The pre-war training camps I mentioned are something I would like to know more of too, I've never run across much anything online - all I know comes from reading microfilm of old papers back when I was an undergraduate. And though sympathetic papers would mention it, they wouldn't provide a whole heck of lot of details, but, reading between the lines, it's pretty clear they were training Canadians to serve with the Ulster Volunteer Force in blocking Home Rule. The interesting question is how many participated, and how high level was government involvement. Hughes would certainly have been aware of this, if for no other reason than that he probably had a subscription to
The Protestant Sentinel. I had briefly contemplated pursuing an MA on the subject but never seriously enough to determine how much information remains accessible on the subject, let alone what scale it was. Still, I do recall multiple training camps for at least a couple years so I think there were at minimum thousands who'd received some training.
Though I am no expert on the Canadian militia of 1914, they were pretty darn weak in 1914. This 1948 article has a good summary of it. My understanding of the demographics of the, essentially voluntary, militia is that they were fairly imperialist and would be inclined to support the crown in any sort of constitutional crisis over the Prime Minister.
http://faculty.marianopolis.edu/c.b...ilitia-TheMilitiaofCanada-Canadianhistory.htm
Fascinating. I know a bit about the militia but had not heard of this Ireland connection before. And if that really does have a broader base instead of just coming out of nowhere, then you may be right about Hughes, too.
Still, a Canadian civil war during the 1910s is a fantasy, although it was a fantasy which was certainly nurtured by some of the more paranoid people of Canada.
If there was a conflict one would imagine it would be between English Protestants and French Catholics, rather than between English Protestants and a Borden government that had inexplicably decided to sit out the war.
The militia gets together every year to go camping, drink beer, and practice shooting. Although people did go from the militia to the regular force to serve in Europe, it's really not intended to function the way the modern American or Canadian reserves do, it's not trained or equipped to do so, and it's hard to imagine the militia descending as an organized political force on Ottawa to demand that the country shape up and join the war effort.
(In part because, as we've already agreed, they wouldn't need to: a critical mass of MPs, and their voters, would never have accepted a Canadian declaration of independence from Britain in 1914.)
I would think Hughes would have been quite keen on supressing a rebellion in Ireland given his activities with the Orange Order. I do agree that Canada could probably have avoided a (substantial) frontline involvement in return for rear area support and colonial garrison duty though. It would have been controversial, and probably not sustainable long term but is certainly something that could have been attempted.
Agreed. Negotiating for rear duty is the sort of thing you do when you want to maintain political obligations on the one hand while minimizing your political fallout on the other. But at least in our timeline, the Borden government doesn't suffer negative political fallout from joining the war, so there would be no reason to look for that kind of way out.
Maybe in some alternative timeline where there was a more powerful independence movement led by Bourassa or something, and a Liberal prime minister with a Quebec base, the government would feel compelled to be creative like that.
Or maybe if we find a time machine and swap out Laurier for Chretien or King. "Ready, aye, ready if necessary, but not necessarily ready, aye, ready"?