Into the Mist: The Story of the Empress of Ireland
By Anne Renaud
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About this ebook
Short-listed for the 2011 Information Book Award and commended for the 2011 VOYA Non-Fiction Honour List
From 1906 to 1914, the Empress of Ireland, one of the fastest and most elegant liners of the Edwardian era, graced the waters of the Atlantic Ocean. Remembered primarily for sinking in only 14 minutes in the St. Lawrence River and for having a greater loss of passenger life than the Titanic, the Empress’s true legacy is the significant role it played in the building of Canada.
During the ship’s many crossings between Canada and England, it ferried royalty, politicians, scientists, authors, actors, captains of industry, and military servicemen aboard its decks, but most important, it carried more than 115,000 hopeful immigrants who left Europe to build new lives on Canadian soil.
Into the Mist is the story of the Empress of Ireland, of the many people who walked its decks, and how, in the early morning of May 29, 1914, it came to rest on the bottom of the St. Lawrence River.
Anne Renaud
Anne Renaud's previous books for young people include Pier 21: Stories from Near and Far, Island of Sorrow: The Story of Grosse Île, and A Bloom of Friendship: The Story of the Canadian Tulip Festival. Her books have been shortlisted for numerous honours, including the Silver Birch Award, the Red Maple Award, and the Red Cedar Award. She lives in Westmount, Quebec.
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Into the Mist - Anne Renaud
noted.
INTRODUCTION
From 1906 to 1914, the Empress of Ireland, one of the fastest and most elegant liners of the Edwardian era, graced the waters of the Atlantic. During her many crossings between Canada and England, she ferried royals and inventors, authors and scientists, actors and politicians. But most importantly, she carried more than 115,000 hopeful immigrants who had left Europe to build their lives on Canadian soil. This is the story of the Empress, of the many people who walked her decks, and how, in the early morning hours of May 29, 1914, she came to rest on the bottom of the St. Lawrence River.
Canadian Pacific Archives (NS 3293)
Immigrants arriving at Quebec City.
The Dominion of Canada was just 13 years old when the Canadian Pacific Railway was created in 1881.
A decade earlier, the province of British Columbia had joined Canada after Prime Minister Sir John A. Macdonald promised to build a transcontinental railway that would link the new western province to the provinces in the east within 10 years. The government hired a contractor named Andrew Onderdonk to begin construction of the railway from British Columbia, moving eastward. But because the Fraser Canyon was so treacherous, only a few kilometres of rail had been laid by 1881, and no work had begun on the railway from Ontario heading westward.
TIME CAPSULE
The Dominion of Canada was created on July 1, 1867, through the British North America Act. This act united the four provinces of Quebec, Ontario, Nova Scotia, and New Brunswick. It would take another 132 years for the country’s six remaining provinces and three territories to be created. The last was the territory of Nunavut, in 1999.
Glenbow Archives NA-1375-1
Sir John A. Macdonald was Canada’s first prime minister. He served from 1867 to 1873, and again from 1878 to 1891.
Canadian Pacific Archives (NS 13561-2)
Track construction in the lower Fraser Valley of British Columbia in 1883.
TIME CAPSULE
The Canadian Pacific Railway was created by a group of Canadian businessmen who invested their money and obtained funds and land from the government to build a railway linking Canada from coast to coast. The company was incorporated on February 16, 1881.
For British Columbia to remain a part of the country the prime minister had to keep his promise, and time was running out.
It was up to the newly founded Canadian Pacific Railway — or CPR — to bind Canada from coast to coast with a ribbon of steel.
The Canadian government gave the company $25 million and 25 million acres of land to build the railway. Over the next four years, across mountain ranges, lakes, rivers, and forests, the CPR oversaw Canada’s largest railway-building project, under the watchful eye of William Cornelius Van Horne.
Once the country was linked from east to west, the Canadian government had to find settlers to fill the wide expanses of land that lay in between. The owners of the CPR also had to find passengers to fill the seats aboard the trains that were now panting their way across the country. Newcomers in search of affordable farmland would provide a common solution.
In the 1890s, both the CPR and the Canadian government sent agents to Europe to encourage people to come and develop the Canadian West. They placed advertisements in European newspapers and magazines and distributed posters and pamphlets.
TIME CAPSULE
Andrew Onderdonk supervised the building of the railway through the most difficult stretch in the entire route, from Port Moody to Eagle Pass in British Columbia. Between 1880 and 1885, many thousands of men, including 8,000 Chinese labourers, carried out the perilous work of clearing the land, dynamiting the rock, building trestles and bridges, and laying 545 kilometres of