Nicholas Flood Davin,
KC (January 13, 1840 – October 18, 1901) was a lawyer, journalist and politician, born at Kilfinane, Ireland. The first MP for
Assiniboia West
Assiniboia West was a federal electoral district in the Northwest Territories, Canada, that was represented in the House of Commons of Canada from 1896 to 1908.
This riding was created in 1886. When the provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan wer ...
(1887–1900), Davin was known as the voice of the
North-West
The points of the compass are a set of horizontal, Radius, radially arrayed compass directions (or Azimuth#In navigation, azimuths) used in navigation and cartography. A compass rose is primarily composed of four cardinal directions—north, east ...
.
Davin founded and edited the ''
Regina Leader'', the first newspaper in Assiniboia. He tried to gain provincial status for the territory.
Davin is considered one of the architects of the
Canadian Indian residential school system. In 1879 he wrote the ''Report on Industrial Schools for Indians and Half-Breeds'', otherwise known as ''
The Davin Report'', in which he advised the federal government to institute residential schools for Indigenous children. In 2015, the Truth and Reconciliation Commission concluded that the assimilation amounted to cultural genocide.
Early life
Davin entered the Middle Temple to study law and was called to the bar on January 27, 1868.
Davin was a parliamentary and war correspondent in
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
before he arrived in Toronto in 1872, where he wrote for ''
The Globe''. Although a fully qualified lawyer, Davin practised little law. The highlight of his legal career was his 1880 defence of
George Bennett George Bennett, Bennette, or Bennet may refer to:
Politics and law
*George Bennett (Ontario politician) (1888–1948), Canadian politician, mayor of Windsor
* George Bennett (Wisconsin politician) (1810–1888), Wisconsin state senator
*George C. ...
, who murdered
George Brown George Brown may refer to:
Arts and entertainment
* George Loring Brown (1814–1889), American landscape painter
* George Douglas Brown (1869–1902), Scottish novelist
* George Williams Brown (1894–1963), Canadian historian and editor
* G ...
.
Move to West
A chance visit to the West in 1882 determined his future. In 1883, he founded and edited the ''Regina Leader'', the first newspaper in Assiniboia, which carried his detailed reports of the 1885 trial of
Louis Riel. A spellbinding speaker and Conservative MP for Assiniboia West from 1887 to 1900, Davin tried to gain provincial status for the territory, economic, and property advantages for the new settlers, even the franchise for women, but he never achieved his ambition to be a
Cabinet minister
A minister is a politician who heads a ministry, making and implementing decisions on policies in conjunction with the other ministers. In some jurisdictions the head of government is also a minister and is designated the ‘prime minister’, â ...
. A mercurial personality, he became depressed by the decline of his political and personal fortunes, and he shot himself during a visit to Winnipeg on October 18, 1901. Davin wrote ''The Irishman in Canada'' (1877), as well as poetry and an unpublished novel.
![100 0806 Grave of Nicholas Flood Davin](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/8/87/100_0806_Grave_of_Nicholas_Flood_Davin..jpg)
He had an interesting, often-illustrious career and upon his death, he was so well-thought of that his colleagues in Ottawa had his body sent from Winnipeg to Ottawa to be buried in Beechwood National Cemetery. The epitaph, carved in stone beneath a plinth upon which his bust in bronze is ensconced, reads: "This monument has been erected by his former parliamentary associates and other people as a lasting proof of the esteem and affection which they entertained (sic) on one whose character was strongly marked by sincerity and fearlessness, whose mind by vivacity and clearness of comprehension and whose classical scholarship and wide culture united to his brilliant oration and singular wit made him intent in debate and delightful in society."
The Davin Report
Davin is considered one of the architects of the
Canadian Indian residential school system. In 1879, he was sent by the Canadian government to investigate Indian Education in the US. In his report, Davin applauded US efforts to concentrate Indigenous peoples on reservations, divide the communal territory into individually owned parcels of land, and prepare Indigenous children for citizenship through industrial education.
