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The best vessel of all was of course the "Discovery," which had been specially constructed for the National Antarctic Expedition in 1900, but she had been acquired by the Hudson Bay Company, and although the late Lord Strathcona, then High Commissioner for Canada, was approached, he could not see his way to obtaining her for us in view of her important employment as supply ship for the Hudson Bay Trading Stations.
Lord Strathcona, who was a member of the House of Lords and High Commissioner for Canada, placed it in command of Superintendent Sam B. Steele, a widely known officer, entertained the corps lavishly both before and after the war, fitted it out as no other regiment was equipped, brought the officers and men into contact with Royalty, kept it more or less in touch with the Associated Press and all of this tended to put this regiment more in the limelight than others from Canada.
That the need of medical assistance exists is unquestionable, as is evidenced from the many appeals which I receive to start hospitals or supply doctors in districts at present utterly incapable of obtaining such help. One still indispensable requisite in our scattered field of work is a hospital steamer. In fact, not a few of us think that the Strathcona is the keystone of the Mission.
While the mill was in its cradle, we in the Strathcona were cruising the northern Labrador waters. We witnessed that year, off the mighty Kaumajets, the most remarkable storm of lightning that I have ever seen in those parts. Inky masses hid the hoary heads of those tremendous cliffs.
This happened at the very beginning of the fishing season, and put an end to the summer's fishing for Uncle Willie, and, of course, to all hope of hunting and trapping during last winter. Then Doctor Grenfell happened along with his brave old hospital ship Strathcona. Dr. Grenfell has a way of happening along just when people are desperately in need of him. With Dr. Grenfell was Dr.
The proposal was received with enthusiasm; yet, though its advocacy was continued by Lord Strathcona and Mr Sifton, little progress was made towards its adoption. After the Conference of 1907 preferential trade ceased for a time to be a living issue.
The blankets with the sheets placed in the centre were strapped into a neat roll at the head of each tartan-rugged cot, at the foot of which lay a folded black oil-sheet. Above, on a small shelf, were the spare uniform and Stetson hat, flanked on either side by a pair of high brown "Strathcona" riding-boots, with straight-shanked "cavalry-jack" spurs attached.
And yet, as in the case of Alexander Mackenzie, there is a wonderfully intimate human link connecting that time with our own; for Lord Strathcona was born before the amalgamation of the rival companies in 1821; he became the last resident-governor of the Hudson's Bay Company while François Beaulieu, Mackenzie's centenarian voyageur, was still alive; and he lived until 1914, the year of the Great World War.
Later a battalion of infantry was raised to garrison Halifax and thus release the Leinster regiment for the front, while Lord Strathcona provided the funds to send the Strathcona Horse. In the last year of the war five regiments of Mounted Rifles and a Constabulary Force, which saw active service, were recruited. All told, over seven thousand Canadians went to South Africa.
Years afterwards in the Boer War time this same Redvers Buller, then commanding the British forces on the veld, said to Colonel Sam B. Steele, of Strathcona's Horse, who also had served under Wolseley: "I know Lord Strathcona very well: when I was at Fort Garry on the Red River Expedition he spoke to me about going out over the plains to investigate conditions, but I was recalled to my regiment and Governor Archibald sent Butler out instead, a good thing too; for he wrote a very good book on his journey which I could not have done."
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