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Launching Canadian Confederation: Means to Ends, 1836–1864

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  11 February 2009

Ged Martin
Ged Martin
Affiliation:
Centre of Canadian Studies, University of Edinburgh
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Extract

Canadian Confederation took shape at a conference at Charlottetown in September 1864, was designed in detail at the Quebec conference in October 1864 and revised into final form in London in 1866–7. The sequence of conferences forms part of the stately tread of Canadian nationhood, and provides a counterpart to the Annapolis and Philadelphia conventions which originated the other great nation of North America, just as the Fathers of Confederation echo the Founding Fathers of the United States. Subsequent meetings in other cities were to reinforce the aura of the nation-building conference, through Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and Durban to the less resounding triumphs of Montego Bay and Victoria Falls. Intercolonial unions, it seemed, were formed by calling conferences. From this assumption it could be deduced as a corollary that if no conference was called, there was no interest in intercolonial union. In Canada, the preservation of the Province House at Charlottetown as ‘the cradle of Confederation’ is a gesture to national feeling, but the mystique thus fostered risks creating historical distortion.

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Articles
Information
The Historical Journal , Volume 27 , Issue 3 , September 1984 , pp. 575 - 602
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1984

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References

1 This article is based on a paper delivered to the Commonwealth and Overseas History seminar at Cambridge in March 1981. I am grateful to Dr John Iliffe and members of the group for their comments.

2 The best general histories of the Confederation period are Creighton, D. G., Road to Confederation: the emergence of Canada 1863–1867 (Toronto, 1964)Google Scholar; Morton, W. L., The critical years: the union of British North America, 1857–1873 (Toronto, 1964)Google Scholar; Waite, P. B., The lift and times of Confederation 1864–1867: politics, newspapers and the union of British North America (Toronto, 1962)Google Scholar.

3 Hodgins, Bruce W., ‘Democracy and the Ontario Fathers of Confederation’, in Firth, Edith G. (ed), Profiles of a province: studies in the history of Ontario (Toronto, 1967), pp. 83–91Google Scholar, reprinted in Bruce Hodgins and Robert Page (eds.), Canadian history since Confederation: essays and interpretations (2nd edn, Georgetown, Ontario, 1979), pp. 19–28.

4 British and colonial support for British North American union before 1864 is discussed in Martin, G. W., ‘Britain and the future of British North America, 1837–1867’ (Cambridge Ph.D. thesis, 1972)Google Scholar; Whitelaw, W. M., The Maritimes and Canada before Confederation (ed. Waite, P. B., Toronto, 1966)Google Scholar; Knox, Bruce A., ‘The rise of colonial federation as an object of British policy, 1850–1870’, Journal of British Studies, XI (1972), 92–112Google Scholar; Upton, F. S., ‘The idea of Confederation, 1754–1858’, in Morton, W. L. (ed.), The shield of Achilles (Toronto, 1968), pp. 184–207Google Scholar; Gibson, James A., ‘The Colonial Office view of Canadian federation, 1856–1868’, Canadian Historical Review, XXXV (1954), 279–313Google Scholar.

5 The memorandum, probably dating from early 1862, is in University of Nottingham, Newcastle Papers, NeC 11260. For the railway negotiations of 1862 see Morton, Critical years, pp. 120–5.

