Province of Lower Canada Province du Bas-Canada (French) | |||||||||||
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1791–1841 | |||||||||||
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Status | British colony | ||||||||||
Capital | Quebec City | ||||||||||
Common languages | French, English | ||||||||||
Government | Château Clique oligarchy under a constitutional monarchy | ||||||||||
Sovereign | |||||||||||
• 1791–1820 | George III | ||||||||||
• 1820–1830 | George IV | ||||||||||
• 1830–1837 | William IV | ||||||||||
• 1837–1841 | Victoria | ||||||||||
Lieutenant-Governor and Executive Council of Lower Canada | |||||||||||
Legislature | Parliament of Lower Canada | ||||||||||
Legislative Council | |||||||||||
Legislative Assembly | |||||||||||
Historical era | British Era | ||||||||||
26 December 1791 | |||||||||||
10 February 1841 | |||||||||||
Area | |||||||||||
1839 [3] | 534,185 km2 (206,250 sq mi) | ||||||||||
Population | |||||||||||
• 1839 [3] | c. 700,000 | ||||||||||
Currency | Canadian pound | ||||||||||
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Today part of |
The Province of Lower Canada (French : province du Bas-Canada) was a British colony on the lower Saint Lawrence River and the shores of the Gulf of Saint Lawrence (1791–1841). It covered the southern portion of the current Province of Quebec and the Labrador region of the current Province of Newfoundland and Labrador (until the Labrador region was transferred to Newfoundland in 1809). [4]
Lower Canada consisted of part of the former colony of Canada of New France, conquered by Great Britain in the Seven Years' War ending in 1763 (also called the French and Indian War in the United States). Other parts of New France conquered by Britain became the Colonies of Nova Scotia, New Brunswick, and Prince Edward Island.
The Province of Lower Canada was created by the Constitutional Act 1791 from the partition of the British colony of the Province of Quebec (1763–1791) [5] into the Province of Lower Canada and the Province of Upper Canada. The prefix "lower" in its name refers to its geographic position farther downriver from the headwaters of the St. Lawrence River than its contemporary Upper Canada, present-day southern Ontario.
Lower Canada was abolished in 1841 when it and adjacent Upper Canada were united into the Province of Canada. [6]
Like Upper Canada, there was significant political unrest. Twenty-two years after an invasion by the United States in the War of 1812, a rebellion now challenged the British rule of the predominantly French population. After the Patriote Rebellion in the Rebellions of 1837–1838 [7] was suppressed by government troops and Loyal volunteers, the 1791 Constitution was suspended on 27 March 1838 and a special council was appointed to administer the colony. An abortive attempt by revolutionary Robert Nelson to declare a Republic of Lower Canada was quickly thwarted.
The provinces of Lower Canada and Upper Canada were combined as the United Province of Canada in 1841, when the Act of Union 1840 came into force. Their separate legislatures were combined into a single parliament with equal representation for both constituent parts, even though Lower Canada had a greater population. [8]
The Province of Lower Canada inherited the mixed set of French and English institutions that existed in the Province of Quebec during the 1763–1791 period and which continued to exist later in Canada-East (1841–1867) and ultimately in the current Province of Quebec (since 1867).
Lower Canada was populated mainly by Canadiens, an ethnic group who trace their ancestry to French colonists who settled in Canada from the 17th century onward.
Year | Census estimate [11] |
---|---|
1806 | 250,000 |
1814 | 335,000 |
1822 | 427,465 |
1825 | 479,288 |
1827 | 473,475 |
1831 | 553,134 |
1841 | 650,000 |
Travelling around Lower Canada was mainly by water along the St. Lawrence River. On land the only long-distance route was the Chemin du Roy or King's Highway, built in the 1730s by New France. [12] The King's Highway was, in addition to the mail route, the primary means of long-distance passenger travel until steamboats (1815) and railways (1850s) began to challenge the royal road. [12] The royal road's importance waned after the 1850s and would not re-emerge as a key means of transportation until the modern highway system of Quebec was created in the 20th century.
The Province of Canada was a British colony in British North America from 1841 to 1867. Its formation reflected recommendations made by John Lambton, 1st Earl of Durham, in the Report on the Affairs of British North America following the Rebellions of 1837–1838.
The Canadas is the collective name for the provinces of Lower Canada and Upper Canada, two historical British colonies in present-day Canada. The two colonies were formed in 1791, when the British Parliament passed the Constitutional Act, splitting the colonial Province of Quebec into two separate colonies. The Ottawa River formed the border between Lower and Upper Canada.
Canada East was the northeastern portion of the United Province of Canada. Lord Durham's Report investigating the causes of the Upper and Lower Canada Rebellions recommended merging those two colonies. The new colony, known as the Province of Canada, was created by the Act of Union 1840 passed by the Parliament of the United Kingdom, having effect in 1841. For administrative purposes, the new Province was subdivided into Canada West and Canada East. The former name of "Lower Canada" came back into official use in 1849, and as of the Canadian Confederation of 1867 it formed the newly created province of Quebec.
The Lower Canada Rebellion, commonly referred to as the Patriots' War in French, is the name given to the armed conflict in 1837–38 between rebels and the colonial government of Lower Canada. Together with the simultaneous rebellion in the neighbouring colony of Upper Canada, it formed the Rebellions of 1837–38.
