An oak tree with Toronto roots could soon be planted at Buckingham Palace as part of a project to memorialize thousands of Canadian soldiers killed in the First World War battle at Vimy Ridge.

The tree was grown from acorns sent to Queen Elizabeth II from the Vimy Ridge woodlot in Scarborough, which was planted by Leslie Miller, a Canadian soldier who returned from that war with a collection of acorns picked up from the ravaged battlefield in France.

“I thought it would be appropriate to offer a tree to Her Majesty,” says Toronto resident Patricia Sinclair, who sent the acorns. Sinclair is working with Miller’s family to preserve his story and legacy.

“It connects those soldiers who went to fight for King and Country.”

About 3,600 Canadians were killed, and a total of 11,000 injured, during four days of fighting before the ridge was in Allied hands.

Sinclair was notified that one of the acorns had flourished in a simple note sent on Buckingham Palace letterhead by Jennifer Gordon-Lennox, a lady-in-waiting for the Queen. It read in part:

“I think you would like to know that one of the acorns from the cache pot which you kindly delivered to Buckingham Palace has germinated vigorously, and is in the gardener’s propagation area, to be planted out on the estate in the future.”

The acorns were delivered to the palace in 2017 by Soo Wong, a former MPP for the riding of Scarborough-Agincourt. The cache pot referred to in the letter, commissioned by the legacy project, was made of Limoges porcelain and hand-painted by Quebec artist Sol Brien.

The idea to send acorns overseas began with Monty McDonald, who founded the Vimy Ridge Legacy Corporation in 2014. McDonald was a boy when he met Miller, on visits with his father Sandy to Miller’s farm.

McDonald founded the corporation to repatriate oak trees from the Scarborough location to France to mark the 100th anniversary in 2017 of the battle. The trees were grown in a French nursery using acorns from the oak trees in Scarborough. They are planted in the Vimy Foundation Centennial Park beside the Canadian National Vimy Memorial in France.

Another couple hundred acorns were sent to France’s National Forests Office, a government agency that oversees forestry. The agency grew 170 trees from the acorns, which are being used to rejuvenate a forest — where one original oak tree still stands — that abuts Canada’s Vimy memorial site.

“Canadians, via Leslie’s acorns, are assisting in the rejuvenation of this French forest,” says Sinclair.

More trees were grown in NVK Nurseries in Dundas, Ont., from cuttings grafted on to B.C. oak, and have been sold to members of the public or given away to organizations that Sinclair felt would be meaningful to Miller, such as Sunnybrook Veteran’s hospital, which is where he lived before he died in December 1979.

Miller graduated from the University of Toronto and left Ontario to teach in Saskatchewan. He enlisted in 1914, training as part of the 32nd Battalion’s signal corps, before being sent to France. When he came back in 1919 he was unable to go back to teaching and his father allotted him 24 acres on the family’s fruit farm, where Miller eventually planted the trees. He named the farm Vimy Oaks Farm.

The woodlot, where nine of the trees remain, is now owned by the Scarborough Chinese Baptist Church. There is no official designation for the land, although Sinclair has talked to the city about ways to protect it.

“Canada’s Vimy Oaks has resonated with Canadians young and old from coast to coast,” says Sinclair. “It is hoped that serious efforts will be made to protect and preserve the Vimy Oaks woodlot for generations to come.”

Miller kept a diary throughout the war. It has been annotated and will be published by University of Toronto Press.

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Sinclair says Miller would have had to gather his acorns in the fall, when his diary places him near Vimy in a town called Abbeville, where he was taking a month-long wireless course.

Correction - Nov. 12, 2019: This article was edited from a previous version that mistakenly said Patricia Sinclair is a volunteer with the Vimy Ridge Legacy Corporation.