1868 in Canada
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{{wikisource|Category:Canada:Acts of Parliament, 1868|Acts of Parliament, 1868}}
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{{Year in Canada|1868}}
{{History of Canada}}
Events from the year 1868 in Canada.
Incumbents
= Crown =
= Federal government =
= Provincial governments =
== Lieutenant governors ==
- Lieutenant Governor of New Brunswick – Francis Pym Harding (until July 23) then Lemuel Allan Wilmot
- Lieutenant Governor of Nova Scotia – Charles Hastings Doyle
- Lieutenant Governor of Ontario – Henry William Stisted (until July 15) then William Pearce Howland
- Lieutenant Governor of Quebec – Narcisse-Fortunat Belleau
== Premiers ==
= Colonies =
== Governors ==
- Colonial Governor of Newfoundland – Anthony Musgrave
- Lieutenant Governor of Prince Edward Island – George Dundas (until October 22) then Robert Hodgson
- Governor of the Colony of British Columbia – Frederick Seymour
== Premiers ==
Events
- March 4 — Royal College of Dental Surgeons of Ontario established
- April 7 — Father of Confederation Thomas D'Arcy McGee is assassinated in Ottawa by Irish Fenians.
- May 26 - The Canadian flag is unofficially introduced.
=Full date unknown=
Louis Riel returns to the Red River area
- The Hudson's Bay Company agrees to turn Rupert's Land and the North-Western Territory over to Canada
- The first Federal Militia Act is passed, creating a Canadian army
- George-Étienne Cartier created a Baronet
Births
=January to June=
- January 16 — Octavia Ritchie, first woman to receive a medical degree in Quebec[http://www.canadianencyclopedia.ca/index.cfm?PgNm=TCE&Params=A1ARTA0006850]
- January 22 — Adjutor Rivard, lawyer, writer, judge and linguist (died 1945)
- February 16 — John Babington Macaulay Baxter, lawyer, jurist and 18th Premier of New Brunswick (died 1946)
- March 14 — Emily Murphy, women's rights activist, jurist and author, first woman magistrate in Canada and in the British Empire (died 1933)
- April 27 — James Kidd Flemming, businessman, politician and 13th Premier of New Brunswick (died 1927)
- May 31 — Victor Cavendish, 9th Duke of Devonshire, politician and 11th Governor General of Canada (died 1938)
=July to December=
- July 8 — Henry Cockshutt, Lieutenant Governor of Ontario (died 1944)
- July 9 — William Alves Boys, politician and barrister (died 1938)
- August 25 — Arthur Puttee, politician (died 1957)
- August 26 — Charles Stewart, politician and 3rd Premier of Alberta (died 1946)
- September 1 — Henri Bourassa, politician and publisher (died 1952)
- September 22 — Louise McKinney, first woman sworn into the Legislative Assembly of Alberta and first woman elected to a legislature in Canada and in the British Empire (died 1931)
- September 28 — Herbert Alexander Bruce, surgeon and 15th Lieutenant Governor of Ontario (died 1963)
- November 9 — Marie Dressler, actress (died 1934)
- December 11 — William Parks, geologist and paleontologist (died 1936)
Deaths
{{Commons category}}
- January 19 — Frederic, Roman Catholic priest, missionary, and bishop (born 1797)
- January 25 — Alexander Roberts Dunn, first Canadian awarded the Victoria Cross (born 18)
- January 28 — Edmund Walker Head, Governor (born 1805)
- February 19 — Dominick Daly, politician (born 1798)
- April 7 — D'Arcy McGee, journalist, politician and Father of Confederation, assassinated (born 1825)
- August 7 — William Agar Adamson, Church of England clergyman and author (born 1800)
- September 12 — Charles Dickson Archibald, lawyer, businessman and politician (born 1802)
- October 17 — Laura Secord, heroine of the War of 1812 (born 1775)
Historical documents
Political cartoon satirizes Nova Scotians' mixed feelings about ConfederationJohn Henry Walker, [http://www.mccord-museum.qc.ca/en/collection/artifacts/M994X.5.273.34§ion=196 "Cross Roads. Shall We Go to Washington First, or How(e)?"] (first published in Diogenes, November 20, 1868). Accessed 9 September 2018
Indigenous people assert claim to their reserve at Lake of Two Mountains (Oka), QuebecIndian Branch, Department of the Secretary of State for the Provinces, [http://digitalarchives.library.mcgill.ca/RBSC/MSG317/rbsc_msg_317_no-greene-collection.pdf "List of Copies of Documents...."] Return[...]of all Correspondence between the Government and the Iroquois Indians of Two Mountains[....] (1870), pgs. 2-3 (PDF pgs. 57-8), Algonquin and Nipissing Indians of Oka Collection, McGill (University) Library. Accessed 15 January 2020
"The moment was fraught with danger" - British spy addresses large rally of FeniansHenri Le Caron, [https://archive.org/stream/twentyfiveyearsi00leca#page/52/mode/2up Twenty-Five Years in the Secret Service; The Recollections of a Spy] (1892), pgs. 53-7. Accessed 9 September 2018
Report by a visitor to newly opened settler lands in Muskoka, Ontario[http://paperspast.natlib.govt.nz/cgi-bin/paperspast?a=d&d=BH18681118.1.7 "Visit to the Free Grant Lands of Canada"] The (Tokomairiro, N.Z.) Bruce Herald, Vol. V, No. 238 (November 18, 1868), pg. 7. Accessed 9 September 2018
In his last Commons speech, D'Arcy McGee lauds anyone "prepared[...]to sacrifice himself [for] principles[...]adopted as those of truth"[https://parl.canadiana.ca/view/oop.debates_HOC0101_01/488?r=0&s=2 "Mr. McGee's Last Speech"] (April 6, 1868), House of Commons Debates; First Session - First Parliament, pg. 468. Accessed 18 April 2021
Federal deputy minister of agriculture says connoisseur in France finds Canadian wine to be vin d'ordinaire second only to their own[http://parl.canadiana.ca/view/oocihm.9_07171_1/547?r=0&s=2 "Report of the Select Committee on the Cultivation of the Vine in Canada; Minutes of Evidence"] Appendix (No. 6), House of Commons Journals, 1st Parliament, 1st Session: Vol. 1 (1868), pgs. A6-1–A6-2. Accessed 12 July 2020
References
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{{Canadian history}}
{{Canada year nav}}
{{North America topic|1868 in}}