Lower Canada, and in 1845 commissioners were appointed by
the Draper administration to inquire into the nature and value of the
losses suffered by her Majesty's loyal subjects in Lower Canada. When
their report was presented in favour of certain claims the Draper
ministry brought in some legislation on the subject, but went out of
office before any action could be taken thereon. The Lafontaine-Baldwin
government then determined to set the question at rest, and introduced
legislation for the issue of debentures to the amount of $400,000 for
the payment of losses sustained by persons who had not been convicted
of, or charged with, high treason or other offences of a treasonable
nature, or had been committed to the custody of the sheriff in the gaol
of Montreal and subsequently transported to the island of Bermuda.
Although the principle of this measure was fully justified by the action
of the Tory Draper government, extreme Loyalists and even some Reformers
of Upper Canada declaimed against it in the most violent terms, and a
few persons even declared that they would prefer annexation to the
United States to the payment of the rebels. The bill, however, passed
the legislature by a large majority, and received the crown's assent
through Lord Elgin on the 25th April, 1849. A large crowd immediately
assembled around the parliament house--formerly the St. Anne Market
House--and insulted the governor-general by opprobrious epithets, and by
throwing missiles at him as he drove away to Monklands, his residence in
the country. The government and members of the legislature appear to
have been unconscious of the danger to which they were exposed until a
great crowd rushed into the building, which was immediately destroyed by
fire with its fine collection of books and archives. A few days later,
when the assembly, then temporarily housed in the hall of Bonsecours
Market, attempted to present an address to Lord Elgin, he was in
imminent danger of his life while on his way to the government
house--then the old Chateau de Ramesay in Notre-Dame Street--and the
consequences might have been most serious had he not evaded the mob on
his return to Monklands. This disgraceful affair was a remarkable
illustration not simply of the violence of faction, but largely of the
discontent then so prevalent in Montreal and other industrial centres,
on account of the commercial policy of Great Britain, which seriously
crippled colonial trade and was the