Edwin Alonzo Boyd - Early Life

Early Life

Edwin Alonzo Boyd was born on April 2, 1914. Four months after Ed was born, the British Empire, of which Canada was part, went to war with Germany. His father Glover Boyd joined the army in August 1915. It would be a few years before Glover would return home from the war. The apartment the family lived in was now too small so they soon moved to a duplex on Bee Street in Todmorden, an area beyond the Don Valley, in East York.

Soon after Eleanor (Edwin’s mother) became pregnant again so Glover Boyd took a job at the Toronto Police Department. Edwin was enrolled in school in the 1921-22 year, but due to an incident at school he did not remain there for very long and before his first year of schooling had ended his family had moved again. At this time he switched to Gledhill Public school to finish out the semester. In September 1923 Glover moved the family a few blocks north and Ed switched to Secord Public school for a brief period of time before being transferred back to Gledhill Public school.

The Boyds soon moved again, this time to Glebemount Avenue. With this move came the transfer to yet another new school, this time to Earl Beatty Public School and it was here that Ed became more of his own person. It was here that he became a soccer player on the school team, and for years his picture hung in the hall of the school. It was also at this time that Edwin Alonzo Boyd joined the YMCA marching band. It was with the YMCA that Boyd mastered the mouth organ and he also accompanied the YMCA band as they won a world championship at the Canadian National Exhibition.

In early 1930 Gord and Norm Boyd contracted scarlet fever, and while taking care of them Eleanor Boyd became sick herself and died from the disease. In 1933 he had his first brush with the law when he was picked up for vagrancy by the Royal Canadian Mounted Police. A few years later he joined the Royal Canadian Regiment, First division and in June 1940 his regiment crossed the channel to France. It was when his regiment was posted to Reigate that Boyd met his future wife, Dorreen Mary Frances Thompson. On August 20, 1941, almost nine months to the day after Ed and Dorreen married, she gave birth to a son, Edwin Alonzo Boyd, Jr. The baby was two days old when the air raid sirens sounded and it was discovered afterwards that their child had died from cerebral haemorrhage and so he was buried on August 30 in a York cemetery.

In early 1941 Dorreen went to York and joined the Army Territorial Service, but she was too short to be a truck driver and thus she became a motorcycle driver to join her husband in the war. Boyd was transferred to the Provosts Corps on July 27, 1942 because he was displeased with the army. Soon after this Dorreen discovered that she was pregnant again and this time they had twins on December 21, 1943. Boyd was officially discharged from the war effort on May 24, 1945 which was two-weeks after the war ended in Europe.

After he was discharged Boyd failed to find adequate permanent employment and so he turned to crime to provide for his war time wife and three children. On September 9, 1949 Boyd robbed a North York branch of the Bank of Montreal. Between September 1949 and October 1951, Boyd pulled at least six bank heists.