Unable To Forget A Battle In 1759

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30562, 3 October 1964, Page 5

Unable To Forget A Battle In 1759

[Specially written for "The

Press" by

TUI THOMAS.]

VEILED threat of assassination and the separatists' message that she will not be welcome in Quebec, are the disturbing thoughts that will mar the Queen’s visit to Canada with Prince Philip next week. Her Majesty is not a person to be bullied by terrorists into staying away when she feels she has a job to do. But her loyal subjects, the security men—and, no doubt, the Queen herself —will be deeply relieved when she returns home safely and the anxious days are over. The Queen’s determination to go to French-speaking Canada at this time of discontent, is tied up with Britain’s eflfort to hold the Commonwealth together. She will take part, even at possible risk to her own safety, in celebrations to commemorate the centenary of meetings in Charlottetown (Prince Edward Island) and Quebec City, which led to the union of the Canadian provinces into a self-govern-ing Dominion. It seems obvious that the majority of French-Canadians would much rather she did not come over. They have nothing against the Queen herself, they repeat But they do not like

the Crown she wears. To! them it is. a symbol of what 1 they regard as economic and ! political domination by British-Canadians—a domi- i nation Quebecers are fighting < in an effort to become a i separate state. Bitter Past The piece of history the Queen is going to honour, is part of a bitter past to the French-Canadians. They have never really accepted the de- ’ feat of their ancestors in the Battle of the Heights of Abraham in 1759, when both General Montcalm and General Wolfe died in the fighting believing his army had won. What they call British despotism still gnaws at them. They carry their resentment even to language. Though they learn English at school, they will shrug their shoulders and ignore a tourist who asks tactlessly in English, a simple question like: “Am I on the right road to Cap de la Madeleine?” Yet once they accept a stranger they are the most generous, sincere friends. Cool Reception The Queen is already acquainted with the rather chilly courtesy of FrenchCanadian officials, the stony stares of the people who happen to be about the streets of Quebec City when the Royal car passes by. It was an uncomfortable place that June day in 1959, when her Majesty walked across the lush green grass of the Heights of Abraham dressed in daffodil yellow. A comparative handful of

ißritish citizens cheered lustily. The French were sullen, silent. In those days the separatist movement was not as vociferous, less aggresive than it is now. In Montreal, a London journalist wrote back to his newspaper that the Canadians were getting ready for the Queen’s visit like a family expecting an unwelcome mother-in-law, dutifully, but with no enthusiasm. Anyone who had followed the Royal tour of New Zealand in 1954 would have agreed with him. Suspended A Toronto television personality, in New York the day the Queen and the Duke arrived at Gander (Newfoundland), was asked her views on the Canadians* reactions to the Royal visit She talked into the microphone about the slackening ties between her country and Britain, of the complete indifference to the coming of the Queen, except among the British stock who numbered only about 40 per cent of the population. This glamorous blonde, who had a fast rise to star status at the Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, came crashing to the ground in a matter of minutes. She had to explain herself on a C.B.C. television network programme that evening and was suspended for a time. On arrival back at the Toronto airport she made a pathetic plea to the newsmen there: “Won’t somebody back me up? You know I’m right”

Everyone looked the other way. Two days before the Queen came to Montreal to open the extended St Lawrence Seaway with the President of the United States (Mr Eisenhower), the buildings were bedecked with flowers and bunting. I remarked to a BritishCanadian businessman that it was pleasing to the city iso gay for the Queen. He looked at me puzzled. “But those decorations are not up for the Queen,” he said. “They’re for Sainte John Baptiste Day, tomorrow. No doubt, they’ll be left up while the Queen and Mr Eisenhower are here.” For their welcome to the Royal visitors, the city fathers mustered a massive crowd of guests. We watched from a nearby embankment above a run-down street with a sparse group of people, most of them the city’s deadbeats out to see a spectacle. In the humid heat it was more pleasant breathing out than in.

Unsmiling, Withdrawn When the Queen drove by she looked straight ahead, unsmiling and withdrawn. In downtown Montreal the streets were packed. Many stood on the sidewalks waiting for a glimpse of her Majesty, but most were pushing through disinterested on their way. It was lunch hour.

By the time she reached Ontario, it was obvious the Queen was not well. But she pressed on doggedly through a gruelling tour in the muggy

heat of a Canadian summer. From the prairie provinces and out west, where the crowds received the Royal visitors with real affection, persistent rumours flowed eastwards that the Queen was pregnant. They were strenuously denied by spokesmen for the tour, who called her malady a gastric upset—“a frequent complaint among travellers,” they explained. “Send Queen Home” “Send the Queen home; She’s ill,” flashed a headline in one of the Toronto newspapers from its touring correspondent. There was an uneasy feeling that something was seriously wrong. Soon after the completion of the Queen’s long, hot journey through the breadth of Canada, came the Buckingham Palace announcement that the Queen was, in fact, expecting a baby.

Canadians were dazed with admiration and a little awed by the truth, when it came. It was not long before someone suggested publicly that the baby, if a boy, should be given the title of Duke of Ottawa.

The Queen’s tenacity, her conscientious attitude to seeing through that particularly trying tour of 1959, rather than disappoint the people who had planned for months to greet her, will be remembered gratefully by both races. The devotion she showed to the- Canadians then may have done more than is realised, in the meantime, to enhance the symbol of the Crown because of the courageous woman who wears it