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SPECIAL SUPPLEMENT

1837-1987
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Anniversary of the

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A.P.C. (C 13493)

Revolution of 1837!

(This supplement prepared for the Canadian Tribune was to have run in our year-end edition in
1987, but was not delivered in time. We include it in this edition instead.)

People who attempt a revolution and fail can expect nothing but hard knocks. Their
homes will be burnt and their leaders hung. Historians, for the most part, will do
everything in their power to convince succeeding generations that those who dared to
disturb the status quo were dangerous madmen, firebrands, fools or scoundrels. The
schools, the museums, the historical societies, the press, the publishing companies, the
mass media — with few exceptions they will be firmly in the hands of the victors who will
use them to ensure that their interpretation of history prevails.

In Canada, each new generation of the ruling class has sought to ridicule, denigrate,
belittle, deny and, if possible, bury the revolutionary intent and traditions of 1837. A
century and a half ago combatants on both sides of the barricades knew it was a
revolution and unabashedly called it one. But with time, most Canadians have been
convinced it was only a rebellion ... an uprising ... a disturbance ... a few drunken
fools on Yonge Street with pitchforks .. . nothing at all. That has been the ideological
trajectory of the Tory interpretation of history.

The Revolution of 1837 was an armed struggle which lasted for a year, a major attempt
by a large number of Canadians to overthrow a budding colonial aristocracy and
establish a democratic republic. In Lower Canada the fighting was fierce. The heart of
the Patriote leader, Jean Olivier Chenier, was cut out of his chest and displayed as a
trophy of war. British troops burned the Patriote strongholds of St. Denis, St. Eustache
and St. Benoit to the ground.

Attempts to portry the Revolution of 1837 as a minor disturbance are also belied by the
long list of prisoners. In Lower Canada, though many wanted men got away to safety in
the United States, 855 Patriotes were arrested, 58 were transported to Australia and 12
were publicly executed.

In Upper Canada 855 men were arrested on charges of sedition and treason, and
warrants issued for another 70. Matthews and Lount were hanged at Toronto; Morreau

at Niagara. Radicals captured near Windsor by Colonel] Prince were simply shot. In all
68 radicals were transported from Upper Canada to Van Diemen’s Land (Tasmania)
where they endured many years in convict colonies.

Events in Canada in 1837 were not a sudden, inexplicable outburst but part of a rising
tide of revolution on both sides of the Atlantic. Papineau was known as the “* Mirabeau of
America.”’ Despite an ever-watchful, book-burning clergy, the works of the great
materialist philosophers — Voltaire, Diderot, Rousseau — with their unsettling ideas,
circulated widely in Lower Canada. After the July Revolution in France in 1830, the
Patriotes organized public subscriptions throughout Lower Canada to raise funds for the
families of dead republicans.

From Ireland, the widow of Wolfe Tone sent £10 to Mackenzie to help him fight
colonial oppression. Mackenzie used his press to reprint revolutionary tracts by Tom
Paine and Patrick Henry. For the radical of 1837, revolution was not a new idea, nor was
it seen as a fateful leap in the dark. It fitted firmly into a coherent view of the world, and
the mileposts by which they marked the birth and growth of this new world were clear:
1688, 1776, 1789, 1830. . . They felt themselves part of a vibrant revolutionary tradition.

From England they received regular reports of the Tolpuddle Martyrs, of Chartism
and the groundswell for Reform. From France in 1830 and again in 1831, 1832 and 1834
came stirring news that the workers of Paris and:Lyons had risen. In Latin America,
country after country fought for and declared its independence. To be fully understood,
the Revolution of 1837 has to be seen in this context. Like everyone else, Canadians
wanted their freedom.

It was also during the 1830s that Canadian workers began to organize. In 1832 they
formed their first trade union, the York Typographical Society. The Mechanics Mutual
Protective Society of Montreal was formed in 1833, the unions of shoemakers, tailors,
coopers, carpenters, masons and bricklayers soon followed. This wave of strikes and
union building, together with the Revolution of 1837, marks the first great upsurge of the

Canadian working class, its debut on the stage of history as an organized and formidable
force.
Continued on page 8

PACIFIC TRIBUNE, JANUARY 20, 1988 e 5