The Canadian History Podcast. A narrative audio history of Canada from the 1830s to 1885. Season One covers the Rebellions of 1837 and 1838 and the fights over Responsible Government in the 1840s. Season Two recounts the tumultuous and divided history of the 1850s and 1860s leading up to Canadian confederation.
Episodes
Thursday May 28, 2020
Episode 21 - The Nova Scotia Breakthrough
Thursday May 28, 2020
Thursday May 28, 2020
Lord Sydenham takes a summer work-cation in Nova Scotia and leaves a political system. Joseph Howe joins a coalition government and then falls out with the Governor. But he takes with him a Tory named James Uniacke who converts to the idea of responsible government. Free trade ideas take over in London and we fast forward through the 1840s to finally end up at the glorious election at the end of 1847 that changed British North American forever.
Thursday May 21, 2020
Episode 20 - Joseph Howe's Non-Revolution
Thursday May 21, 2020
Thursday May 21, 2020
Fresh from his libel trial, Joseph Howe gets himself elected to the Nova Scotian Assembly. And then he makes himself even more famous by doing what all Reformers seemed to desperately want to do in these years - he makes up some resolutions. Howe also writes some famous letters to Lord John Russell in England making the case for responsible government. Party lines are hardening in Nova Scotia and the Governor discovers that Joseph Howe is a real pain in the... 'dignity'.
Thursday May 14, 2020
Episode 19 - Tribune of the People
Thursday May 14, 2020
Thursday May 14, 2020
We are in Nova Scotia this week (and for the next two weeks) so it's rewind time as we (briefly) catch up on things like the Acadian expulsion and the rum trade with the West Indies. Then we zoom forward to meet one of the most interesting people in Canadian history: Joseph Howe, the poetry reading, donkey-owning rambler, who liked his drink and his politics - a man who wasn't easy to pin down. And we end up with the famous libel trial of 1835. Long live the free press!
Thursday May 07, 2020
Episode 18 - Double Majority
Thursday May 07, 2020
Thursday May 07, 2020
Governor General Charles Metcalfe tries to keep a government going - fending off nice insults like 'Old Square Toes' - while Reformers try to embarrass his government into submission. And vying ideas of how to govern the Canadas face off in an as-yet-undecided mid 1840s contest: it's responsible government vs 'double majority'. And we have more duels, a bench-clearing parliamentary brawl, and a club-wielding civil servant bent on clearing his name.
Thursday Apr 30, 2020
Episode 17 - The Metcalfe Crisis
Thursday Apr 30, 2020
Thursday Apr 30, 2020
The Canadas have a new Governor General and this one comes with a cancerous tumour that is going to - yet again - limit his time on this planet. But while he's here, Lafontaine and Baldwin go toe to toe with him to determine who really controls the government. The Reformers pass a misjudged Secret Societies Bill, trying to ban the Orange Order and then step on their own foot by resigning on principle in a situation that doesn't show up their principles very well. We're introduced to a man named Dominick Daly who somehow ends up forming a government with two former Patriotes. And then, to top it off, Canadians head to the polls yet again.
Wednesday Apr 22, 2020
Episode 16 - Reform Ascendant
Wednesday Apr 22, 2020
Wednesday Apr 22, 2020
The new Governor General Charles Bagot decides to ask for forgiveness and not permission. And this means we have a government - sort of - controlled by the Reformers Louis Lafontaine and Robert Baldwin. Robert Baldwin is defeated by his cousin and that gives Lafontaine an idea. And our new Governor General, the one we've just met, goes and does what Governors General do at this time - he gets sick and dies. And that leaves the Reformers and responsible government, such as it so far is, very much in the lurch.
Thursday Apr 16, 2020
Episode 15 - Bromance
Thursday Apr 16, 2020
Thursday Apr 16, 2020
It all starts with a letter from Francis Hincks to Louis Lafontaine. But soon Robert Baldwin is getting in on the action and then the Reformer bromance really takes off - and all with the idea of responsible government at its political heart. The Assembly meets in the brand new capital of Kingston. We get an actual motion calling for responsible government that wins support. There's an unprecedented election in Upper Canada. And, we're not talking metaphorically here: Lord Sydenham falls off a horse.
Thursday Apr 09, 2020
Episode 14 - The Sydenham System
Thursday Apr 09, 2020
Thursday Apr 09, 2020
It is early 1841 and the Canada's have been officially joined together. Now Lord Sydenham has to find someway of making the shotgun marriage actually work. A lot of reformers were hoping for a switch to this newfangled thing called 'responsible government'. But Lord Sydenham has his own system instead - and a plethora or corrupt electoral techniques to make sure it will work, at least in the short term.
Thursday Apr 02, 2020
Episode 13 - Shotgun Marriage
Thursday Apr 02, 2020
Thursday Apr 02, 2020
How did we go from loyalist victory in the rebellions to loyalist anger in the Rebellion Losses Bill mob riot in 1849? When did winning look so much like losing?
This week we start in 1849 but quick return to the years right after the rebellions. Lord Durham is back (but don't worry, as usual, he's not staying long); there's a new Governor General with a new nickname (welcome Le Poulet); Lower Canada and Upper Canada are forced to marry; Robert Baldwin is back in yet another executive (how long will he last this time?); and we have more elections in the Canadas which means, you guessed it, more election violence.
Thursday Mar 26, 2020
Episode 12 - What the !$#! Just Happened?
Thursday Mar 26, 2020
Thursday Mar 26, 2020
The Rebellions of 1837 and 1838 are finally over. Houses have burned; Governors General have come and gone; rebels have fled, been imprisoned, hanged and been exiled. And now we need to figure out what it all means. We step back in this episode to ask:what caused the rebellions? why did they fail? could they have succeeded? And then there is the most important historical question of all: so what?