Canadian history on www.gedmartin.net

 This is a list with outline information of Canadian history and Canadian Studies articles, chapters and essays by Ged Martin on www.gedmartin.net, as of February 2020 (updated to August 2024). The material available here represents a selection of research and comment, both published and (more recently) written for the website. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

"Mrs G. was practically his keeper: John A. Macdonald on Gladstone" reviews his attitudes to a leading British politician.
https://www.gedmartin.net/martinalia-mainmenu-3/364-macdonald-on-gladstone

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

"Lord Bury's civilization scorecard for Canada's First Nations, 1855" looks briefly at a curious exercise carried out by a 23-year-old British aristocrat in December 1855. Lord Bury, the Superintendent General of Indian Affairs in the Province of Canada, published an index of civilization among the indigenous communities under his charge, awarding them marks on a scale from 0 to 15. 
https://www.gedmartin.net/martinalia-mainmenu-3/402-lord-bury-first-nations-scorecard

 

 

 

 

"The appointment of Sir Francis Head as lieutenant-governor of Upper Canada in 1835" examines the legend that this controversial governor was appointed by mistake.

based on an article published in the Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, iii (1975), 280-91.

 

 

first published in British Journal of Canadian Studies, xxviii (2015), 63-86.

 

 

"Gladstone and the limits of Canadian self-government, 1849: the Rebellion Losses Bill in British politics" suggests that the coming of responsible government in 1848-9 might be reconsidered as a "peace process", on the lines of attempts at institutional reconciliation in modern Northern Ireland and South Africa. It asks why the rebellions of 1837-8 apparently left so little long-term mark on the Canadian psyche, unlike divisive conflicts in other countries (e.g. Ireland in 1922-3). It also notes that the removal of the provincial capital from Montreal in 1849 seems to have caused the virtual disappearance of Canada's largest city from the subsequent narrative of its political history.

based on an article published  in the Journal of Imperial and Commonwealth History, vi (1977), pp. 3-22.

 

"Gladstone, Canada and calibration: Part 1 of Gladstone and Canada" examines Gladstone's involvement with British North American issues throughout 60 years of his career: 

"Gladstone Through the Looking Glass: Part 2 of Gladstone and Canada" builds upon the discussion of his attidues to Canada to suggest some interpretative themes. 
https://www.gedmartin.net/martinalia-mainmenu-3/369-gladstone-canada-part-2

"'Our Lady of the Snows': the Canadian context and reactions to Kipling's poem of 1897" is a discussion of the origins of Rudyard Kipling's poem hailing the Fielding tariff of 1897, which cut import duties on British goods. Kipling misunderstood a political manoeuvre as an imperial gesture.  The poem memorably captured Canada's relationship with Britain in the couplet: "Daughter am I in my mother's house / But mistress in my own". In later years, politicians made convoluted attempts to update Kipling's imagery. It finally died in the aftermath of the 1956 Suez crisis. The most surprising aspect of Canadian reaction to Kipling's well-meant if patronising verse was the widespread protest against his apparent assumption that Canada was a land of eternal winter.
https://www.gedmartin.net/martinalia-mainmenu-3/328-our-lady-of-the-snows

 

 

 

"The Canadian analogy in South African Union, 1870-1910", published in 1976, examined how four prominent white South Africans manipulated Canadian precedents in support of the centralised union that was created in 1910.
https://www.gedmartin.net/martinalia-mainmenu-3/400-canadian-analogy-south-africa.

 

"Canadian economic history in a South African context: Pietermaritzburg, 1992" was a keynote address delivered to a conference at the University of Natal as South Africa was emerging from apartheid and academics were rebuilding overseas links. It was an attempt by a "generalist" consumer of Canadian history to review some of the main issues discussed by economic historians, to present them in a context of South African history and suggest comparisons and contrasts. My discussion made no claim to deep insights, but is presented as a contribution to the historiography of the time.

 

 

"Carnarvon Diaries: Camden Series, volume 35. Comments and Corrections" included some points about Canada-related entries in the Camden Series edition of the diaries of the Earl of Carnarvon, who was colonial secretary in 1866-67, at the time of the passage of the British North America Act. 

 

"Why did Parnell avoid Ottawa in 1880?" draws attention to the fact that Charles Stewart Parnell, leader of Ireland's Home Rule movement, made no attempt to visit the Dominion capital and see Canada's devolved parliament in action during his 1880 tour of North American.
https://www.gedmartin.net/martinalia-mainmenu-3/366-why-did-parnell-avoid-ottawa-in-1880

 

 

"Father Michael O'Donel: The Newfoundland Adventures of a Clashmore County Waterford Parish Priest" follows the cleric who was – as his tombstone at Clashmore states – the nephew of the first Roman Catholic bishop of Newfoundland, J.L. O'Donel. https://www.gedmartin.net/martinalia-mainmenu-3/173-father-michael-odonel-the-newfoundland-adventures-of-a-clashmore-county-waterford-parish-priest