WILLIAM

See also:

• WILLIAM KINGSFORD (1819-1898)

KINGSFORD (1819-1898)  , British engineer and Canadian historian, was born in London on the 23rd of December 1819 . He first studied architecture, but disliking the confinement of an office enlisted in the 1st Dragoon Guards, obtaining his discharge in Canada in 1841 . After serving for a time in the office of the city surveyor of Montreal he made a survey for the Lachine canal (1846-1848), and was employed in the United States in the building of the Hudson River railroad in 1849, and in Panama on the railroad being constructed there in 1851 . In 1853 he was surveyor and, afterwards district superintendent for the Grand Trunk railroad, remaining in the employment of that company until 1864 . The following year he went to England but returned to Canada in 1867 in the hope of taking part in the construction of the Intercolonial Railway . In this he was unsuccessful, but from 1872 to 1879 he held a government post in charge of the harbours of the Great Lakes and the St Lawrence . He had previously written books on engineering and topographical subjects, and in 188o he began to study the records of Canadian history at Ottawa . Among other books he published Canadian Archaeology (1886) and Early Bibliography of Ontario (1892) . But the great work of his life was a History of Canadain 10 volumes (1887-1897), ending with the union of Upper and Lower Canada in 1841 . Kingsford died on the 28th of September 1898 .