James Douglas (governor)
Sir James Douglas (August 15, 1803 – August 2, 1877) was a Canadian fur trader and politician who became the first Governor of the Colony of British Columbia. He is often credited as "The Father of British Columbia." He was instrumental to the resettlement of 35 African-Americans fleeing a life of racial persecution in San Francisco who arrived in the province aboard the steampship ''Commodore'' in what later became known as the Pioneer Committee. In 1863, Douglas was knighted by Queen Victoria for his services to the Crown. He started work at 16 for the North West Company and then the Hudson's Bay Company and became a high-ranking officer. From 1851 to 1864, he was Governor of the Colony of Vancouver Island. In 1858, he became the first Governor of the Colony of British Columbia and asserted the authority of the British Empire during the Fraser Canyon Gold Rush, which had the potential to turn the Mainland into an American state. He remained governor of both colonies until ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Grand Cross Of The Order Of The Bath
The Most Honourable Order of the Bath is a British order of chivalry founded by George I on 18 May 1725. The name derives from the elaborate medieval ceremony for appointing a knight, which involved bathing (as a symbol of purification) as one of its elements. The knights so created were known as "Knights of the Bath". George I "erected the Knights of the Bath into a regular Military Order". He did not (as is commonly believed) revive the Order of the Bath, since it had never previously existed as an Order, in the sense of a body of knights who were governed by a set of statutes and whose numbers were replenished when vacancies occurred. The Order consists of the Sovereign (currently King Charles III), the Great Master (currently vacant) and three Classes of members: *Knight Grand Cross ( GCB) ''or'' Dame Grand Cross ( GCB) *Knight Commander ( KCB) ''or'' Dame Commander ( DCB) *Companion ( CB) Members belong to either the Civil or the Military Division.''Statutes'' 1925, arti ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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North West Company
The North West Company was a fur trading business headquartered in Montreal from 1779 to 1821. It competed with increasing success against the Hudson's Bay Company in what is present-day Western Canada and Northwestern Ontario. With great wealth at stake, tensions between the companies increased to the point where several minor armed skirmishes broke out, and the two companies were forced by the British government to merge. Before the Company After the French landed in Quebec in 1608, spread out and built a fur trade empire in the St. Lawrence basin. The French competed with the Dutch (from 1614) and English (1664) in New York and the English in Hudson Bay (1670). Unlike the French who travelled into the northern interior and traded with First Nations in their camps and villages, the English made bases at trading posts on Hudson Bay, inviting the indigenous people to trade. After 1731, pushed trade west beyond Lake Winnipeg. After the British conquest of New France in 1763 ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Dictionary Of Canadian Biography
The ''Dictionary of Canadian Biography'' (''DCB''; french: Dictionnaire biographique du Canada) is a dictionary of biographical entries for individuals who have contributed to the history of Canada. The ''DCB'', which was initiated in 1959, is a collaboration between the University of Toronto and Laval University. Fifteen volumes have so far been published with more than 8,400 biographies of individuals who died or whose last known activity fell between the years 1000 and 1930. The entire print edition is online, along with some additional biographies to the year 2000. Establishment of the project The project was undertaken following a bequest to the University of Toronto from businessman, James Nicholson for the establishment of a Canadian version of the United Kingdom's ''Dictionary of National Biography''. In the spring of 1959, George Williams Brown was appointed general editor and the University of Toronto Press, which had been named publisher, sent out some 10,000 announc ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Free Person Of Color
In the context of the history of slavery in the Americas, free people of color (French: ''gens de couleur libres''; Spanish: ''gente de color libre'') were primarily people of mixed African, European, and Native American descent who were not enslaved. However, the term also applied to people born free who were primarily of black African descent with little mixture. They were a distinct group of free people of color in the French colonies, including Louisiana and in settlements on Caribbean islands, such as Saint-Domingue ( Haiti), St. Lucia, Dominica, Guadeloupe, and Martinique. In these territories and major cities, particularly New Orleans, and those cities held by the Spanish, a substantial third class of primarily mixed-race, free people developed. These colonial societies classified mixed-race people in a variety of ways, generally related to visible features and to the proportion of African ancestry. Racial classifications were numerous in Latin America. A free ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Times Colonist
The ''Times Colonist'' is an English-language daily newspaper in Victoria, British Columbia, Canada. It was formed by the Sept. 2, 1980 merger of the ''Victoria Daily Times'', established in 1884, and the ''British Colonist'' (later the ''Daily Colonist''), established in 1858 by Amor De Cosmos who was later British Columbia's second Premier. The ''British Colonist'' was B.C.'s first paper "of any permanence". De Cosmos was the editor until 1866 when D.W. Higgins took over — he would remain in the role for the next twenty years. Local news receives the greatest prominence in the ''Times Colonist''. Stories and photographs about Greater Victoria are often featured on the front page. The newspaper also has national and international stories, plus sections covering the arts, sports, and business. The Times Colonist has a website as well as an e-edition, which offers a digital replica of the printed pages. According to News Media Canada, the Times Colonist saw an average daily circu ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Sir Andrew Buchanan, 1st Baronet