6 Arthur Gordon, lieutenant-governor of New Brunswick, and a critic of Confederation, raised the awkward question of the insertion of a promise of railway construction into an act of parliament in February 1865, in a dispatch to Cardwell and a letter to Gladstone. He argued that such a provision would be ‘either unnecessary or unjust’ – unnecessary if the new legislature decided to honour the plan, unjust if it did not. In any case, the provision was unenforceable. In the Colonial Office it was recognized that Gordon had raised an awkward question, and Cardwell's official reply was evasive. Privately, however, he ruled out a British promise. ‘Of course the railway will not be made by the Imperial Parliament. It will be made, if at all, by a guarantee of the 3 Provinces, or the United Province, as the case maybe; and our engagement is that we will ask Parliament to back that guarantee.’ As Gordon reported to his principal minister, S. L. Tilley, Cardwell ‘repudiates the idea of the construction of the Intercolonial Railway being secured by an act of the Imperial Parliament. They will ask Parliament to guarantee a loan for its construction but all else the provinces themselves must settle.’ Sir Richard MacDonnell of Nova Scotia thought that the British government should make some formal promise that the railway would be built. A Colonial Office official thought that to include the undertaking in an imperial act ‘would create a rare imbroglio’, but MacDonnell felt that even if an ‘ungainly’ provision in a constitution, ‘what of all that?’ As late as 23 January 1867, a draft bill based on the delegates' resolutions relegated the intercolonial railway to a schedule, with a note that it ‘must be dealt with separately’. The first version of clause 145 appeared only in the revised draft of 2 February 1867. Not until 13 March, after the British North America Act had passed both houses, did the Colonial Office formally apply to the Treasury for a renewal of the guarantee offered in 1862, pointing out that the terms of the offer left it open until December 1867 in any case. Lord Monck, the governor-general, who was on leave in London, was anxious about the reception of the financial guarantee in the House of Commons. Confederation was certainly intended to lead to the construction of the intercolonial railway, but the British government was too wary of colonial politicians to fall into the trap of making a direct trade-off. Gordon to Gladstone, confidential, 27 Feb. 1865, in Knaplund, P. (ed.), Gladstone-Gordon correspondence, 1851–1896, Transactions of the American Philosophical Society, II (06 1961), 45–6Google Scholar; Public Record Office, CO 188/143, Gordon to Cardwell, no. 23, 27 Feb. 1865, and minutes, fos. 181–7, printed, with Cardwell, 's reply of 18 March 1865, in UK Parliamentary Papers (1867), XLVIII (3769), 88–9, 116Google Scholar; University of New Brunswick, Stanmore Papers, Cardwell to Gordon, private, 18 March 1865; Public Archives of Canada, Tilley Papers, MG 27, IDI 5, 18, Gordon to Tilley, 1 April 1865; CO 217–238, MacDonnell to Cardwell, no. 103, 31 Aug. 1865 and minutes, fos. 86–8; Public Archives of Canada, Monck Papers, A–756, MacDonnell to Monck, 20 March 1865; drafts of the British North America Bill, in Pope, Joseph (ed.), Confederation (Toronto, 1895), pp. 157, 176Google Scholar; UK Parliamentary Papers (1867), XLVIII, 833–42; Public Archives of Canada, Macdonald Papers, vol. 51 B, Monck to Macdonald, 28 Feb. 1867, 20397–20403; vol. 75, Monck to Macdonald, 2 March 1867, 29038–29041. A powerful statement of the argument that British governments used the intercolonial railway as a lever to bring about union has been advanced by Roman, D. W., ‘The contribution of imperial guarantees for colonial railway loans to the consolidation of British North America 1847–1865’ (Oxford, D.Phil, thesis, 1978)Google Scholar.

7 British Library, Gladstone Papers, Add. MS 44753, fos. 125–43, printed in Knaplund, Paul, Gladstone and Britain's imperial policy (London, 1927), pp. 228–42Google Scholar. For Gladstone's unpopularity with cabinet colleagues, Buckle, G. E. (ed.), Letters of Queen Victoria: second series (2 vols. London, 1926), I, 248–9Google Scholar. Cardwell had replied to Monck's announcement of the new ministry and its policy on 7 July (Public Archives of Canada, Monck Papers, A-755). The Times reported that the new Canadian ministry was committed to federation, 11 July 1864.

8 E.g. Public Record Office, CO 217/235, MacDonnell to Cardwell, separate, 22 Nov. 1864, fos. 187–212.

9 Creighton, D. G., John A. Macdonald I: The young politician (Toronto, 1952), p. 361Google Scholar.

10 As early as January 1865 it was clear that British and Canadian defence plans diverged. Significantly Cardwell brushed aside the disagreement with the comment that ‘ulterior questions will await the issue of the Scheme for Union’. Public Archives of Canada, Monck Papers, A-755, Cardwell to Monck, private, 28 Jan. 1865.

11 The section which follows draws upon ‘An imperial idea and its friends: Canadian Confederation and the British, 1837–1864’ to appear in Gordon Martel (ed.), The experience of empire: essays in honour of A. P. Thornton.

