Commanding Officer 48th Highlanders of Canada 1928-1930
When George Hagarty McLaren was born on 29 December 1877, in Hamilton, Wentworth, Ontario, Canada, his father, LCol Henry McLaren, was 30 and his mother, Mary Gates, was 26.
He attended high school at Trinity College School in Port Hope and graduated in 1899 with a degree in medicine.
Lt McLaren was attested into the 15th Battalion on 19 September 1946 and promoted to Captain and appointed commanding officer of C Company on September 22. He was gassed in April 1915 at the battle of 2nd Ypres. He was evacuated to the 7th Stationary Hospital, Boulogne and for several days his survival was considered doubtful. He was evacuated to England on May 11, and admitted to Miss Pollocks Private Hospital, London.
He returned to Canada and became the second in command of the 96th Battalion and then returned to France with that unit.
Maj McLaren was discharged due to demobilization at Toronto, Ontario on January 04, 1919. He remained with the 48th Highlanders Regiment post war.
Unfortunately his war injuries forced him to give up the practice of medicine in 1921.
He was married to Sarah Hamilton Shoenberger born 1889 in Paris, France and died 29 April 1973. She was a sister of a fellow 15th Bn Officer named Lt William Hamilton Shoenberger. They had a son, Major Frederick George McLaren, who served with the 48th Highlanders during World War II. Tragically, Major McLaren was killed in action on December 5, 1944, in Italy. Their daughter, 2Lt Mary Susannah McLaren, was in the CAMC in World War 2, and died on active service in England on August 28, 1944.
LCol McLaren died on 7 January 1957, in Toronto, Ontario, Canada, at the age of 79, and is buried in Holy Trinity Anglican Cemetary in Thornhill, York, Ontario, Canada.
