Pigeon Post of Canada
Major-General Donald Roderick Cameron, then Commandant of the Royal Military College of Canada in Kingston, Ontario recommended an international pigeon service for marine search and rescue and military service in a paper entitled "Messenger Pigeons, a National Question" Sir Charles Hibbert Tupper, then Minister of Marine and Fisheries supported the pigeon policy. Colonel Goldie, Assistant Adjutant General and Major Waldron of the Royal Artillery, and Captain Dopping-Hepenstal of the Royal Engineers carried through the plan. The pigeon post between look-out stations at lighthouses on islands and the mainland at the citadel in Halifax, Nova Scotia provided a messenger service from 1891 until it was discontinued in 1895. The pigeon post faced a heavy mortality among the pigeons as many were lost on the operations. The flight from the Citadel in Halifax, Nova Scotia to Sable Island, for example, was difficult for the pigeons to complete.
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Famous quotes containing the words pigeon, post and/or canada:
“They wait, each like a wooden decoy
or soft like a pigeon or
a sweet snug duck:
until one moves, moves that dart-beak
breaking over.”
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