Mount Coulter was named for Flying Officer Richard Leslie Coulter.
Born in 1918 at Delisle, Saskatchewan, Leslie attended Atchelitz Public School and Chilliwack High School. Leslie participated in junior cattle judging, golf, badminton and sailing and was a junior member of the Chamber of Commerce. Prior to enlistment he was an employee of the Royal Bank in Chilliwack and New Westminster. Leslie Coulter was trained as an observer in the R.C.A.F., and graduated at Pennfield Ridge. Overseas he flew with an R.A.F. squadron on several missions over Germany. In the spring of 1942 he was attached to Ferry Command until he contracted malaria. In October 1942 he was re‑posted to the Egyptian Front and took part in the El Alamein offensive. On December 17, 1942, when serving from Malta with 104 Squadron, a Wellington bomber unit, Leslie’s aircraft failed to return from operations. Other members of the crew killed were Flying Officer George Cochrane Silver R.C.A.F., Sergeant Leonard Booth R.A.F. and Sergeant Herbert George Lines D.F.M., R.A.F. (Ferguson, 2009).
In 1947, geographical features were named by an agency of the federal government, the Canadian Permanent Committee on Geographical names after receiving a list of names of Canadian servicemen from Chilliwack who were killed during the Second World War From Canada’s Department of National Defence. The names were divided by province and were to be assigned to geographical features close to the place of enlistment (Grainger, 1998, p.82).
Mount Coulter is a 1969 meter mountain located near the Hope Slide.
- Grainger, N. (1998). The Mountain Project.Chilliwack, B.C.: Neil Grainger
- Ferguson, P. (2009). Chilliwack War Memorial. Online exhibit retrieved from http://www.chilliwackmuseum.ca/war-memorial/WW2_c_names.html
Photograph caption: Flying Officer Richard Leslie Coulter. [Chilliwack Museum and Archives]