Sir Andrew Buchanan, 1st Baronet, GCB, PC, DL (7 May 1807 – 12 November 1882) was a Scottish diplomat. Family Buchanan was the only son of James Buchanan of Blairvadach, Ardinconnal, Dumbartonshire, and Janet, the eldest daughter of James Sinclair, 12th Earl of Caithness. He married first on 4 April 1839 Frances Katharine, the daughter of the Very Rev Edward Mellish, dean of Hereford (she died 4 December 1854). The children from this marriage were: * Louisa Buchanan (d. 19 Jan 1923) * Frances Matilda Buchanan (d. 13 Dec 1908) * Sir James Buchanan, 2nd Baronet (7 Aug 1840 – 16 Oct 1901) * Sir Eric Alexander Buchanan, 3rd Baronet (19 Aug 1848 – 29 Jul 1928) * Andrew Archibald Buchanan (16 Jan 1850 – 5 Oct 1932) *Rt. Hon. Sir George William Buchanan (25 Nov 1854 – 20 Dec 1924) Secondly, on 27 May 1857, Buchanan married Georgiana Eliza, the third daughter of Robert Walter Stuart, 11th Lord Blantyre. Buchanan was related to Sir James Douglas Career Buchanan ent ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Cecilia Douglas
Cecilia Douglas (née Douglas) (28 February 1772 – 25 July 1862) was an important slave owner, art collector and philanthropist from Glasgow, Scotland. A very wealthy woman (worth c. £40,000), her fortune was derived from slavery in the Caribbean. Early life Cecilia Douglas was born to John Douglas, a West Indian merchant, and Cecilia Buchanan on 28 February 1772. She was the fifth of 11 siblings, and one of only two daughters. Marriage Douglas married Gilbert Douglas, a rich West Indian plantation owner from Balcony, on 26 January 1794, in Glasgow. Their marriage lasted until Gilbert's death in 1807. No children resulted from the union. Gilbert owned two plantations: Fairfield, a cotton plantation in Demerara, and Mount Pleasant, a sugar plantation on the island of St. Vincent. Later life After the death of Gilbert in 1807, she inherited half shares in his plantations and enslaved people in St Vincent and Demerara. Her late husband also bequeathed her the use of e ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Neil Douglas
Lieutenant-General Sir Neil Douglas (1779 – 1 September 1853) was a British Army officer who fought at the 1815 Battle of Waterloo and later became Commander-in-Chief, Scotland. Life He was born in Glasgow the fifth son of John Douglas a merchant and descendant of the Earls of Angus. Douglas was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant into the 95th Regiment of Foot on 28 January 1801. Promoted to captain in the 79th Regiment of Foot on 19 April 1804, he took part in the Battle of Copenhagen in August 1807, the Battle of Corunna in January 1809 and Battle of Bussaco in September 1810 during the Napoleonic Wars. In the last he was almost killed, being found on the battlefield with seven bayonet wounds but nevertheless surviving. In May 1813 he took command of the whole regiment in place of Lt Col Fulton. At the Battle of the Pyrenees he had his horse shot out from under him. He went on to fight in the Battle of Nivelle in November 1813, the Battle of the Nive in December ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Scotland
Scotland (, ) is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. Covering the northern third of the island of Great Britain, mainland Scotland has a border with England to the southeast and is otherwise surrounded by the Atlantic Ocean to the north and west, the North Sea to the northeast and east, and the Irish Sea to the south. It also contains more than 790 islands, principally in the archipelagos of the Hebrides and the Northern Isles. Most of the population, including the capital Edinburgh, is concentrated in the Central Belt—the plain between the Scottish Highlands and the Southern Uplands—in the Scottish Lowlands. Scotland is divided into 32 administrative subdivisions or local authorities, known as council areas. Glasgow City is the largest council area in terms of population, with Highland being the largest in terms of area. Limited self-governing power, covering matters such as education, social services and roads and transportation, is devolved from the Scott ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Fraser Canyon Gold Rush
The Fraser Canyon Gold Rush, (also Fraser Gold Rush and Fraser River Gold Rush) began in 1858 after gold was discovered on the Thompson River in British Columbia at its confluence with the Nicoamen River a few miles upstream from the Thompson's confluence with the Fraser River at present-day Lytton. The rush overtook the region around the discovery, and was centered on the Fraser Canyon from around Hope and Yale to Pavilion and Fountain, just north of Lillooet. Though the rush was largely over by 1927, miners from the rush spread out and found a sequence of other gold fields throughout the British Columbia Interior and North, most famously that in the Cariboo. The rush is credited with instigating European-Canadian settlement on the mainland of British Columbia. It was the catalyst for the founding of the Colony of British Columbia, the building of early road infrastructure, and the founding of many towns. Gold rush Although the area had been mined for a few years, news of ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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British Empire
The British Empire was composed of the dominions, colonies, protectorates, mandates, and other territories ruled or administered by the United Kingdom and its predecessor states. It began with the overseas possessions and trading posts established by England between the late 16th and early 18th centuries. At its height it was the largest empire in history and, for over a century, was the foremost global power. By 1913, the British Empire held sway over 412 million people, of the world population at the time, and by 1920, it covered , of the Earth's total land area. As a result, its constitutional, legal, linguistic, and cultural legacy is widespread. At the peak of its power, it was described as "the empire on which the sun never sets", as the Sun was always shining on at least one of its territories. During the Age of Discovery in the 15th and 16th centuries, Portugal and Spain pioneered European exploration of the globe, and in the process established large overse ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |