Fonds documents the political career and personal life of Sir John Thompson. It also contains extensive family-related papers including correspondence between Thompson and his wife and children.
Fonds consists of the following five series: Political papers; personal papers; family papers; additional papers; and family art. Volumes 1-300 are available on 55 reels of microfilm. The index is available on one reel.
Fonds consists of a plan of a proposed canal at Jeddore, N.S., a plan of Halls Harbour in King's County, N.S., a county map of Prince Edward Island, a map focusing on land grants in New Brunswick, a map of Barrington, N.S. and a map of part of Antiogonish County, N.S., Fonds includes family related artwork. Portraits include one posthumous portrait miniature of Sir John Sparrow Thompson painted by Bonne de Bock, ca. 1895. Art also includes an 1894 posthumous painted photograph of Sir John Thompson by an unknown artist after a 1891 photograph by William James Topley and a monochrome photograph of Lady Thompson likely from around 1870, the time of her marriage to John Thompson. Both are encased in elaborate lockets with inscriptions.
An early accession of art material includes an album of approximately 710 artworks of various media. They have been grouped into twelve sections: 1) Landscape views (in Canada, United States and Europe), 2) Architectural views (Europe), 3) Miscellaneous sketches of animals, and miscellaneous subjects, 4) Crimean, Civil War, and miscellaneous warfare scenes, 5) Scenes of Victorian gentry, 6) Love and matrimony, and miscellaneous, 7) Natives in Australia, Canada and the United States, 8) Greeting cards, 9) Scenes from Shakespeare's plays, 10) Portraits of various people, 11) View engraved by Smillie, 12) Views of Nova Scotia, lithographed by Eagar.
Thompson, John S. D. (John Sparrow David), Sir, 1844-1894 : Prime Minister of Canada (1892-94).
John Sparrow David Thompson was born at Halifax, Nova Scotia on 10 November 1845. He apprenticed as a lawyer, practiced in Halifax and served on local bodies.
Thompson was elected to the provincial legislature in 1878 as a Conservative in the riding of Antigonish. He served as attorney general in the cabinet of Simon Holmes, who he succeeded as premier in May 1882, only to lose the provincial election in June. He then served on the province's Supreme Court and helped found Dalhousie University's law school.
Sir John A. Macdonald made Thompson federal minister of justice in September 1885, just before he was elected to parliament for the riding of Antigonish. Thompson acted as Macdonald's deputy, but refused an opportunity to succeed him in 1891. He continued as attorney general in Sir John Abbott's cabinet, investigating corruption and overseeing the publication of the first Criminal Code.
Thompson succeeded Abbott in December 1892. He rejuvenated the ageing cabinet, helped adjudicate Canadian-American sealing rights in the Bering Sea, and tried to resolve the Manitoba Schools Question.
Thompson endorsed the federal government's systematically racist relationship with Indigenous Peoples, which caused tremendous ongoing trauma, displacement, disenfranchisement and exclusion. Specifically, Thompson was key to defeating an 1886 parliamentary motion expressing regret for Louis Riel's execution. He argued that Riel had received a fair trial and appropriate punishment for inciting Indigenous Peoples to wage war against Canada and kill settlers. To Thompson, this justified the government's immense power to protect settlers and punish those who resisted the federal state.
In 1998, the minister of Indian and northern affairs issued a 'Statement of Reconciliation' for centuries of mistreatment of Indigenous Peoples, including the execution of Louis Riel.
Thompson was knighted in 1888. He married Annie Affleck in 1870. Thompson died suddenly on 12 December 1894 during lunch at Windsor Castle. He is buried at Holy Cross Cemetery, Halifax.