It quickly became evident that the submarine alone was not enough to tell the story. How could a military museum turn down an opportunity to save this extraordinary piece of Canadian history? Project Ojibwa was born to acquire, move, mount, preserve and present Ojibwa as a Museum. Photo credit “From the collection of the Elgin Military Museum.” The forward torpedo room, the largest compartment on the boat, housed an armament of 22 torpedoes and provided sleeping quarters for between 8 and 10 submariners. It was for good reason that the submarine service was known as the “real secret service”, families often not even knowing that their loved ones served on submarines. They left harbour in the dark of night and returned the same way, their crews coming and going dressed as regular dock workers to avoid detection. Although glorified in movies, little was actually known about the real activities of the submarine service at the time. HMCS Ojibwa was built in the Chatham dockyards in England and commissioned to the Royal Canadian Navy in 1965 in response to growing apprehension about the Cold War. So began a three and a half year odyssey through the perils and pitfalls of the Ottawa bureaucracy. The somewhat tongue-in-cheek response from DND was that no tanks were currently available, but would the Museum be interested in a submarine instead. Thomas, Ontario, a small, independent charitable organization, approached the Department of National Defence (DND) in search of a tank to add to their collection. It began innocently enough in 2009 when the Elgin Military Museum of St. The story behind the acquisition of this decommissioned cold war warrior is almost as long as the boat itself. But there she sits, the first artifact of the Museum of Naval History. Such is HMCS Ojibwa, Canada’s first Oberon Class submarine… not a sight one would immediately associate with the Great Lakes, much less with the tiny harbour of Port Burwell, Ontario. The article below details the story of the HMCS OJIBWA and how the Elgin Military Museum brought the submarine to Port Burwell.Ģ97.5 feet long, 5 stories high, elegant, imposing-hiding secrets of the Cold War. The HMCS OJIBWA will be the centerpiece of the new Museum of Naval History – an Education and Interpretive Centre teaching the history of the Canadian Navy. Elgin Military Museum’s project that brought HMCS OJIBWA (Canada’s first Oberon Class submarine) to Port Burwell, Ontario.

He also is Project Coordinator of Project Ojibwa. McNeil spoke on the history of the Canadian Submarine Service and role our submarines have taken on for Canada and NATO. On February 12, 2014, Retired Rear-Admiral Dan McNeil was keynote speaker at the Garrison Community Council meeting. (Many thanks to the The Museum of Naval History and The Garrison Community Council of London for permission to use the article below in this blog)

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