Monday, May 12, 2008

Restoring B.C.'s military heritage

By Dan Hilborn, Burnaby Now assistant editor
Published Nov. 12, 2003


Two of the oldest pieces of British Columbia's military history will be back on display next year thanks to the dedication of the Royal Westminster Regimental Museum and Burnaby Village Museum.

The two 1859 cannons that once protected the original capital city of the province against an expected invasion from the United States are now in the final stages of a long-awaited restoration.

"They're a great historical item," said Jack Fournier, chair of the restoration committee at the regimental museum. "They were brought to Canada in the event of an American incursion, and they sat at the foot of the Pattullo Bridge for years until they finally fell apart.

"Later, they were displayed at Westminster Quay, where they were put onto concrete pedestals, but most of the old wood has rotted and the barrels are corroded."

The restoration project was first started four years ago with the help of a federal millennium grant project, but is only now nearing completion because of the painstaking work involved.

Professional restorer Brady Foster was brought in for the task of building new wooden assemblies to carry the old guns, replacing the 144-year-old teak carriages that had rotted beyond repair.

The gun barrels themselves were taken to Burnaby Village Museum, where they were polished and refurbished so that all the intricate detailing and markings on the original castings were made visible again.

Fournier said the cannons were never fired in a military engagement, however, they were sometimes used for firing practice from their original location at the south entrance to the Pattullo Bridge.

"Albert Crescent was a good firing site," Fournier said. "It was a high piece of ground and you could shoot up or down the river. I know it may sound crazy, but in the 1860s and '70s, many people were worried about the Americans and their economic beliefs - I guess some people still are."

Jim Wolf, an assistant heritage planner for the City of Burnaby and a New Westminster resident, said the cannons are among the most colourful pieces of B.C.'s history.

"What's amazing about these guns is that they've even survived this long," said Wolf, who noted that the best source of information on the guns and their deployment is the 1978 book Vancouver Defended: A History of the Men and Guns of the Lower Mainland Defences, 1859-1949 by Peter N. Moogk.

About 30 years after the cannons - officially classified as Early Crimean guns by military historians - were deployed, the guns failed and were deemed unsafe to use in the upcoming Victoria Day festivities in New Westminster, Wolf said. That's when another local tradition was started - what is now known as the Ancient and Honourable Hyack Anvil Battery Salute.

Foster, who works as a restorer at BVM, has toiled away on the project over several years, and said the toughest part has been the final tweaking to make sure that all the pieces of the giant guns fit together properly.

Among the many complications he encountered was the fact that the 144-year-old steel barrels and other metal parts were so old, that they could no longer be reheated for easy fitting around the wood.

A local lumber mill donated the Douglas fir used to build the new carriages, while Burnaby Village Museum did much of the restoration of the original cannon barrels. The steel axles for the carriages were built in Kentucky.

Extra help on the project came from Coquitlam resident Larry Beckett, who actually owns his own 140-year-old cannon, which he brings out every year to the traditional Dominion Day celebrations at BVM.

After all the different parts of the rebuilt cannons were finished, Foster then had to spend countless hours reshaping the carriages to make sure the pieces fit together properly.

The whole apparatus will be painted in historic Canadian military colours before the gun barrels are finally brought out of storage and dropped onto the newly made carriages.

And if everything goes according to plan, the newly restored 1859 Royal Engineer cannons will once again find a home overlooking the Fraser River, where they will once again stand on guard for thee.

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