My Dearest Mother, Canada, 1901 MY DEAREST MOTHER - 1901 Letters from Canada 1901 Ella Brewin Page 1 of 74 My Dearest Mother, Canada, 1901 My Dearest Mother - 1901 Copyright © 2018 by James Holme. All Rights Reserved. All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means including information storage and retrieval systems, without permission in writing from the author. The only exception is by a reviewer, who may quote short excerpts in a review. Cover designed by Cover Designer Printed in the United States of America First Printing: Feb 2018 Name of Company ISBN-13 978-1-9768316-4-5 Page 2 of 74 My Dearest Mother, Canada, 1901 Many thanks to my wife, Edith, who put up with me chained to my computer all day and for her invaluable help deciphering some of my grandmother’s very unreadable hand writing. Page 3 of 74 My Dearest Mother, Canada, 1901 Contents My Dearest Mother - 1901 ..................................................................................................................................................................... 1 My grandmother, Ella Brewin ............................................................................................................................................................... 5 Ella’s family ............................................................................................................................................................................................ 7 Andrew George Blair’s Family ............................................................................................................................................................... 8 Julius Jottings Jan 1902 No 6 ................................................................................................................................................................. 9 Lecture notes from “Impressions of Canada” .................................................................................................................................... 11 29th April 1901, S.S. Corinthian ............................................................................................................................................................ 14 2nd May 1901, S.S. Corinthian ............................................................................................................................................................. 16 May 8th 1901, Ottawa ............................................................................................................................................................................ 19 May 12th 1901, Ottawa ........................................................................................................................................................................... 21 May 15th 1901, Ottawa ........................................................................................................................................................................... 25 May 19th 1901, Ottawa .......................................................................................................................................................................... 27 May 22nd 1901, Ottawa .......................................................................................................................................................................... 29 May 29th 1901, Ottawa .......................................................................................................................................................................... 33 June 2nd 1901, Ottawa ........................................................................................................................................................................... 35 June 5th 1901, Boston, U.S.A. ............................................................................................................................................................... 37 June 6th 1901, Boston, U.S.A. ................................................................................................................................................................ 40 June 9th 1901, Ottawa ............................................................................................................................................................................ 42 June 12th 1901, Fredericton................................................................................................................................................................. 46 June 16th 1901, Fredericton ................................................................................................................................................................... 48 June 19th 1901, Fredericton ................................................................................................................................................................... 50 June 23rd 1901, Fredericton .................................................................................................................................................................. 52 June 27th 1901, Rothesay, N.B. ............................................................................................................................................................. 54 June 30th 1901, Rothesay, N.B. ............................................................................................................................................................. 56 July 4th 1901, Rothesay, N.B. ................................................................................................................................................................ 58 July 7th 1901, Chamard’s Hotel, Lorne House, Murray Bay ................................................................................................................ 61 July 8th 1901, Murray Bay ..................................................................................................................................................................... 63 July 12th 1901, Murray Bay ................................................................................................................................................................... 66 July 18th 1901, Rothesay, N.B. ...............................................................................................................................................................68 July 21st 1901, Rothesay, N.B. ............................................................................................................................................................... 71 July 24th 1901, Rothesay, N.B. .............................................................................................................................................................. 72 August 2nd, S.S. Tunisian ..................................................................................................................................................................... 73 Footnotes .............................................................................................................................................................................................. 74 Page 4 of 74 My Dearest Mother, Canada, 1901 My grandmother, Ella Brewin When my grandmother, Ella Brewin, was born on March 24, 1871, in Isleworth, Middlesex, her father, Arthur, was 35 and her mother, Maria, was 26. Between 1901 and 1906, before she married, she travelled twice to Canada (1901 and 1902) and to several times to Jamaica to visit relatives. Her brother Francis (Frank) married, Amea, the daughter of Hon. Andrew George Blair1 (Canadian Minister of Railroads & Canals) and his wife Annie Elisabeth (nee Thompson). Most of her letters to her mother during her journeys have survived and I have transcribed them, deciphering the often difficult handwriting. I have kept to her spelling, punctuation and formatting. The letters are a fascinating insight into the life in Canada at the start of the 20th century. She was very privileged in staying with the family of A. G. Blair and meeting the Governor General, Lord Minto, and the Prime Minister, Wilfrid Laurier. She also reveals the prejudices of that time of a typical upper class young English woman abroad: very Anglican, avoiding discussions of the South African war, disapproving “Yankee” twang and using non-PC descriptions of coloured people. In 1903, back in England, she gave some lectures of her impressions and I have transcribed her notes. These fill in some of the background to her visit. Some events described in the letters are repeated in these notes. I have included many end notes. All have been taken from public domain sources using Google searches. Many are copies from Wikipedia. It is remarkable the amount of fascinating information that is available for these years of the beginning of the 20th century: biographies, political events, passenger lists, geographical descriptions etc. Ella married my grandfather, Rev. Maurice Ingram Holme, on July 27, 1909. They had one child (Hugh Francis, my father). She died on February 27, 1952, in Wrecclesham, Surrey, at the age of 80. 1 Andrew George Blair, PC KC (March 7, 1844 – January 25, 1907) was a Canadian politician in New Brunswick, Canada. He was first elected to the Legislative Assembly of New Brunswick in 1878. He joined the parliamentary opposition in the legislature and, in 1879, became leader of the opposition to the Conservative