The Halifax Connection
Read The Halifax Connection Online
Authors: Marie Jakober
To the memory of my father, who could never understand why his teenaged daughter kept bringing home all those books about dead generals from another country. He would be intrigued now, I think, to see where it all led.
A Historical Note to the Reader
A Note on the Terminology of the Period
Book One - Halifax, February 1862
Chapter 2 - The Old Man is Looking for Some Spies
Book Two - The North Atlantic, Summer 1863
Book Three - Montreal, October 1863
Chapter 9 - At the Sailors’ Church
Chapter 10 - The Grand Conspiracy
Chapter 14 - Not Death but Love
Book Four - Halifax, October–December 1863
Chapter 20 - After the Chesapeake
Chapter 22 - To Love or Not to Love
Chapter 25 - At the Halifax Club
Chapter 31 - Setting the Snare
Chapter 32 - The Vessel of Retribution
Chapter 33 - The Nature of the Game
Historical Persons Mentioned or Appearing in the Text
Canadian and British
John Bright
, British manufacturer, member of Parliament for Birmingham
George Brown
, editor of the Toronto
Globe;
Liberal politician and subsequently a Father of Confederation
William Gladstone
, British Chancellor of the Exchequer
Joseph Howe
, popular Nova Scotia politician, leader of the movement for responsible government
Lord Lyons
(Richard Bickerton Pemell), British ambassador to Washington
John A. Macdonald
, Conservative politician, subsequently a Father of Confederation and first prime minister of the Dominion of Canada
Vice-Admiral Sir Alexander Milne
, commander of the British fleet in North America
Lord Monck
(Charles Stanley, Fourth Viscount Monck), governor general of British North America and subsequently of the Dominion of Canada, 1861–68
Lord Palmerston
(Henry John Temple), prime minister of England
George Wade
, a Nova Scotian recruited by the Confederates under John Braine
Sir Fenwick Williams
, commander of all British military forces in North America
American (Union and Confederate)
John Braine
, British-born Kentuckian adventurer and petty criminal, hijacker of the ship
Chesapeake
Clement Clay
, Confederate commissioner to Canada
Jefferson Davis
, president of the Confederate States of America
Mortimer Jackson
, United States consul in Halifax
George Kane
, former police marshal of Baltimore; Confederate agent in Canada
Robert E. Lee
, Confederate general
Abraham Lincoln
, president of the United States
General John Hunt Morgan
, Confederate cavalry commander and leader of raid into northwestern states in 1863
Captain Raphael Semmes
, captain of the Confederate raiding ship
Alabama
Jacob Thompson
, Confederate commissioner to Canada
Captain John Wilkinson
, Confederate naval officer
Important Fictional Characters Appearing in the Novel
Bryce Amberson
, English naval officer, related by marriage to Erryn Shaw
Sylvie Bowen
, English mill worker and immigrant to Canada
Aggie Breault
, housemaid at Den, a Halifax boarding house
Jonathan Bryce
, Montreal police constable and spymater
Matt Calverley
, Halifax police constable
Daniel Carroll
, Montreal businessman, Confederate supporter
Susan Danner
, mistress of the Den
Harry Dobbs
, manservant at the Den
François Dufours
, Halifax police constable
Jackson Follett
, chief Confederate agent in Montreal
Nathaniel Foxe
, captain of the U.S. merchant ship
Osprey
Frances Harris
, aunt of Sylvie Bowen
James Fitzroy Hawkins
, commander of the Halifax militia
Maury Janes
, Confederate agent
Latour
, Canadian undercover agent in Montreal
Annie MacKay
, scullion at the Den
Alexander MacNab
, Halifax businessman, Confederate supporter
Louise Mallette (“Madame”)
, Halifax widow
Edmund Morrison
, Montreal businessman, Confederate supporter
Jack Murray
, friend of Erryn Shaw
Isabel Orton
, daughter of James Orton
James Orton
, Halifax lawyer, Confederate supporter
Jabin Romney
, chief Union agent in Halifax
“Captain William Ross,”
alias of blockade-running English naval officer Bryce Amberson
Emma Sanders
, cook at the Den
Erryn Shaw
, exiled English aristocrat
David Strange
, friend of James Orton, Confederate supporter
Brad Taylor
, Confederate courier killed in Halifax
Zeb Taylor
, Brad Taylor’s brother
Gideon Winslow
, Erryn Shaw’s landlord
I
N
1860, A
BRAHAM
L
INCOLN
was elected president of the United States on a platform that would have prohibited the further expansion of slavery into the nation’s western territories. Within months of this election, seven Southern states had seceded from the Union and formed the Confederate States of America. Civil war broke out between the sections in April 1861, and four more border states joined the Confederacy. Its capital was established in Richmond, Virginia.
From the very beginning, the main objective of Confederate foreign policy was to obtain European support, especially from England. Considerable hostility already existed between Britain and the United States, carried over from the American Revolution and the War of 1812. A new war between the two powers would have thrown the full weight of the British Empire into the camp of the Confederates.
The best place to provoke such a war was Canada. It had a long, unwatched border with the United States, allowing for the
possibility of Confederate raids—raids that might be followed by American retaliation and the outbreak of war. Although England was officially neutral, many Englishmen, mostly of the wealthier classes, sympathized with and aided the Confederates, both in Britain and in Canada.
Since the Confederacy was not recognized as a nation, it did not have official diplomatic status in any country. However, many Southerners came to Canada to further the interests of the Confederacy in various ways, and the Union sent a number of intelligence operatives north to try to keep track of their activities.
At the time, Canada was not yet a nation state. In official documents and usage, all of the British territories on the continent were collectively known as British North America. The region that was actually called Canada comprised only small parts of what today are Ontario and Quebec. Colloquially, however, on both sides of the border, the terms “Canada” and “Canadians” were used more indiscriminately, to refer to the entire region and its inhabitants. I have chosen to follow this usage much of the time, partly in the interests of clarity and simplicity, and partly because I believe we were a nationality before we were a nation state; this was one of the reasons Confederation was possible.