Today is the Journée nationale des Patriotes, a end of May holiday which in the rest of Canada is sometimes called the Queen's Birthday or Victoria Day. In Quebec it was called the Fête de Dollard until the fact that Dollard's main claim to fame was a massacre of Amerindians percolated in the consciences of politicians.The new name was adopted a couple of years ago, and I think it's a winner.
The flag above is a copy of the flag flown during the Rebellions of 1837-38, which was the nearest thing to a revolution that Canada ever had. Patriots, both English- and French-speaking, took on the British government for representative government. Some went further than others: on the right is a portrait of Robert Nelson, who picked up the rebellion in the winter of 1838 when the other leaders were in jail, exile or hiding, and declared the Republic of Lower Canada. I wrote a fictionalized biography of him several years ago--The Words on the Wall: Robert Nelson and the Rebellion of 1838--which remains a project that I'm proud of.
So today I've got the Quebec flag flying on the balcony in honour of Nelson and the other Patriotes. I do it not because I'm a Quebec separatist, but because I like this place, and I want to make sure that the majority realizes that people like me belong here too.
1 comment:
I used to have a Drapeau des patriotes - the original one did not have the figure of the armed man - believe he was an illlustration from an adventure story by Jules Verne about the 1837 rebellions, "Famille sans nom"
Another version adds a gold star, much like the gold star on the Acadian flag based on the French tricolore.
http://www.patriotes.cc/portal/fr/ArticleView.php?article_id=25
So it is a typical simple tricolore of the democratic revolutions, uprisings and rebellions of its era. Note that the Hungarian flag is the same colours upside down (red on top) and of course the Italian flag uses the same colours but in vertical rows. The Iranian flag is also similar to le Drapeau des Patriotes.
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