S8E2 The Frontier Constabulary - Canada’s First Secret Police

Curious Canadian History · Sep 20, 2022 · 33m

From 1864 until 1871 a relatively secret organisation of Canadian police patrolled Canada’s border with the United States. What began as a mission to prevent increasing tension between Britian and the US evolved into a concerted effort to undermine a major threat to Canadian sovereignty. This threat came from the Irish Republican organization known as the Fenians. Through a complex array of informants and spies on both sides of the border the Canadian secret police (known as the Frontier Constabulary) played a central role in defining Canada’s response to the Fenian threat and became the…