellars did so much for us she will be missed may God bless

It is too bad that when one becomes ill from doing Service to his or her Country, they need to fight again at home for even a small token of recognition from the DVA

upon the death of Mrs. Sellar heaven just became a better place. God Bless

mrs sellar was a very special lady and will be missed by all, god bless and rest in peace dear lady

I was totally shocked when I learned of Gloria's passing.

I had met with Gloria and interviewed her at her home in Kingston in Sept. of 2006. I found Gloria at that first meeting to be gracious, considerate and very committed to exposing the truth of what really happened, concerning the Gagetown Atrocity.

Gloria was not happy with the Harper Government, DND, VAC and the Cantox Environmental health risk assessment study. Gloria said well, they can prove anything with numbers. Gloria believed that the Cantox study ( a company that was then and still is today owned by the chemical industry ) of the chemicals sprayed at Gagetown was going to destroy all that she had worked so hard for on our behalf. Gloria was absolutely correct with her assessment of aftermath of the Cantox fraudulent study.

Gloria's beliefs of the Harper Government's continual coverup of what really took place with the 28
year Gagetown spraying program reared its ugly on Sept. 12th. 2008 when Peter Mac-Kay and Greg Thompson announced the $20.000 ex-gratia payment that would only compensate less than 1% of the thousands who were poisoned at Gagetown.

Greg Thompson would shortly there after use the Cantox study to totally change the qualifying guidelines for pension approval for exposure to the chemicals that were sprayed at Gagetown from 1956 to 1984. The benefit of a doubt no longer applies for any of us. Harper, Mac-Kay and Thompson have washed their hands of us and The Gagetown Atrocity. Where is the truth, accountability and the justice that Gloria Sellar sacrificed her remaining years for, on our behalf?

I know there are some in our association's leadership who feel they have been treated well by Harper, Mac-Kay and Thompson and are happy with the $20.000 ex-gratia and are willing to let the remaining 99% of our comrades just fade away in the toxic dust of Gagetown, I am not one of those people. I do not share their warm fuzzy feelings, especiall after being betrayed by our government.

Gloria Sellar gave the Gagetown Veterans all that she had left of her remaining years fighting for accountability and justice on our behalf.
I cannot and will not abandon her just cause. Crimes have been committed against the Gagetown Veterans and the men and women who are presently serving at Gagetown. We were knowingly exposed to the most toxic chemicals known to man and that crime is being covered up by another crime. ( Fraud )

I do not believe it is enough for us to merely convey our thanks and respect to Gloria Sellar after all she has done for us, especially now that she is no longer with us.
We must honor her memory by continuing the fight she started. Gloria never quit and neither should we.

In Goria's memory I ask all of you to demand a public inquiry into the 28 year Gagetown toxic chemical spraying program and if our government will not commence a public inquiry within the next 4 months then I ask all Canadian Veterans to join with me and march to the steps of our Capital on Canada Day of this year to demand an public inquiry into the Gagetown Poisoning and to demonstrate our disproval of all the other Veteran issues.

Sincerely and with pride.
Gary Goode
250-423-4245

you are 100 % right gary, i think that we all pretty near knew what the outcome was going to be in the end, but still, it was a bitter dissapointment, greg thompson was at the centre in oromocto once or twice a week just to keep an eye on things and to see how best the could screw us out of as much money as possible, and they sure managed to do a good job of it , i never recceived a penny and probly never will,like most of our people how can you fight someone who uses your own tax money to fight you with, it,s digusting, they should be ashamed but in truth they could care less about us ,take care gary willie musgrave