Sean Walker
November 15th, 2016
Dr. Tracey Penny Light
HIST 1120
Reading log #9
Morgan’s “‘In search of the phantom misnamed honour'” and Bown’s, “Pistols at Six O’clock”
Duelling, the practice of meeting another at an arranged meeting to settle personal disputes (often to regain one’s honor) through a fight following a list of set procedures, most often with lethal weapons, such as swords or pistols. Duelling fell out of popularity as a way to settle disputes before the dawn of the twentieth century, mainly because society was changing, duels were fought between two men of Gentlemanly status, as the number of men who were considered Gentlemen fell so did the number of duels. But why what were the causes of duels. Challenges could be declared for a great many things, some examples include insulting one’s wife, insulting one’s honor, or even for applying for one’s job. We have many sources to show that duels happened for these reasons, many of them primary sources and many of them secondary sources. One of the secondary sources is an article written for The Beaver, a Canadian history magazine, it is called “Pistols at six O’ clock” and it was written by Stephen Bown. “Pistols at six O’ clock” tells us of the unfortunate series of events that lead to the duel between John Wilson and Robert Lyon, ultimately leading to the death of Robert Lyon. I do not wish to tell the whole story so I shall try to summarize for you, John Wilson was a student-at-law in the town of Perth, Upper Canada in 1833, and he was quite enamoured with a primary School Teachers assistant, and gentlewoman by the name of Elizabeth Hughes, but felt that she wouldn’t reciprocate his feelings because of his low birth status. He had heard from another law student, Robert Lyon, that Elizabeth had been having liaisons and flirtatious meetings with a man by the name of Henry Lelievre. Lamenting on his predicament he wrote a letter to another student-at-law and friend Gideon Ackland about his troubles, Gideon shared the letter with Johns patron, who told Elizabeth’s family, thus tarnishing her reputation. When confronted Lyon said he only said things in jest, and caught in in the middle of a scandal as a gossip Lyon was very angry, mainly at John. Lyon Knocked John to the street and John, sensitive about his low birth challenged Lyon to a duel. John ended up winning, getting arrested for murder, getting acquitted, and living a long and successful life. What this [1]document does is show us what can cause a duel, while also showing us some interesting social issues of the time, such as the Class Gap, what was considered improper conduct for a Gentlewoman and public reaction to things like scandal and deaths by duel.
[1] Bibliography
Bown, Stephen R. “Pistols at Six O’clock.” Beaver 79, no. 4 (August 1999): 22. Academic Search Complete, EBSCOhost (accessed November 15, 2016).