1891-2. ] CORRESPONDENCE OF LIEUT.-COL. COFFIN. 283 
David Alexander Grant, of Blairfindy, Scotland. The children by this 
marriage were Charles Irwin Grant, Baron de Longueuil, who died in 1878, 
and Charlotte, who is married to Mr. J. Antisell Allen, both of whom are 
living in the beautiful old home of Alwington, in Kingston, Ont., for 
some years the residence of the Governors-General of Canada. 
It is to Carolina, Baroness de Longueuil, and her daughter Charlotte, 
that the letters in the packet are addressed. 
The correspondence to which I have had access covers a period of 
over six years, from January 24th, 1834,to March 17th, 1840. There 
are twenty-six letters in all, and, being written to intimate friends and 
relatives, they naturally contain much that is of merely family and per- 
sonal interest. But there is also a great deal that must be interesting to 
Canadians in general, and it is chiefly the writer’s account of and frank 
comments on the exciting political events of the day that I desire to 
bring before your notice. 
At the outset let me utter a word of caution. Even to-day a narrative 
of the incidents of 1837-38 can awake not a little intensity of feeling, and 
it is but natural to expect that a young man, living in the midst of those 
events, shotild feel the heat of party strife and express the sentiments of 
an ardent partisan. But herein lies the value of these letters. It is often 
difficult to understand and estimate fairly the principles and sentiments 
of both sides in a political struggle, and this holds more true the farther 
the contest is removed from our own time. To-day Canadians of all 
parties give their unqualified assent to the principle of responsible 
government, and it is not always easy, therefore, to appreciate the 
honesty and sincerity of those who in former days so bitterly denounced 
William Lyon Mackenzie. Yet the latter lived to acknowledge himself 
that it would have been a misfortune for Canada if all his plans had suc- 
ceeded. In any case let us bear in mind that in Lower Canada the 
struggle of ’37 was very different in character from that in Upper Canada 
—that it was chiefly a racial strife, and involved questions which, as 
recent events have shown, are even yet unsettled. Col. Coffin was an 
enthusiastic loyalist, and to his mind the problem to be solvea in Lower 
Canada in the earliest years of Queen Victoria’s reign was whether the 
work of Pitt and Wolfe was to be undone, and the tricolor was once 
more to float over the citadel of Quebec. His views as expressed in 
these letters, were undoubtedly the views of a great majority of the 
British population in Lower Canada at that time, and therefore deserve, 
to say the least, a respectful hearing. Only by studying both sides can 
we get the proper historical perspective. 