12 Hansard's Parliamentary Debates, 3rd series, LIII (13 April 1840), col. 1065 (Peel); University of Durham, Grey Papers, Russell to Grey, 6 August 1849; Public Record Office, CO 188/119, minute by Newcastle, 7 June 1853, fo. 274; Lytton to Derby, 7 Sept. 1858, in Knox, Bruce A., ‘Sir Edward Lytton and Confederation, 1858’, Canadian Historical Review, LIII (1972), 108–11Google Scholar. For Howick, see below.

13 D. G. Creighton, John A. Macdonald, 1, 271–2; Lindsey, Charles, The life and times of William Lyon Mackenzie (2 vols. Toronto, 1862), I, 55–8Google Scholar; Careless, J. M. S., Brown of the Globe, I: The voice of Upper Canada, 1818–1860 (Toronto, 1959), pp. 93, 253, 321Google Scholar; Skelton, O. D., Life and times of Sir Alexander Tilloch Gait (Toronto, abridged edn, 1966), pp. 79–82Google Scholar; Pryke, Kenneth G., Nova Scotia and Confederation, 1864–1874 (Toronto, 1979), p. 3Google Scholar; Morton, , Critical years, p. 19Google Scholar, emphasizes that Cartier's endorsement of federation in 1858 was ‘a tremendous commitment for a French politician’.

14 Hamilton, P. S., Observations upon a union of the colonies of British North America (Halifax, 1855), p. 25Google Scholar.

15 Morton, , Critical years, pp. 207–8Google Scholar; Waite, , Life and times of Confederation, pp. 37n.–38n.Google Scholar

16 Public Archives of Canada, Monck Papers, A-755, Cardwell to Monck, private, 16 July 1864.

17 Trollope, Anthony, North America (2 vols. London, 1862), I, 105–6Google Scholar.

18 Newcastle's comment in University of Nottingham, Newcastle Papers, NeC 11260 (memorandum, early 1862).

19 Cf. Public Record Office, CO 217/230, minute by Newcastle, 22 June 1862, fos. 251–6.

20 Whitelaw, , Maritimes and Canada before Confederation, p. 128Google Scholar.

21 Stanley to Head, 7 April 1858, in Knox, Bruce A., ‘The British government, Sir Edward Lytton, and British North American Confederation, 1858’, Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, IV (1976), 206–17CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

22 Public Record Office, CO 217/221, Mulgrave to Lytton, confidential, 30 Dec. 1858, fos. 556–76.

23 Annand, William, quoted by Waite, , Life and times of Confederation, p. 50Google Scholar.

24 Saint John Evening Globe, quoted ibid. p. 63.

25 Ward, John M., Earl Grey and the Australian colonies (Melbourne, 1958), pp. 162–95Google Scholar; Hansard's Parliamentary Debates, 3rd series, ex, 13 May 1850, col. 1426.

26 Public Archives of Canada, Newcastle Papers, A-309, Hincks to F. Bruce, 10 Dec. 1855.

27 See the comments of Joseph Howe of Nova Scotia in an open letter to the League's president, George Moffatt: ‘A confederation of the colonies may be the desire of your convention. If so, the object is legitimate, but it must be pursued by legitimate means.’ But he added that if proposals were ‘made by the Government and Parliament of Canada, they would be treated with deference and respect’. Chisholm, J. A. (ed.), The speeches and public letters of Joseph Howe (2 vols. Halifax, 1909), II, 25Google Scholar.

28 Public Record Office, CO 537/137, secret minute, 20 Dec. 1837, fos. 144–9; epitome of proposed Canada Act, 19 Jan. 1837, fos. 196–202. Cf. Martin, Ged, ‘Confederation rejected: the British debate on Canada, 1837–1840’, Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, XI (1982), 33–57CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

29 University of Durham, Grey Papers, Stephen to Howick, 28 Dec. 1837; Colonial Papers no. 99; journal of 3rd Earl Grey 29 Dec. 1837.

30 Ibid. Melbourne to Howick, 2 Jan. 1838; Royal Archives, Howick to Melbourne, private, 2 Jan. 1837 [recte 1838]. Melbourne's hand-writing is not clear. He seems to have written ‘erection’. Howick, Both and Burroughs, P., The Canadian crisis and British colonial policy, 1828–1841 (London, 1972), p. 97Google Scholar, read it as ‘creation’. Material in the Royal Archives is quoted by gracious permission of H.M. the Queen.

