The Rebellions of 1837

Family Compact

The Chateau Clique

Council of Twelve

Lower Canadian Rebellion

Upper Canadian Rebellion

After the War of 1812• The War of 1812 stopped what may have been the

conquest of North America by the Americans.• Anti-American feelings ran high at least among the

English Canadian elite.• Democracy was viewed as “Yankee Republicanism”• For French Canadians the struggle was not anti-

Americanism but anti-Anglicization• English and Irish immigrants made the French feel

they would lose their language, religion and culture, in short – assimilation.

The Colonies of British North America

• Upper Canada – Ontario• Lower Canada – Quebec• New Brunswick• Nova Scotia (with Cape

Breton)• Prince Edward Island• The senior governor was

based in Lower Canada• The other colonies had

lieutenant governors• Newfoundland was ruled

by a separate governor

• After the Pemmican Wars in 1816 the NWC and the HBC worked on cooperation

• In 1821, the North West Company and the Hudson’s Bay Company united to form the Hudson’s Bay Company

• With the merger their was a sharp drop in liquor trade with First Nations

• Selkirk’s Red River colony struggled on.

Lead up to Rebellion

• Lower Canada lead by Louis-Joseph Papineau (aristocratic)

• Upper Canada lead by William Lyon Mackenzie (newspaperman)

• Reasons were the same: a colonial administration out of touch with its subjects

• In Upper Canada political change

• In Lower Canada political change with language and culture

Mackenzie

PapineauPapineauPapineauPapineau

Political Problems

• The root problem was having elected assemblies under the control of appointed councils.

• Councils and assemblies could not get along.

• In Lower Canada the elected assembly was mostly French Canadian and the council was English Canadian.

Chateau Clique• Château Clique, a nickname given to the small group of

officials, usually members of the anglophone merchant community.

• The term referred to the governor's residence and the location of government offices, Château St-Louis.

The Château St-Louis burned down in 1834.

Chateau Clique

• Included James McGill and John Molson , who dominated the executive and legislative councils, the judiciary and senior bureaucratic positions of Lower Canada until the 1830s.

James McGillJames McGill

McGill UniversityMcGill University

Chateau Clique• John Molson, brewer,

banker, steamship builder.• He also entered the

lumber business during the building boom of the early 1800s, built a hotel and in 1821 established the colony's first distillery and financed the Champlain and Saint Lawrence Railroad, the first railway in Canada.

Rule by “Clique”• The French Canadians

were still able to get French language as the language of government.

• The elected assemblies could only use their power in a negative manner.

• They could block the government from making laws but could make no law.

• British immigrants poured into Lower Canada.

• Two different types of immigrants:

1. Poor Irish coming to Canada to improve their lives came as “human ballast” on lumber ships.

2. Middle class Brits looking to make it rich.

• Canada was settled by extremes of middle class and poor.

• America was settled by middle class.

• The Clique aggressively pursued canal building, the establishment of banking institutions, and the abolition of the Seigneurial System and French Civil Law.

• In the 1820s the Clique opposed efforts by the assembly to control public revenues and continued their efforts aimed at the assimilation of French Canadians. • In 1822, the Clique supported

a scheme to reunite Upper and Lower Canada.

• In the 1830s, the Clique blocked Louis-Joseph Papineau's resolutions demanding Responsible Government.

Rule by “Clique”

Family Compact• In Upper Canada the

oligarchy was called the Family Compact.

• Comprised of Conservatives, members of the Anglican Church, Loyalists and self proclaimed “defenders of 1812.”

• Most often the families were related in one way or another.

• They were centered at York [Toronto], linked by family patronage and shared political and social beliefs to the

professional and mercantile upper middle class.

Bank of Upper Canada

The Family Compact• The group emerged after

John Graves Simcoe, Upper Canada's first lieutenant-governor, attempted to create a local aristocracy by appointing his Loyalist friends to government posts and granting them land.

John Graves Simcoe

The Family Compact• The next generation

included Sir John Beverley Robinson and John Strachan, who were drawn into the governing Tory [conservative] elite.

