Aboriginal peoples — the first nations

When Europeans first explored Canada, they called the inhabitants "Indians" because the early explorers thought they had reached the East Indies. Today they are known as the First Nations, the Inuit and the Métis — the three Aboriginal peoples recognised by the Constitution.

Huron-Wendat (Great Lakes region) and Iroquois — farmers and hunters.
Cree and Dene (Northwest) — hunter-gatherers.
Sioux — nomadic, following the bison herds.
Inuit — lived off Arctic wildlife.
West Coast peoples — preserved fish by drying and smoking.

The first Europeans and the naming of Canada

Around the year 1000, Vikings from Iceland — who had already colonised Greenland — reached Labrador and Newfoundland. The remains of their settlement at L'Anse aux Meadows are a UNESCO World Heritage site.

European exploration began in earnest in 1497 with John Cabot, an Italian-born explorer for England, who was the first to map Canada's Atlantic shore. Between 1534 and 1542, Jacques Cartier made three voyages across the Atlantic, claiming the land for King Francis I of France. Cartier heard two Iroquoian guides speak the word kanata — meaning "village" — and by the 1550s the name Canada began appearing on European maps.

Royal New France

In 1604, French explorers Pierre de Monts and Samuel de Champlain established the first European settlement north of Florida — first on St. Croix Island, then at Port-Royal in Acadia (today's Nova Scotia). In 1608, Champlain built a fortress at what is now Québec City.

Champlain allied the colony with the Algonquin, Montagnais and Huron, historic enemies of the Iroquois — a confederation of five (later six) First Nations who battled the French settlements for nearly a century until peace was made in 1701.

The French and Aboriginal peoples collaborated in a vast fur trade economy driven by the European demand for beaver pelts. Outstanding leaders such as Jean Talon, Bishop Laval and Count Frontenac built a French empire that reached from Hudson Bay to the Gulf of Mexico.

The struggle for a continent

In 1670, King Charles II of England granted the Hudson's Bay Company exclusive trading rights over the entire watershed draining into Hudson Bay. For the next 100 years, the Company competed with Montreal-based traders. The skilled men who travelled by canoe were known as voyageurs and coureurs des bois, and formed strong alliances with First Nations.

By the 1700s, England and France were openly battling for control of North America. In 1759, the British defeated the French at the Battle of the Plains of Abraham, at Québec City — marking the end of France's empire in America. Both commanders, Brigadier James Wolfe and the Marquis de Montcalm, were killed leading their troops.

Sir Guy Carleton (Lord Dorchester), as Governor of Quebec, defended the rights of the Canadiens, defeated an American military invasion of Quebec in 1775, and supervised the Loyalist migration of 1782-1783.

A tradition of accommodation — the Quebec Act of 1774

To better govern the French Roman Catholic majority, the British Parliament passed the Quebec Act of 1774 — one of the constitutional foundations of Canada. It:

Allowed religious freedom for Catholics and let them hold public office (something not even allowed in Britain at the time).
Restored French civil law while keeping British criminal law.
Recognised the French language.

United Empire Loyalists

In 1776, the 13 British colonies south of Quebec declared independence and formed the United States. More than 40,000 "Loyalists" — people loyal to the Crown — fled the American Revolution and settled in Nova Scotia, New Brunswick and Quebec.

Joseph Brant led thousands of Loyalist Mohawk Indians into Canada.
The Loyalists came from many origins: Dutch, German, British, Scandinavian and Aboriginal.
Their religions included Presbyterian, Anglican, Baptist, Methodist, Jewish, Quaker and Catholic.
About 3,000 Black Loyalists — freedmen and former slaves — moved north seeking a better life.
In 1792, some Black Nova Scotians went on to establish Freetown, Sierra Leone (a British colony for freed slaves).

The War of 1812 — the fight for Canada

Believing it would be easy to conquer Canada, the United States launched an invasion in June 1812. The Americans were mistaken. Canadian volunteers and First Nations — including Shawnee led by Chief Tecumseh — supported British soldiers in defence.