31 University of Durham, Grey Papers, Palmerston to Howick, 4 Jan. 1838; Melbourne to Howick, 2 Jan. 1838.

32 Hansard's Parliamentary Debates, 3rd series, XL, 25, 26 01 1838, cols. 476–550Google Scholar, especially Peel, cols. 557–8; Public Record Office, CO 42/283, Durham to Glenelg, no. 58, 13 Sept. 1838, fos. 162–3. For Durham's attempts to win support for federation, Sanderson, C. R. (ed.), The Arthur Papers (3 vols. Toronto, 1957–1959), I, 205–6, 274Google Scholar and New, Chester W., Lord Durham: a biography of John George Lambton first earl of Durham (Oxford, 1929), pp. 462–8Google Scholar. Ironically, the Quebec conference of 1838 unconsciously followed a procedure recommended by William Lyon Mackenzie in 1824: ‘Let an Act be passed in the British Parliament calling a convention of all the colonies, and let a British nobleman or gentleman of competent knowledge preside… let representatives from each section of British America, chosen by the people and in proportion to the population, compose that convention; let the outlines of a constitution be drawn up by this confederation of the talents and the wisdom of His Majesty's American subjects, and be sent home for the consideration of the Imperial Parliament.’ Colonial Advocate, 24 June 1824, quoted in Lindsey, , Life and times of Mackenzie, I, 58Google Scholar.

33 Public Record Office, CO 42/534, Grey to Elgin (draft), no. 10, 31 Dec. 1846, fos. 369–79; copy in Public Archives of Canada, Elgin Papers, A-396.

34 Public Archives of Canada, Elgin Papers, A-397, Grey to Elgin, 23 Dec. 1846.

35 Public Record Office, CO 42/541, Elgin to Grey, confidential, 18 Feb. 1847, fos. 41 56; Elgin to Grey, private, 3 Sept. 1849, in Doughty, A. G. (ed.), The Elgin-Grey Papers, 1846–1852 (4 vols. Ottawa, 1937), II 463–6Google Scholar. J. W.Johnston had been a member of the Nova Scotian delegation to Quebec in 1838, and remained a supporter of colonial union.

36 Elgin to Grey, 26 April 1847, in ibid. 1, 33–4; Public Archives of Canada, Elgin Papers, A-397, Grey to Elgin, private, 2 April 1847.

37 Public Record Office, CO 42/536, minute by Stephen, 12 Sept. 1846, fos. 131–2; Grey, to Elgin, (extract), 3 11 1847, in Doughty, (ed.), Elgin-Grey Papers, I, 76–8Google Scholar.

38 Public Archives of Canada, Durham Papers, 18, confidential memorandum by Harvey, 16 Aug. 1838, pp. 378–90; Public Record Office, CO 217/202, Harvey to Grey, no. 133, 10 Aug. 1849, fos. 177–8; Harvey to Grey, private, 16 Aug. 1849, and minutes by Hawes, 4 Sept. and Grey, 12 Sept. 1849, fos. 204–5; Harvey to Grey, no. 139, 7 Sept. 1849, fo. 211.

39 Examiner, 26 May 1849, pp. 323–5; Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, LXXXII (1857), 118Google Scholar; Spectator, 17 Sept. 1853, p. 885.

40 Newcastle referred to the initiative in University of Nottingham, Newcastle Papers, Ne C 11260, memorandum (early 1862) and in NeC 10888, Newcastle to Gordon (copy), private, 28 Nov. 1863, pp. 37–41. The criticism by Hincks is in Public Archives of Canada, Elgin Papers, A-309, Hincks to F. Bruce, 10 Dec. 1853.

41 For Elgin's interest in imperial federation, see Martin, Ged, ‘Empire federalism and imperial parliamentary union, 1820–1870’, Historical Journal, XVI (1973), 68n.Google Scholar He was roundly criticized by The Times (7 Jan. 1856) for raising the issue in a speech.

42 Public Record Office, CO 188/124, Manners Sutton to Russell, no. 35, 18 April 1855, and minutes by Merivale, 10 May 1855, fos. 239–53; Manners Sutton to Russell, private, 12 June 1855, and minute by Russell, undated, fos. 405–13; CO 217/220, minute by Blackwood, 20 June 1857, fo. 166; CO 42/608, minute by Merivale, 18 Jan. 1856, fos. 9–11.

