The resignation of Canada’s third Prime Minister, Sir John Abbott, was announced by officials at Rideau Hall on this date in 1892. Abbott had taken office in the aftermath of the death of Sir John A. Macdonald of Kingston only 18 months before.
“The Governor General has received with great regret a letter from Sir John Abbott intimating that he is compelled by the state of his health to resign his office,” it was announced. “Acting upon the advice of Sir John Abbott, His Excellency has requested Sir John Thompson to form a new Cabinet.”
Abbott, of course, was the first Canadian-born Prime Minister.
Arthur Milnes is an accomplished public historian and award-winning journalist. He was research assistant on The Rt. Hon. Brian Mulroney’s best-selling Memoirs and also served as a speechwriter to then-Prime Minister Stephen Harper and as a Fellow of the Queen’s Centre for the Study of Democracy under the leadership of Tom Axworthy. A resident of Kingston, Ontario, Milnes serves as the in-house historian at the 175 year-old Frontenac Club Hotel.