Toronto - Northwest Rebellion Monument

 

 

Location:  City of Toronto     N 43.66175   W -79.38991

On the grounds of Queen's Park, 11 Queen's Park Circle East.

 

The following is borrowed from  www.veterans.gc.ca.

"In 1894, at age nineteen and having only minimal training as a sculptor, Walter S. Allward won a competition to design a bronze statue of Peace for the Northwest Rebellion Monument in Toronto. The monument had been proposed by a group of Toronto women who began raising funds in the early 1890s. In 1894, the committee hired Toronto based D. McIntosh & Sons to provide a pedestal and to supervise Allward’s progress. The pedestal, designed by McIntosh employee James Wilson Gray, is made of grey granite, twenty feet high, and ornamented with the insignia of the various regiments that took part in the Northwest Resistance. 

Allward’s lack of experience meant that he worked slowly, which resulted in complaints from his employer, who had provided money in advance for his studio and tools. Confident in his artistic abilities, Allward threatened to destroy the sculpture if the company continued to exert pressure. The McIntosh representative relented, but when Allward arrived at the site the next morning a guard was stationed beside the figure, an arrangement that continued until he completed the sculpture.

Allward worked on the sculpture throughout 1895 in his studio at the Imperial Chambers Building on Adelaide Street in Toronto, completing a clay model in time for a public showing in January 1896. The bronze casting of the final model was done at the foundry of Bureau Brothers in Philadelphia.

Designed according to the then popular Beaux-Arts style, the monument has a single figure on a pedestal within a pyramidal composition. The statue portrays Peace as an idealized female figure in a static pose, with a full-length robe falling loosely from her shoulders. Her right hand holds an olive branch and her left hand is raised in a gesture commanding silence. The sword at her side represents the power of Canada at rest. The sculpture, Allward’s earliest professional commission, was his first to focus on peace, a theme he would return to throughout his career.

The unveiling on June 27, 1896, featured a military parade and speeches by officials from various levels of government, including the Honourable Sir George Airey Kirkpatrick, Lieutenant Governor of Ontario, and Mayor Robert John Fleming. The monument honours soldiers and volunteers who died during the Northwest Rebellion of 1885, when the Canadian government sent troops to suppress an uprising led by the Métis leader Louis Riel. Allward attended the unveiling and when the crowd called out for him to speak, he responded with a modesty that became one of his hallmarks: “I thank you for your appreciation of my work. It is not what it might have been, but it was the best I could do. Probably I will do better next time.”

A plaque, commemorating the fiftieth anniversary of the rebellion, was added in 1935.

The Northwest Rebellion Monument deals with a battle that took place at the height of the government’s attempts to control Indigenous communities and does not acknowledge the Indigenous lives lost or the trial and subsequent death of Riel. The monument has become re-appropriated and given different meaning by Métis and Indigenous groups. It has served as a meeting place and the anniversary of Riel’s death has been commemorated here with Indigenous ceremonies and events."

 

 

Marker text:

Front:

ERECTED
TO THE MEMORY OF THE
OFFICERS AND MEN
WHO FELL
ON THE BATTLEFIELDS
OF THE NORTH-WEST
IN 1885.

DULCE ET DECORUM EST
PRO PATRIA MORI.

 

 

 

 

Right side:

KILLED IN ACTION

PRINCE ALBT. VOLUNTEERS	CAPT.	JOHN MORTON
"                "                "	CORPORAL	W. NAPIER
"                "                "	PRIVATE	S.C. ELLIOT
"                "                "	"	D. McPHAIL
"                "                "	"	D. McKENZIE
"                "                "	"	J. BAKIE
"                "                "	"	R. MIDDLETON
"                "                "	"	J. ANDERSON
"                "                "	"	A. FISHER

DIED OF WOUNDS

ROYAL CANADIAN ARTILLERY	GUNNER	ARMSWORTH
"                "                "	"	CHARPANTIER
INFANTRY SCHOOL CORPS	PRIVATE	WATSON
10TH ROYAL GRENADIERS	"	ISAAC HUGHES
90TH BATTL. RIFLES	LIEUT.	SWINFORD
"                "                "	CORPORAL	CODE
"                "                "	PRIVATE	F.A. WATSON
BOUTLON'S SCOUTS	TROOPER	D'ARCY BAKER
N. W. M. POLICE	CORPORAL	LOWRY
"    "    "          "	CONSTABLE	ARNOLD
"    "    "          "	"	GARRETT
"    "    "          "	"	BURKE

CUT KNIFE

 

 

 

Back:

YORK
&
SIMCOE

 

1885 — 1935

50 YEARS AFTER
THE SURVIVING MEMBERS
OF THE
NORTH-WEST FIELD FORCE 1885
GATHERED IN JUBLIEE RE-UNION
AT TORONTO
JULY 26TH 27TH & 28TH
— 1935 —

"THEY DID NOT FORGET"

 

DUCK LAKE

FISH CREEK

 

 

 

 

Left side:

KILLED IN ACTION

ROYAL CANADIAN ARTILLERY	GUNNER	DE MANOLLY
"                "                "	"	COOK
"                "                "	"	PHILLIPS
INFANTRY SCHOOL CORPS	BUGLER	FOULKES
GOV GENERAL'S FOOT GUARDS	PRIVATE	OSGOODE
"            "             "         "	"	ROGERS
10TH ROYAL GRENADIERS	LIEUT	FITCH
"                "                "	PRIVATE	MOORE
90TH BATTLE RIFLES	"	FERGUSON
"                "                "	"	HUTCHINSON
"                "                "	"	WHEELER
"                "                "	"	ENNIS
"                "                "	"	KARDISTY
"                "                "	"	FRASER
BOUTLON'S SCOUTS	CAPTAIN	BROWN
FRENCH'S          "	"	FRENCH
INTELLIGENCE CORPS	LIEUT	KIPPEN
N. W. M. POLICE	CORPORAL	SLEIGH
"    "    "          "	CONSTABLE	COWAN
"    "    "          "	"	GIBSON
"    "    "          "	"	ELLIOTT
BATTELFORD RIFLES	PRIVATE	DOBS

BATOCHE