43 CO 42/614, minute by Merivale, 31 Aug. 1858, fos. 295–6. Merivale was evidently anxious to defend Head, a personal friend, against the charge of exceeding instructions. In fact Labouchere seems to have believed that both Maritime Union and Confederation lay in the future. Bodleian Library, Oxford, Clarendon Papers, C-70, Labouchere to Clarendon, private, 30 Sept. 1857, fos. 100–1.

44 Martin, C., ‘Sir Edmund Head's first project of federation, 1851’, Canadian Historical Association Report (1928), pp. 14–26Google Scholar.

45 Public Record Office, CO 217/217, minute by Blackwood, 13 Oct. 1855, fos. 425–7.

46 Public Archives of Canada, Newcastle Papers, A-309, Stewart to Newcastle, 26 May 1854.

47 Public Record Office, CO 217/216, Hamilton to Molesworth, 15 Aug. 1855, fos. 224–7; for Hamilton, see Hamilton, W. B., ‘P. S. Hamilton – the forgotten Confederate’, Collections of the Nova Scotian Historical Society, XXXVI (1968), 67–94Google Scholar; Rutherford, Paul, ‘A portrait of alienation in Victorian Canada: the private memoranda of P. S. Hamilton’, Journal of Canadian Studies, XII (1977), 12–23CrossRefGoogle Scholar; and Hamilton, 's letter in Imperial Federation, IV (1889), 77Google Scholar.

48 E.g. Creighton, D. G., ‘The United States and Canadian Confederation’, Canadian Historical Review, XXXIX (1958), 209–22CrossRefGoogle Scholar; Chester Martin, ‘British policy in Canadian Confederation’, ibid, XIII (1932), 3–19.

49 Stanley to Head, 7 April 1858; Merivale to Stanley, 8 Sept. 1858; Head to Stanley, 28 April 1858, in Knox, ‘The British government’, pp. 206–17.

50 Public Record Office, CO 42/614, minutes by Blackwood, 30 Aug. 1858 and Merivale, 31 Aug. 1858, fos. 295–6.

51 Ibid. CO 188/131, Manners Sutton to Lytton, private and confidential, 11 Oct. 1858, fos. 450–2; CO 194/153, Bannerman to Lytton, no. 83, 11 Oct. 1858, fos. 350–1; CO 226/90, Daly to Lytton, no. 2, 4 Jan. 1859, fos. 5–7.

52 Canadian News, 15 Sept. 1858, p. 287. For Blackwood, 's reliance on the Canadian News, Public Record Office, CO 42/645, minute of 8 02 1864, fos. 65–6Google Scholar.

53 Ibid. CO 42/615, minute by Blackwood, 22 Sept. 1858, fos. 64–5; CO 42/614, minute by Carnarvon, 1 Sept. 1858, fos. 295–6; Public Record Office, Carnarvon Papers, PRO 30/6/132, memorandum, 22 Sept. 1858, fos. 21–2; CO 42/615, minute by Carnarvon, 8 Nov. 1858, fos. 183–4; minute by Blackwood, 22 Sept. 1858, fos. 64–5.

54 Lytton, to Derby, , 7 09 1858, in Knox, , ‘Lytton and Confederation’, pp. 108–11Google Scholar. It is not clear whether this letter, printed from Lytton's draft, was sent, although it evidently represents his views.

55 Public Record Office, Lytton to Head (draft), no. 55, 10 Sept. 1858, fos. 297–300, often reprinted, most conveniently in G. P. Browne, Documents on the Confederation of British North America (Toronto, 1969), p. 2.

56 Lytton, to Derby, , 7 09 1858, in Knox, , ‘Lytton and Confederation’, pp. 108–11Google Scholar.

57 Cartier, , Ross, and Galt, to Lytton, , 23 10 1858, in Skelton, , Gait (1966 edn), pp. 93–6Google Scholar, printed with corrected date in Browne, , Documents, pp. 15–17Google Scholar.

