Born May 6^th, 1923, in Dundee, Scotland, David Christie arrived in Canada on May 18^th, 1924, with his parents, James and Davidina Christie. They came second class, with her father, John Cleghorn, and her sister Betsy Cleghorn, to Quebec City aboard the Saturnia. They moved to Hawkesbury when David’s father came to work as a machinist for the Canadian International Paper mill. 

In May of 1940, David was 17 years old, unhappy at school after seeing many of his older friends join the Armed Forces.  He left school and joined the Army: No. 2 sect. 16th Field Engineers. He did his basic training in the Montreal area and at Farnham, QC. In August, the recruits traveled by truck convoy from the Montreal area to Debert, Nova Scotia (near Truro) where David worked on constructing the military base, driving trucks, operating bulldozers, and other heavy equipment. In early 1941, the authorities discovered that he was underage, and David had to go back home.

By December 1942, he was old enough to join the R.C.A.F. and was sent to Ottawa to take a course in Aero Engine Mechanics at the old Ottawa Technical High School. 

His new posting was to No. 6 Service Flying Training School in Hagersville, as an engine and frame mechanic. The aircrafts he worked on were Avro Anson, Harvard and Cornell. 

David remembered witnessing the crash-landing of a plane on the tarmac. Both the instructor and a student were still alive in the cockpit when he arrived with the rescue crew. As they were running toward the plane with a fire blanket, the plane blew up, and he and the rest of the rescue crew were sent flying backward through the air. Both men on the plane were killed.

David was married to Marion Laundry in 1956, and the couple had three children: James (Jim), Andrew and Janet. The family later acquired a historic home known as The White Inn on Front Road West near L’Orignal.

For many years David, assisted by his son Jim, operated a machine shop and sharpening service in what had once been the wood and carriage sheds of The White Inn. 

David Christie died in 2001.