Sir John Beverley Robinson

John Strachan

The Council of Twelve• In Nova Scotia the

oligarchy was called the Council of 12.

• They were 12 men on the non-elected council appointed by the governor.

• Nova Scotia at this time was the most successful colony in the empire.

• Halifax, an international seaport, had a population of 15,000.

• Nova Scotia had the most repressive of the colonial governments but it was in Upper and Lower Canada where the rebellions began.

Government House, Halifax

A Deteriorating Situation• In Lower Canada the

seigneurial system had failed to protect the elites.

• By 1830 more than ½ of the estates were in English hands.

• It was the Molson’s and the McGills that controlled the Clique.

The Patriotes

• Primarily francophone party,

• Led mainly by members of the liberal professions and small-scale merchants,

• Widely supported by farmers, day-labourers and craftsmen.

The Patriotes was the name given after 1826 to the Parti Canadien and to the popular movement that contributed to the Rebellions of 1837-38 in Lower Canada.

• Led by Louis-Joseph Papineau, Jean-Olivier Chénier and Wolfred Nelson.

Louis-Joseph Papineau

The Patriotes

Besides Papineau, Wolfred Nelson and Jean-Olivier Chénier were leading figures of the Patriotes.

Dr. Wolfred Nelson Jean-Olivier Chénier

The Patriotes

• The Patriotes demanded greater power for assembly members, including increased ministerial responsibility and eligibility for appointment to the council.

• The Patriotes dominated the elected House of Assembly in Lower Canada.

• Their adversaries, the merchant bourgeoisie, the aristocracy and the colonial administration, controlled the appointed

Legislative Council, which held most of the power.

• Their demands, put forth in the name of democracy and the right of peoples to self-government, marked a liberal, nationalist and anticolonial ideology.

The Patriotes• In 1834, the Patriotes listed

their major complaints in the "Ninety-Two Resolutions" sent to the British government.

• Britain rejected this call for reform, which caused many demonstrations; verbal violence soon gave way to physical violence.

Fights in the Streets• Lower Canada crops had

failed• Immigrants were flooding

into the colony (English, Irish)

• Cholera in the cities killing 1000’s

• A violent clash between the Doric Club and the patriote organization the Fils de la Liberte on November 6, 1837 was a prelude to the Lower Canadian Rebellions of 1837.

Fights in the Streets

• Doric Club, founded 1836 in Montréal, a paramilitary political association of young anglophone Tories.

• Set up by Adam Thom who later became a secretary for Lord Durham.

• The Doric Club dissolved when many of its members were recruited by General Colborne to fight the rebels.

Rebellion• Britain sent an answer to

the 92 Resolutions - the answer was NO!

• Lower Canada had waited for 3 years.

• Papineau spoke against the British rule.

• Dr. Wolfred Nelson, hero of the War of 1812, joined the patriotes.

• Revolutionary assembly would meet at St.-Denis.

Battle of St.-Denis• With the Richelieu Valley

in revolt the governor sent British troops and Canadian militia to arrest the leaders.

• The Patriotes blockaded the streets in St.-Denis and waited for the British.

• In a few short minutes the British were forced to retreat.

• The Patriotes had won the battle.

Battles of St.-Charles and St.-Eustache

• Two days later in November British troops killed 60 Patriotes and arrested many others.

• The battle of St.-Charles was over quickly.• With the rebellion over in the towns the governor

turned to Montreal.• The Patriotes had invaded the town of Oka and stole

weapons.• At St.-Eustache British troops and Canadian militia

killed 100 Patriotes and set the town on fire.

Death of a Dream• The rebellion in collapse

Dr. Robert Nelson (brother of Dr. Wolfred Nelson) went south to find Papineau.

• Papineau refused to fight.• Nelson said of Papineau,

“A man fit only for words, but not of action.”

• Nelson gathered troops in America and returned in 1838.

• When he returned to the States he was arrested.

Lord Seaton

• In 2 years of battles 27 soldiers and 300 French Canadians were killed

• “Lord Satan” John Colborne a former Lieutenant-Governor of Upper Canada put down the revolt.