58 Except where indicated, citations in this paragraph are from memoranda by Elliot, 4 Nov. 1858, and Lytton, 10 Nov. 1858, in Reginald Trotter, G., ‘The British government and the proposal of federation in 1858’, Canadian Historical Review, XIV (1933), 285–92Google Scholar, and cf. Browne, , Documents, pp. 19–27Google Scholar.

59 Public Record Office, CO 188/131, minute by Elliot, 25 Oct. 1858, fo. 442.

60 Hertfordshire County Record Office, Lytton Papers, D/EK 027, letter book beginning Sept. 1858, Lytton to Head (copy), confidential, 12 Dec. 1858, in reply to D/EK 025, Head to Lytton, confidential, 15 Nov. 1858.

61 Lytton, 's comments, 10 11 1858, are in Trotter, , ‘British government’ p. 287Google Scholar; Public Record Office, CO 42/615, minute by Carnarvon, 22 Sept. 1858, fos. 64–5. The request for a cabinet meeting is in Hughenden MSS B/XX/Ly 113, Lytton to Disraeli (undated). For the dispatch, Browne, , Documents, pp. 27–8Google Scholar.

62 University of Nottingham, New castle Papers, NeC 11230, Gait and Smith to Newcastle, 18 Jan. 1860, unsigned copy in Public Record Office, CO 42/622, fos. 91–2.

63 Ibid. CO42/619, draft of circular despatch, 27 Jan. 1860, fos. 375–6, versions printed in Browne, , Documents, p. 30Google Scholar and Gibson, J. A., ‘The Colonial Office view of Canadian federation, 1856–1868’, Canadian Historical Review, XXXV (1954), 296Google Scholar. The original draft (with deleted passages italicized in parentheses) ran: ‘HM’s Govt. see no reason to depart from the general line of policy which they have hitherto pronounced [replacing ‘indicated’] is their intention to adopt if the occasion should arise. They do not think it their duty to initiate any movement toward to such union but they have no wish (in any way) to impede (it. And they are ready to lend whatever assistance may be requisite from them toward carrying into effect) any well considered scheme which may have the concurrence of the people of the Provinces through the Legislatures, assuming of course that it does not interfere with Imperial interests.'

64 Canadian historians have been coy in linking the defeat of the Militia Bill to the issue which has twice dangerously divided Canada in the twentieth century. Rather it has been viewed as an irrational response to a continental crisis which demonstrated the ineptitude of Canadian politics and so led to circumstances from which the wider union could be deduced as a solution in 1864. The conscriptionist element is touched on in Creighton, , Macdonald, 1, 329–33Google Scholar and in Stacey, C. P., Canada and the British army 1846–1871 (2nd edn, Toronto, 1963), p. 135Google Scholar. Morton, , Critical years, pp. 108–12Google Scholar, recognized the significance of the issue, but explained the defeat of the bill as an expression of general political discontent.

65 Public Record Office, Russell Papers, PRO 30/22/31 Russell to Newcastle, copy, confidential, 12 June 1862. The Newcastle Papers are incomplete, and there is no evidence that the letter was sent. Newcastle's reaction to the Nova Scotian federal resolution suggests that it was.

66 Public Record Office, CO217/230, Mulgrave to Newcastle, no. 47, 21 May 1862, enclosures, minutes by Elliott, 14 June 1862, Fortescue, 19 June 1862, and draft of Newcastle to Mulgrave, no. 182, 6July 1862, fos. 251–61. Cf. Browne, , Documents, 30–1Google Scholar. The resolution is Chisholm, (ed.), Speeches of Joseph Howe, 11, 368–9Google Scholar.

67 Hansard's Parliamentary Debates, 3rd series, 19 Feb. 1867, col. 1166.

68 Public Record Office, CO226/100, minutes by Blackwood and Elliot, 29 March 1864, fo. 116. Cardwell had been designated as Newcastle's successor as early as 23 March, but the duke did not formally resign until 2 April.

69 Ibid., minutes by Blackwood, CO 43/642, fo. 157 (10 Sept. 1864); CO 217/235, fos. 60–1 (27 Sept. 1864); CO 188/143, fo. 25 (31 Jan. 1865). For his initial discounting of the genuineness of the initiative, see CO 42/646, fo. 305 (3 Aug. 1864).

70 The Times, 15 Oct. 1864; Examiner, 22 Oct. 1864, pp. 673–4. The latter article was condemned by Daily News, 25 Oct. 1864.