Major-General Sir Isaac Brock captured Detroit but was killed defending Queenston Heights, near Niagara Falls.
Lieutenant-Colonel Charles de Salaberry and 460 soldiers (mostly French Canadiens) turned back 4,000 American invaders at Châteauguay in 1813.
In 1813, the Americans burned Government House and the Parliament Buildings in York (now Toronto).
In retaliation in 1814, Major-General Robert Ross led an expedition from Nova Scotia that burned down the White House and other public buildings in Washington, D.C.
Laura Secord, a pioneer wife and mother of five, made a dangerous 30 km journey on foot to warn Lieutenant FitzGibbon of a planned American attack — contributing to the British victory at the Battle of Beaver Dams.

By 1814, the American attempt to conquer Canada had failed. The present-day Canada-U.S. border is partly an outcome of the War of 1812 — which ensured that Canada would remain independent of the United States.

The beginnings of democracy

Democratic institutions developed gradually and peacefully. The first representative assembly was elected in Halifax, Nova Scotia, in 1758. Prince Edward Island followed in 1773 and New Brunswick in 1785.

The Constitutional Act of 1791 divided the Province of Quebec into Upper Canada (later Ontario) — mainly Loyalist, Protestant and English-speaking — and Lower Canada (later Quebec) — heavily Catholic and French-speaking. The Act granted, for the first time, legislative assemblies elected by the people. The name "Canada" became official at this time and has been used ever since.

Abolition of slavery

Slavery has existed all over the world. The first movement to abolish the transatlantic slave trade emerged in the British Parliament in the late 1700s.

1793 — Upper Canada, led by Lieutenant Governor John Graves Simcoe (a Loyalist military officer), became the first province in the British Empire to move toward abolition.
1807 — The British Parliament prohibited the buying and selling of slaves.
1833 — Slavery was abolished throughout the British Empire.
Thousands of slaves escaped from the United States, following "the North Star" via the Underground Railroad — a Christian anti-slavery network — to settle in Canada.
Mary Ann Shadd Cary became the first woman publisher in Canada in 1853, founding and editing The Provincial Freeman, a weekly anti-slavery newspaper.

Confederation — the birth of Canada (1867)

Between 1864 and 1867, leaders later called the Fathers of Confederation negotiated the union of the British North American colonies. On 1 July 1867, the British North America Act created the Dominion of Canada with four founding provinces:

Ontario
Quebec
Nova Scotia
New Brunswick

Sir John Alexander Macdonald, the country's first Prime Minister, is celebrated as the principal architect of Confederation. Sir George-Étienne Cartier was the key Québec leader who brought Québec into Confederation and helped extend Canada's borders westward — he is regarded as the father of modern Quebec and a key architect of Canada.

Building the country (1867-1914)

After Confederation, Canada expanded westward. Manitoba (1870), British Columbia (1871) and Prince Edward Island (1873) joined. Alberta and Saskatchewan were created in 1905, and Newfoundland and Labrador joined in 1949.

The world wars and the modern era

Canada fought as part of the British Empire in the First World War (1914-1918). More than 60,000 Canadians died. The April 1917 victory at Vimy Ridge — won by all four divisions of the Canadian Corps fighting together — is celebrated as the moment Canada became a true nation.

In the Second World War (1939-1945), more than one million Canadians and Newfoundlanders served. Canada trained 130,000 Allied air crew under the British Commonwealth Air Training Plan, and Canadian troops famously liberated the Netherlands in 1944-1945. From 1950 to 1953, Canadian forces fought in the Korean War.

1867
Confederation: birth of the Dominion of Canada.
1870
Manitoba joins Confederation.
1871
British Columbia joins Confederation.
1885
Last spike of the Canadian Pacific Railway at Craigellachie.
1905
Alberta and Saskatchewan join Confederation.
1917
Victory at Vimy Ridge — the birth of a nation.
1945
End of the Second World War; Canadian troops liberate the Netherlands.
1949
Newfoundland and Labrador joins Confederation.
1982
Patriation of the Constitution; Canadian Charter of Rights and Freedoms.

Canada's History