ABSTRACT
Of the many challenges Canada has faced since Confederation in 1867, none has involved such an expenditure of blood and treasure as its participation in overseas wars. Throughout the nineteenth century, British North Americans adhered to a model of amateur military service that was transplanted to the new world by English settlers, where it became a founding military tradition of both Canada and the United States. For the first time both it and the other maritime colonies began to seriously consider entering Confederation with Canada, a project that might not have been achieved as early as 1867 were it not for the crisis created by the American Civil War. The departing British army had even provided schools of instruction to the militia, a role that would have disappeared entirely after 1871 were it not for the small Canadian Permanent Force (PF) that was reluctantly authorized to fill this instructional gap.