71 Gladstone, to Gordon, , 11 07 1965, in Knaplund, (ed.), Gladstone-Gordon correspondence, 1851–1896, pp. 46–7Google Scholar.

72 Public Archives o f Canada, Macdonal d Papers, 188, Brown t o Macdonald, private and confidential, 22 Dec. 1864, 78607–78612, and cf. Pope, J., Memoirs of the Right Honourable Sir John Alexander Macdonald (2 vols. London, 1894), 1, 273–4Google Scholar.

73 University of New Brunswick, Tilley Papers, MG Hio, Macdonald to Tilley, 14 Nov. 1864.

74 Public Record Office, Cardwell Papers, PRO 30/48/6/39, Gordon to Cardwell, private, 19 Dec. 1864.

75 Ibid., CO 42/647, MacDonnell to Monck, confidential, 9 Jan. 1865, copy in Monck to Cardwell, 20 Jan. 1865, fos. 227–44; COO 217/237, MacDonnell to Cardwell, confidential, 15 Feb. 1865, fos. 150–2; National Register of Archives, Broadlands MSS, GC/CA/401, Cardwell to Palmerston, 9 Dec. [1864].

76 Public Record Office, CO 194/175, minute by Blackwood, 28 July 1866, fos. 197–8.

77 Ibid., CO 194/174, Musgrave to Cardwell, no. 69, 19 Aug. 1865, fos 239–40. ‘Only one influence operated in Newfoundland as in the rest of British North America in favour of Confederation. This was the pressure of the Colonial Office on the governor, and of the latter on the local legislature. But by itself this was not enough to make up for the absence of all the other predisposing factors.’ Mayo, H. B., ‘Newfoundland and Confederation in the eighteen-sixties’, Canadian Historical Review, XXIX (1948), 129Google Scholar. One of the few politicians who supported Confederation recalled that Musgrave ‘never…had any real power or influence in Newfoundland’. Prowse, D. W., A history of Newfoundland from the English, colonial and foreign records (London, 1895), p. 494Google Scholar.

78 Bolger, F. W. P. (ed.), Canada's smallest province: a history of P. E. I. (Charlottetown, 1973), pp. 179–82Google Scholar; Public Record Office, Carnarvon Papers PRO 30/6/139 Dundas to Carnarvon, private, 7 Feb. 1867, fos. 151–2; Canadian Mews (31 01. 1867), p. 77. Cf. Harvey, D. C., ‘Confederation in Prince Edward Island’, Canadian Historical Review, XIV (1933), 143–60CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

79 Public Record Office, CO 194/175, minute by Carnarvon, 11 Aug. 1866, fo. 199.

80 Ibid.

81 Public Archives of Canada, Macdonald Papers, Letter Book 8, Macdonald to Watkin (copy), private, 27 March 1865.

82 University of New Brunswick, Stanmore Papers, Gordon to Cardwell, private, 13 May 1865, copy in Public Record Office, Cardwell Papers, PRO 30/48/6/49, fos. 78–81. Material in the Stanmore Papers is cited by permission of the Trustees.

83 Public Archives of Canada, Tilley Papers, 18, Gait to Tilley, private, 3 June 1865. Creighton calls the London talks Canada's ‘Appeal to Caesar’, Creighton, Road to Confederation, ch. 9.

84 The dispatch, dated 24 June 1865, was printed in U. K. Parliamentary Papers (1867), XLVIII, 79–80 (Nova Scotia), 118–19 (New Brunswick), 136 (Prince Edward Island), 155–6 (Newfoundland). Governors were instructed to communicate the dispatch to their legislatures, the normal form of publication. In Nova Scotia, where the legislature was in extended recess, MacDonnell feared that ‘the friends of Confederation would probably find themselves deprived till next February of the very great support which they cannot but derive from an earlier publication of so judicious an exposition of the opinions of Her Majesty's Government’. He immediately published the dispatch. Ibid., MacDonnell to Cardwell, 6 July 1865, p. 61.

