Open AccessUpper Canada Preserved
Author(s) -
Nathan Ewen
Publication year - 2020
Publication title -
the general brock university undergraduate journal of history
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
ISSN - 2371-8048
DOI - 10.26522/tg.v5i1.2386
Subject(s) - victory , mythology , nationalism , indigenous , identity (music) , world war ii , history , political science , sociology , law , political economy , aesthetics , politics , art , ecology , biology , classics
Following the end of the War of 1812, there was a conscious effort on the part of prominent Upper Canadians to immortalize the deeds and contributions of the Canadian Militia. Hugely overstating their meagre efforts, these figures claimed the lions share of victory for the citizen soldiers, ignoring the far more meaningful and significant effect that British redcoats and Indigenous warriors had in defeating the Americans. By creating this myth these prominent men, many of whom served in the militia, sought to enrich and entrench their positions in Upper Canadian society. Additionally, this Militia Myth helped form a new sense of Canadian identity (a specifically British version of it), that would be crucial in fostering a new nationalism that would emerge in mid-19th century Upper Canada.