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J.E. Bernier and the historical record

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 October 2016

Alan MacEachern
Alan MacEachern*
Affiliation:
Department of History, The University of Western Ontario, Lawson Hall, Room 2268, London, Ontario N6A 5B8, Canada ([email protected])
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Abstract

In the 1920s, Canada developed and promoted a sector claim to the Arctic archipelago based on the 1880 transfer from Great Britain and on subsequent occupation, as expressed in licensing, patrols, and posts. The fact that in July 1909 the government-sponsored explorer J.E. Bernier had claimed the sector by planting a flag, indeed, the fact that Canada had him planting flags at all, complicated if not contradicted this narrative. This research note shows that Canadian government officials of the 1920s misunderstood or, more likely, deliberately mischaracterised Bernier's earlier sovereignty work, and in doing so have distorted our historical understanding of it. The note also argues that, contrary to recent writing in this journal, it is likely that Bernier did not make an earlier sector claim in August 1907.

Type
Notes
Information
Polar Record , Volume 53 , Issue 1 , January 2017 , pp. 102 - 104
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 2016 

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