• He had no love of the French Canadians he burned estates and arrested thousands.

The Family Compact

• The Family Compact fought for Anglican Religion in schools

• the rebels in Upper Canada wanted public schools and a separation of church and state

• Many moderates fought within the system but accomplished little, William Lyon Mackenzie was a fiery newspaperman who did more.

• Mackenzie a penniless son of a widow

• Mackenzie was opposed to the large land grants given to the Anglican Church

• Mackenzie attacked the Family Compact over every matter

• The Compact harassed Mackenzie.

Muckraker

• Hated by the establishment but loved by the people Mackenzie was a real “muckraker”

• Mackenzie was first elected to the assembly in 1828 and kicked out by the rest of the members

• He was quickly re-elected and just as quickly expelled

• 4 times he was expelled by the ruling “Tories”

Report on Grievances• In 1834 William Lyon Mackenzie became the first

mayor of Toronto “Muddy York.”• All the while denouncing the ruling families of

Upper Canada.• Mackenzie roamed Upper Canada getting a list of

all the wrongs of the ruling elite.• The complaints came in at 500 pages, Upper

Canada’s idea of the 92 resolutions.• Mackenzie’s was the Report on Grievances• Demanded everything from responsible

government to a new and lower postage stamp.

Sir Francis Bond Head• Along came Sir Francis

Bond Head appointed as Lieutenant-Governor.

• A real Brit with the ideas of an upper class English gentleman.

• He did not trust reformers and hated Mackenzie.

• Reformers in the assembly stopped funds from going to the government.

• Bond Head called an election.

Sir Francis Bond Head

A Bought Election

• Bond Head did not stay out of the election.

• He campaigned for the Conservatives and used bribes to get votes.

• Only landowners could vote so he gave grants of land to supporters.

• The bribes and scare tactics worked the Conservatives won a majority.

• Mackenzie could do worse• changed the name of the

newspaper from “The Colonial Advocate” to “The Constitution”

• Came up with the “Toronto Declaration”

• Inspired by the Lower Canadian Rebellion Mackenzie preached rebellion

Montgomery’s Tavern

• More than 600 men gathered at Montgomery's Tavern on Yonge Street.

• Bond Head said no reformers would try anything while he was in charge.

• He had sent the garrison to Montreal to put down the Lower Canadian Rebellion.

“Bar Room Brawl”

• Mackenzie’s men and Sheriff Jarvis’s men met.

• Jarvis's men fired and everyone ran.

• The battle was over.• The next day Bond

Head took the militia to Montgomery’s Tavern arrested the rebels and torched the tavern.

• Mackenzie escaped to America.

British Values Win Again

• Mackenzie raised forces and money in America landed on Navy Island and declared himself president of the Canadian Republic.

• It was over quickly, more than 1000 rebels captured, 20 hanged, and 800 prisoners taken.

• The Judge that hanged them imprisoned them or sent them to Australia was a member of the Family Compact.

A New Party

• The British pardoned both Papineau and Mackenzie.

• Wolfred Nelson could return and all were re-elected.

• Papineau and his reformers would set up the “parti rouge” later they would join with English-Canadian reformers and become the Liberal Party.

• Mackenzie dropped from sight.

Mackenzie’s Grave in Toronto

Canadian Democracy is Born!• Rebellions of 1837 as a struggle for democracy

and self rule by elected representatives.• The rebellions changed both the Canadas and the

British Empire.• Britain realized that if rebellions could happen in

the most stable of colonies, they could happen anywhere.

• “The Rebellions were American Revolutions in miniature, and though at the time they seemed to have failed, they cleared the way for self-government, and just beyond self-government, nationhood.”

Did You Know?

• William Lyon Mackenzie King, politician and prime minister of Canada during the periods of 1921-26, 1926-30 and 1935-48 was the grandson of William Lyon Mackenzie.

Did You Know?

• Canada sent a battalion of volunteers to fight in the Spanish Civil War in 1937.

• Most call this war the start of World War II, because it was a war of democracy against fascism.

• The battalion was called the “Mackenzie Papineau Battalion”

• or the “MAC PAPS”