Source:  “300 étudiants de l’Université d’Ottawa brûlent Donald Gordon:  10 arrestations”, (translation:  “300 students from the University of Ottawa burn Donald Gordon in effigy:  10 arrests”) by Jean Charpentier, La Presse, 6 December 1962, Notebook No 2 / Pages 19-36

D R A F T

 
NEVER TWO WITHOUT THREE, Mr. GORDON — After Montreal and Quebec, yesterday it was the turn of French speaking students in Ottawa to burn Mr. Donald Gordon in effigy.  Shown above, radiant students surround a carbonized Mr. Gordon (“straw man”).
 

300 students of the University of Ottawa burn Donald Gordon:  10 arrests

By Jean CHARPENTIER

OTTAWA. — Following Montreal, Quebec and Sherbrooke, Ottawa had its anti-Gordon protest yesterday.  But it nearly degenerated into a ranged battle due to the intolerance of the forces of order.

On the pretext that it would desecrate the memorial to the dead, the combined strength of the municipal police and the Royal Canadian Mounted Police, backed up by a fire engine, tried vainly to prevent some 300 students from the University of Ottawa from burning the effigy of Mr. Gordon.

Scope of the operation :  one fainting fit, a few bruises, and 10 arrests, three of which involving charges.

The Saint-Jean-Baptiste Society of Ottawa, the students and a few journalists on the scene filed a complaint with City Hall, commissioner Lloyd Francis, deputy mayor in the absence of Miss Whitton, announced that an investigation will be instituted on the comportment of the police officers.

It was around noon that the demonstrators, brandishing placards and shouting “Gordon to the stake!” were led to Confederation Place.  A dozen motorized agents were waiting for them.  But for lack of prompt renforcement by the RCMP, they were unable to push the students back.

As for the firefighters, they were unable to intervene in time to stop the students from setting fire to the effigy of Mr. Gordon, due to the very heavy traffic which, at this time of the day, paralyzes Confederation Place, which has thus been named the “Place of Confusion”.

Police officers and students came to blows when the latter refused to answer the questions of the former unless framed in French.

That’s when the agents arrested a dozen who were taken to the station.  Seven were then released and the other three must appear in municipal court today in Ottawa on charges of disturbing the pease.

The police stated that, warned in advance of the students’ plans, they had announced that all protesting at the (war memorial to the dead) was prohibited.

Their effigy burned, the protesters marched directly to Parliament where a delegation of French Canadian MPs from four of the parties greeted them and offered to cover bail for their imprisoned comrades.  But it was the parents who took care of it.

The Prime Minister [Diefenbaker] and the Transport Minister met three spokesmen for the students who were promised that Mr. Gordon would be informed of their views.*

In their manifesto to the government, the protesters demanded the immediate appointment of 9 French Canadians to the management office of Canadian National, presently composed of 28 anglophones.

They also demanded the firing of Mr. Gordon whom they reproached for his insulting remarks concerning (French Canadians).**

 

* Notes: Gordon is no doubt out of town. Nice set-up. Remove him from the scene so that chaos may reign, and he doesn’t have to be seen answering the students, or producing the Minutes.

** Look where they put their bracket! The Minutes show that GREGOIRE et als’ attack on Gordon is entirely confused, mixing all kinds of terms, including French-SPEAKING Canadians and French Canadians; nonetheless, a racist “insult” is immediately assumed with respect to ethnic French Canadians; however, logically, he ought to have insulted ALL French-SPEAKING Canadians, whether ethnically French Canadian or not, if there was indeed an insult; but there was none; it was INVENTED by the Communist controlled French press in Quebec.