Fonds consists of political papers, n.d., 1823-1916, 2.165 m; personal papers, n.d., 1821-1915, 0.385 m; family papers, 1857, ca. 1878-1919, 0.165 m; additional papers, n.d., 1841-1915, 1958, 0.151 m; related papers, 1885, 1887-1914, 0.203 m., Fonds also consists of two paintings of Sir Charles Tupper and his wife dated 1888 by John Horsburgh.
Tupper, Charles, Sir, 1821-1915 : Prime Minister of Canada (1896). Charles Tupper was born at Amherst, Nova Scotia on 2 July 1821. He studied medicine at the University of Edinburgh and was the founding president of the Canadian Medical Association. Tupper was elected as a Conservative to the Nova Scotia legislature in 1855 for the riding of Cumberland County. He served as provincial secretary under Premier James W. Johnston, who he succeeded in 1864. Tupper was elected to parliament for the riding of Cumberland in 1867. Under Sir John A. Macdonald, Tupper served as president of the Privy Council (1870-72), minister of inland revenue (1872-73), customs (1873-74), public works (1878-79), and railways and canals (1879-84), in which role he championed the transcontinental railway. Tupper travelled to Red River in 1869 after his son-in-law was detained by the Métis provisional government under Louis Riel. Tupper went to London as Canada's high commissioner in 1883. He initially retained his cabinet post and was actively involved in Canadian politics throughout his time as high commissioner, including serving as minister of finance (1887-88). Tupper returned to Ottawa in January 1896 to become secretary of state in Sir Mackenzie Bowell's disintegrating government. He represented the riding of Cape Breton. Tupper succeeded Bowell on 1 May 1896. Despite losing the general election in July, Tupper led the Conservatives until 1900. His 69-day term as prime minister is the shortest in Canadian history. Tupper endorsed the federal government's systematically racist relationship with Indigenous Peoples, which caused tremendous ongoing trauma, displacement, disenfranchisement and exclusion Tupper married Frances Morse in 1846. He was knighted in 1879, and created a baronet in 1888. He retired to England and died there on 30 October 1915. He is buried at St John's Cemetery, Halifax.