British North America comprised the colonial territories of the British Empire in North America from 1783 onwards. English colonisation of North America began in the 16th century in Newfoundland, then further south at Roanoke and Jamestown, Virginia, and more substantially with the founding of the Thirteen Colonies along the Atlantic coast of North America.
The Province of Quebec was a colony in British North America which comprised the former French colony of Canada. It was established by the Kingdom of Great Britain in 1763, following the conquest of New France by British forces during the Seven Years' War. As part of the Treaty of Paris, France gave up its claim to the colony; it instead negotiated to keep the small profitable island of Guadeloupe.
Quebec was first called Canada between 1534 and 1763. It was the most developed colony of New France as well as New France's centre, responsible for a variety of dependencies. Common themes in Quebec's early history as Canada include the fur trade -because it was the main industry- as well as the exploration of North America, war against the English, and alliances or war with Native American groups.
The British North America Act, 1840, also known as the Act of Union 1840, was approved by Parliament in July 1840 and proclaimed February 10, 1841, in Montreal. It abolished the legislatures of Lower Canada and Upper Canada and established a new political entity, the Province of Canada to replace them.
The Parti canadien or Parti patriote was a primarily francophone political party in what is now Quebec founded by members of the liberal elite of Lower Canada at the beginning of the 19th century. Its members were made up of liberal professionals and small-scale merchants, including François Blanchet, Pierre-Stanislas Bédard, John Neilson, Jean-Thomas Taschereau, James Stuart, Louis Bourdages, Denis-Benjamin Viger, Daniel Tracey, Edmund Bailey O'Callaghan, Andrew Stuart and Louis-Joseph Papineau.
The Report on the Affairs of British North America, (1839) commonly known as the Durham Report or Lord Durham's Report, is an important document in the history of Quebec, Ontario, Canada and the British Empire.
The Parti rouge was a political group that contested elections in the Eastern section of the Province of Canada. It was formed around 1847 by radical French-Canadians inspired by the ideas of Louis-Joseph Papineau, the Institut canadien de Montréal, and the reformist movement led by the Parti patriote of the 1830s.
The colony of Canada was a French colony within the larger territory of New France. It was claimed by France in 1535 during the second voyage of Jacques Cartier, in the name of the French king, Francis I. The colony remained a French territory until 1763, when it became a British colony known as the Province of Quebec.
Austin Cuvillier was a businessman and political figure in Lower Canada and Canada East. He was a successful Canadien businessmen, unusual when most businessmen in Lower Canada were British. He also was a member of the Legislative Assembly of Lower Canada for twenty years, as a member for the Parti canadien, which tended to oppose the policies of the British-appointed governors. As a result, he served as a bridge between the conservative business community, and the more radical Parti canadien, although he finally broke with the Parti canadien prior to the Lower Canada Rebellion of 1837–1838.
Starting with the 1763 Treaty of Paris, New France, of which the colony of Canada was a part, formally became a part of the British Empire. The Royal Proclamation of 1763 enlarged the colony of Canada under the name of the Province of Quebec, which with the Constitutional Act 1791 became known as the Canadas. With the Act of Union 1840, Upper and Lower Canada were joined to become the United Province of Canada.
By the arrangements of the Canadian federation, Canada's monarchy operates in Ontario as the core of the province's Westminster-style parliamentary democracy. As such, the Crown within Ontario's jurisdiction may be referred to as the Crown in Right of Ontario, His Majesty in Right of Ontario, the King in Right of Ontario, or His Majesty the King in Right of Ontario. The Constitution Act, 1867, leaves many functions in Ontario specifically assigned to the sovereign's viceroy, the lieutenant governor of Ontario, whose direct participation in governance is limited by the constitutional conventions of constitutional monarchy.
René-Joseph Kimber was a physician and political figure in Lower Canada and Canada East, in the Province of Canada. He represented Trois-Rivières in the Legislative Assembly of Lower Canada, as a member of the Parti patriote, although he opposed the use of force in the Lower Canada Rebellion. After the creation of the Province of Canada, which he opposed, he was the member for the district of Champlain in the Legislative Assembly of the Province of Canada.
The 1763 Treaty of Paris ended the major war known by Americans as the French and Indian War and by Canadians as the Seven Years' War / Guerre de Sept Ans, or by French-Canadians, La Guerre de la Conquête. It was signed by Great Britain, France and Spain, with Portugal in agreement. Preferring to keep Guadeloupe, France gave up Canada and all of its claims to territory east of the Mississippi River to Britain. With France out of North America this dramatically changed the European political scene on the continent.
Montreal District was colonial district in New France and British North America with its capital in Montreal. A descendant of the district exists today as the judicial district of Montreal. Western parts transferred to Upper Canada, later as Canada West and are now in Ontario where as the northeast became Labrador and now within Newfoundland and Labrador.
Section 68 of the Constitution Act, 1867 is a provision of the Constitution of Canada relating to the seats of government of the four original provinces, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Ontario and Quebec.
Labrador Act, 1809. – An imperial act (49 Geo. III, cap. 27), 1809, provided for the re-annexation to Newfoundland of 'such parts of the coast of Labrador from the River St John to Hudson's Streights, and the said Island of Anticosti, and all other smaller islands so annexed to the Government of Newfoundland by the said Proclamation of the seventh day of October one thousand seven hundred and sixty-three (except the said Islands of Madelaine) shall be separated from the said Government of Lower Canada, and be again re-annexed to the Government of Newfoundland.'
summary of the original french version