Davin believed industrial boarding schools were superior to day schools, where children returned to their homes after a day’s education and were still under the ‘influence of the wigwam’. The industrial boarding school was in his view the best option for Indians ‘to be merged and lost’ within the nation. But Davin also felt that the migratory nature of Indigenous groups in the northwest made the extensive establishment of industrial boarding schools expensive and inefficient; he argued Canada should use its already existing network of denominational missions for the residential schooling system. Soon after his report, several government-sponsored boarding schools opened.
Authorship
Davin used, among others, the literary device of inter-textuality to draw upon British canonical writers including Tennyson, Byron, and Shakespeare to connect the associations of empire with his 19th-century audience. In 1876, Davin wrote an adaptation of ''Shakespeare The Fair Grit''; or ''The Advantages of Coalition. A Farce'', an adaptation of Shakespeare’s ''Romeo and Juliet''. The play is a farce on governmental coalitions and the corrupted role of media in Canadian politics – a power fully realized by Davin as a writer and founder of the ''Regina Leader'' newspaper located in Canada’s North-West.
Three years later, Davin produced the ''Report on Industrial Schools for Indians and Half-Breeds'', otherwise known as ''The Davin Report'' (1879), in which he advised John A. Macdonald’s federal government to institute residential schools for Indigenous youth; the recommendation led, in part, to the establishment of the Canadian Indian residential school system that decimated Canadian Aboriginal families.
In 1884, while visiting Ottawa, Davin wrote ''Eos – A Prairie Dream'' (1884), a collection of poems that, in his own words, "strike a true and high note in Canadian politics and literature" (5) while he represents, through his poetry, the destruction of Aboriginal culture (Moll, "The Davin Report: Shakespeare and Canada's Manifest Destiny," Canadian Adaptations of Shakespeare Project, par 2).
Gunhilda Letters
Nicholas Flood Davin complimented the 'Gunhilda letters' "for felicity of expression, cogency of reasoning, fierceness of invective, keenness of satire and piquancy of style" and "Nothing equal to them has appeared in the Canadian press for years." In 1881,
Susan Anna Wiggins used the nom de plume 'Gunhilda' to write the ''Gunhilda Letters--Marriage with a Deceased Husband's Sister: Letters of a Lady to
ohn Travers Lewis Ohn is a Burmese name, used by people from Myanmar. Notable people with the name include:
* Daw Ohn (1913–2003), Burmese professor in Pali
* Ohn Gyaw (born 1932), Burmese Minister of Foreign Affairs from 1991 to 1998
* Ohn Kyaing (born 1944), Bur ...
the Right Rev. the Lord Bishop of Ontario'', which consisted of letters of support for Mr. Girouard's bill regarding the legalization of marriage with a deceased wife's sister, long-time prohibited by British law at home and overseas. The Gunhilda Letters were dedicated to the members of the
Senate of Canada
The Senate of Canada (french: region=CA, Sénat du Canada) is the upper house of the Parliament of Canada. Together with the Crown and the House of Commons, they comprise the bicameral legislature of Canada.
The Senate is modelled after the B ...
and of the
House of Commons of Canada
The House of Commons of Canada (french: Chambre des communes du Canada) is the lower house of the Parliament of Canada. Together with the Crown and the Senate of Canada, they comprise the bicameral legislature of Canada.
The House of Common ...
who supported Mr. Girouard's Bill.
Marriage with a deceased wife's sister : letters of a lady to the Right Rev. the Lord Bishop of Ontario.
/ref>
References
External links
Canadian Shakespeares
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Davin, Nicholas Flood
1840 births
1901 deaths
Newspaper founders
19th-century Canadian newspaper publishers (people)
Members of the House of Commons of Canada from the Northwest Territories
Conservative Party of Canada (1867–1942) MPs
Canadian non-fiction writers
19th-century Canadian poets
Canadian male poets
Writers from the Northwest Territories
Persons of National Historic Significance (Canada)
19th-century Canadian male writers
Residential schools in Canada
Canadian male non-fiction writers
British emigrants to Canada
Genocide perpetrators
Canadian King's Counsel