Floating Households

Government vessels

D.G.S. Newington
Image courtesy of City of Vancouver Archives

In Canada, responsibility for the regulation of harbours falls to the federal government. Ottawa is also responsible for immigration, fisheries, and aids to navigation. The Dominioin government maintained a small fleet of vessels to carry out these functions along the British Columbia coast.

The following government vessels were enumerated in Victoria Harbour in 1911:

Newington (1908) -- Capt. Charles Barnes + 13 crew
Quadra (1891) -- Capt. Charles Hackett + 24 crew
Madge (1907) -- Second Engineer H. F. Hart

The Dominion Government Ship [D.G.S.] Newington, a former trawler, looked after lighthouses and wireless telegraph stations around Vancouver Island and the Gulf Islands. Shortly before the census, she had delivered supplies to the newly established Estevan Point Lighthouse and assisted in constructing emergency shelters for shipwrecked mariners along the exposed west coast of Vancouver Island.

Her commanding officer, Charles Barnes, qualified as a master mariner with the British Board of Trade, had served as Second Officer on the Quadra before taking command of the Newington in 1909.

The Quadra was built in Scotland specifically for the Canadian government; when commissioned, she was given the prefix C.G.S., meaning 'Canadian Government Ship,' as her official name. Her first skipper, Capt. John T. Walbran, was at the helm for over a decade. After he retired from the coast guard service, Capt. Walbran wrote a gazetteer esteemed by geographers, historians and mariners in this region. Its full title is British Columbia coast names, 1592-1906, to which are added a few names in adjacent United States territory: their origin and history, with map and illustrations (1909).

Capt. Charles Hackett, commander of the Quadra, was born in Nova Scotia and went to sea as a youth. He brought a sealing schooner to Victoria in 1889 and was involved with the sealing industry for several years. He was an officer with the Canadian Pacific Navigation Company, precursor of the CPR's British Columbia Coast Service. He was appointed master of the Quadra in 1906. At the time of the 1911 census, the Quadra was engaged in fisheries patrols and hydrographic work.

C.G.S. Quadra entering Victoria harbour.
Image courtesy of BC Archives, A-00128.

In addition to the large tug Petrel, the Canadian government owned a smaller tug, the Madge. A sleek-looking craft, Madge was built at the British Columbia Marine Railway, known as Bullen's shipyard, in Esquimalt. She helped trans-Pacific ocean liners dock at the Canadian government quarantine station at William Head, twenty-five kilometres southwest of Victoria. When passenger ships from the Orient had cleared the quarantine station, they were permitted to proceed to their final destinatioins.