85 E. g. Public Record Office, CO 188/143, Cardwell to Gordon (draft), confidential, 1 March 1865, fo. 99; University of New Brunswick, Stanmore Papers, Cardwell to Gordon, private, 29 April 1865, repeated in letters of 13 May 1865 and 3 March 1866. Cf. Waite, P. B., ‘Edward Cardwell and Confederation’, Canadian Historical Review, XLIII (1962), 17–41CrossRefGoogle Scholar.

86 University of Ne w Brunswick, Stanmore Papers, A. J. Smith to Gordon, 7 July 1865. The Confederation struggle in New Brunswick has been extensively studied, most recently by Baker, W. M., Timothy Warren Anglin: Irish Catholic Canadian (Toronto, 1977), pp. 57–118CrossRefGoogle Scholar. See also Bailey, A. G., ‘Railways and the Confederation issue in New Brunswick, 1863–1865’, Canadian Historical Review, XXI (1940), 367–83CrossRefGoogle Scholar, and ‘The basis and persistence of opposition to Confederation in New Brunswick’, ibid., XXIII (1942), 374–97; J. K. Chapman, ‘Arthur Gordon and Confederation’, ibid. XXXVII (1956), 142–57; Carl Wallace, ‘Albert Smith, Confederation and reaction in New Brunswick: 1852–1882’, Ibid., XLIV (1963), 286–312.

87 The calculation was apparently made by Monck, despite Gordon's assertion that the margin of defeat was 47,000 to 29,000. University of New Brunswick, Stanmore Papers, Cardwell to Gordon, 13 May 1865, Gordon to Monck, undated draft. The Times, 28 April 1865, accepted the lower figure, which it called ‘a slender balance enough to sway the destinies of half a continent.’

88 Creighton, , Road, pp. 348–55Google Scholar. The protest by the New Brunswick ministers of 12 July 1865 is in U. K. Parliamentary Papers (1867), XLVIII, 99–100. Chester Martin called it ‘perhaps the most spirited and incisive rejoinder of the entire controversy.’ ‘British policy in Canadian Confederation’, Canadian Historical Review, XIII (1932), 3–19Google Scholar.

89 W. M. Baker, ‘Squelching the disloyal, Fenian sympathizing brood: T. W. Anglin and Confederation in New Brunswick, 1865–6’, Ibid., LV (1974), 141–58.

90 The bishop's letter dates from April or May 1866, and was published in U. K. Parliamentary Papers (1867), XLVIII, 107–8. Baker, Anglin, pp. 75–9, challenges the received notion that Irish Catholics were predominantly anti-Confederate, pointing out that the Antis polled 51 4 per cent of the vote in two separate subdivisions of Saint John county, in one of which Catholics formed 65 9 per cent of the population, but in the other only 28–1 per cent. Rogers was bishop of a North Shore diocese, where many Catholics were francophone Acadians, who had little reason to defer to British wishes. Only one North Shore seat changed from anti-to pro-Confederation in the two general elections of 1865 and 1866, but all these arguments rest on the assumption that this (or any other) issue actually influenced New Brunswick voters. Cf. Creighton, , Road, pp. 261, 387Google Scholar.

91 Waite, , Life and times of Confederation, pp. 219–27Google Scholar; Creighton, , Road, pp. 295–6, 326–8, 357–8Google Scholar; Pryke, K. G., Nova Scotia and Confederation 1864–74 (Toronto, 1979), pp. 22–4Google Scholar.

92 Patterson, G., ‘An unexplained incident of Confederation in Nova Scotia’, Dalhousie Review, VII (1927), 445Google Scholar. Waite, , Life and times of Confederation, p. 269Google Scholar, agrees that the story has ‘a ring of truth’.

93 Public Record Office, Carnarvon Papers, PRO30/6/154Rogers to Carnarvon, 12 Dec. 1866, fos. 175–6.

94 Public Archives of Canada, Howe Papers, C-1834, Howe to Sir John Hay, (draft), private, 12 Nov. 1866, pp. 199–210, also printed in Burpee, L. J., (ed.), ‘Joseph Howe and the Anti-Confederation League’, Transactions of the Royal Society of Canada, 3rd ser. X (1917), 437–9Google Scholar. Howe claimed that his subsequent abandonment of the Nova Scotian repeal movement came when Annand warned him in October 1868 that he would ‘go for annexation’ to the United States. Chisholm, (ed.), Speeches of Joseph Howe, II, 618Google Scholar.