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OTTAWA — When Nancy Payne’s son was killed in Afghanistan in 2006, his superior told the Lansdowne, Ont., mother that her son should never have been there in the first place.
“They knew that they had somebody good. He could have gone a lot, a lot further had he not gone to Afghanistan,” Payne recalled.
“Yeah, that’s what his boss said: ‘I shouldn’t have let him go cause he had great potential.'”
Cpl. Randy Joseph Payne was killed in action on April 22, 2006, while serving as a member of the military’s “close protection team” — a unit tasked with safeguarding VIPs, like the prime minister, or chief of defence staff.
Randy had been guarding Brig.-Gen. David Fraser, now retired, at the time he was killed, only three months into his deployment, and two years after he joined the Armed Forces as a military police officer.
“He loved what he was doing,” Payne said.
“You know, that was Randy. All the excitement and the adrenalin, yeah, that was him.”
Fraser wasn’t with the unit when a roadside bomb struck their armoured vehicle, known as a G-wagon, while they were returning to Kandahar Airfield. Randy was one of four soldiers killed in the explosion.
It was the deadliest attack on Canadian Forces in four years at the time. Randy was the 15th Canadian soldier to be killed at the time.
“General Fraser had left by helicopter the night before. So the next day, Randy and the crew were heading back to the base in Kandahar,” Payne recalled.
“So I think the people that did it, the Taliban, thought that Fraser was in the vehicle that Randy was driving, and Fraser had taken off the night before. So they took out four innocent people.”
On Tuesday, Nancy will lay a wreath at the National War Memorial in Ottawa on behalf of all mothers of Canadian soldiers who have died in combat.
Earlier this month, she was named this year’s national Silver Cross Mother by the Royal Canadian Legion. Each year the legion recognizes a mother of a soldier who has died to represent all mothers who have had a child die while serving in the military.
“It’s a great, humbling feeling for sure that they entrusted this to me,” she said. “It’s a great honour for sure.”
Along with the wreath-laying, she’s had a full schedule in the national capital meeting with dignitaries and attending events.
“I’m not young anymore so it’ll be a challenge, for sure,” she said, lightheartedly.
Nancy has laid a wreath at a local Remembrance Day ceremony every year since Randy was killed, but this year will be the first in a long while she’ll also attend with her husband, as they usually attend different ceremonies in their region.
“We spread ourselves around so we’re not both at the same one, so we’re out and about in the community,” Nancy said.
The Payne family comes from a long line of service to the Canadian Armed Forces. Her husband, David, served 30 years in the CAF infantry, her other son Chris had a 20-year career in the military, and her uncle served in the Second World War.
Even Randy’s son is now a combat engineer with the CAF.
When Nancy has laid her wreaths, she said she reflects on what it must have been like for the members of her family to go to war.
“Especially in the last hours, minutes, what they went through,” she said.
“And then I think of Randy, of course, what it was like for them.”
This report by The Canadian Press was first published Nov. 9, 2025.
Nick Murray, The Canadian Press
