This song takes us back a long way—before Canada came to be. It involves some of the complex negotiations and social forces that led to the whole of Vancouver Island remaining British—despite American expansionism that would have had it otherwise.
In the east, the Great Lakes made a fine natural boundary between the British and Americans. But west of the Great Lakes was another matter. In 1818, after quite a bit of haggling, they were able to agree that, west of Lake Superior, the border would be the 49th parallel running straight across, westward from present day Lake of the Woods, Ontario.
A strict application of this border line westward across the continent would have split Vancouver Island into two. North of Ladysmith would have been British and the southern part of the Island American. This meant that our beloved Saanich Peninsula would have been part of the US if the 49th parallel had been projected straight across—yikes!!
Just to let you know serious this was, a small southward facing peninsula near Vancouver, Point Roberts, was indeed split between the Americans and British by the 49th parallel, and remains so today. Vancouver Island was lucky this didn’t happen to it as well. Can you imagine what a pain it would be to have to dig out your passport every time you wanted to drive to Nanaimo?
Like most things in politics, the final outcome of this border negotiation was a compromise. The British had a substantial claim to much of the territory around the Columbia River basin, including a good portion of present-day Oregon. They had “discovered” it, explored it, and claimed it as theirs. But the Americans coveted this territory and soon their settlers began to flood into the area.
After all was said and done, the southern tip of Vancouver Island was traded for the Oregon territories—a fair exchange, I suppose. Oregon became American, southern Vancouver Island, below the 49th parallel, remained British. A somewhat convoluted line was drawn across the ocean, passing almost within spitting distance of South Pender Island and through Haro Strait dividing the British territories from the American. Apart from the death of a pig (there must be good song in that), this border was drawn peacefully and remains in place today.
But all of this didn’t happen in a vacuum. There was a lot of push-and-pull on the west coast, including a number of years when the disputed Oregon territory was considered to be jointly owned.
The Americans had worked out an interesting strategy for expanding their territories. They would send a whole gaggle of settlers into a district they coveted and, when their numbers were sufficient, they would petition to join the States. This was a significant part of how they expanded their territories into Mexican-held lands, in Texas and California, for example. This strategy was known as annexation, and when coupled with the threat of military intervention, became a major agent of American expansionism and its notion of “manifest destiny.” This was a gradual process whereby the settlers, often referred to as squatters, would “crib a corner” of the desired land and eventually absorb it.
While all of this British/American border stuff was being worked out, residents of southern Vancouver Island were on edge about the prospect of being annexed by the Americans. They’d seen annexation work elsewhere and were concerned they’d be victims of this process too. The tensions of the time were nicely revealed in this song. Set to the jingoistic American tune of “Yankee Doodle,” the lyric reveals some of the tensions being felt at the time—including reference to other places where annexation had worked and some of the political figures involved. Here we have a lovely snapshot of some of the political anxieties being felt on the Saanich Peninsula as the fate of southern Vancouver Island was being decided.
This song, “Annexation,” was documented in the Phil Thomas collection of BC songs (see his book Songs of the Pacific Northwest. Hancock House: Saanichton BC, 1979, pp. 17-19). The recording here is by Phil on his 1980 album Where the Fraser River Flows and Other Songs of the Pacific Northwest. The comments in Phil’s book explain the many specific references in the lyrics (TR).
