Commentary
One day in the early summer of 1874, two gentlemen appeared unannounced at Fort Henry outside Kingston, Ontario. Today the fort is a National Historic Site but in those days it was an active military installation, home to A Battery, Garrison Artillery (today part of the 1st Regiment Royal Canadian Horse Artillery), and a gunnery school, among the first full-time permanent Canadian military elements.
The two men approached the guard at the gate and asked to be “shown around.” To such a request, out of the blue, a sentry’s only response would be something like, “And who might you be, sir?” They answered: “The Prime Minister of Canada.” The other was his personal secretary, William Buckingham, an Englishman formerly on the staff of George Brown’s Globe newspaper….