Staff Sergent Joseph Paul Marquis, CD - Calgary, Alberta
Posted by: wildwoodke
N 51° 00.200 W 114° 07.316
11U E 701920 N 5654138
This memorial is a plaque located in Buffalo Park in the community of Garrison Woods in southwest Calgary, Alberta.
Waymark Code: WM52F6
Location: Alberta, Canada
Date Posted: 10/31/2008
Views: 7
Staff Sergeant Joseph Marquis was the first Canadian Peacekeeper to die serving on an armed United Nations mission. Marquis served with the 57th Canadian Signals Unit as part of the United Nations Operation in the Congo (ONUC), a 19,000-strong force created in 1960 to bring law and order to the newly independent African nation, and to halt Belgian intervention in its former colony. At the same time military forces arrived, UN civilian experts were rushed in to help ensure the continued operations of essential public services. ONUC's civilian aid component was the UN's largest single programme of assistance up to that time.
Marquis was killed January 20, 1962. He was one of 245 military personnel killed during ONUC's four-year mission. In September 2001, Marquis' family was presented with the Canadian Memorial Cross, symbolic of those soldiers who died while on duty for Canada.
From the Plaque and the web: (
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