Parks Canada has erected scaffolding around the entrance of Brock’s Monument after the Friends of Fort George organization alerted it earlier this month that small pieces of mortar and debris were falling and landing at its base.
The scaffolding effort is part of a bigger plan to review the structure’s integrity, according to Sara Quinlan-Cutler, the national historic site manager for Parks Canada.
As for immediate public concerns, she said nothing that’s fallen so far is alarming enough to cause a closure of the monument’s extended grounds.
The scaffolding was put up “out of an abundance of caution” and “there is no danger to the public,” she said.
It is encased in particle board, creating a tunnel-like entrance to the 168-year-old structure.
“We wanted to just make sure that if any debris was going to fall on that front area that we would be protecting visitors and staff,” she said.
“The area directly around the monument is closed to the public anyway,” she added, referring to the grassy base enclosed all the way around by a three-foot concrete barrier.
Annual structural reviews
Parks Canada conducts yearly safety and structural reviews of the site with the last time the monument receiving any major maintenance or upgrades being in 2009.
The last inspection in “late 2022 and early 2023” — which Quinlan-Cutler described as “a deep dive,” as it had been more than 10 years since restoration work was done on the monument — determined some work was needed and a design package is being developed for those repairs.
However, with the new safety concerns, Parks Canada is going to review the site again.
“We are going to actually go ahead and commission another inspection to see what’s going on with the debris and to make sure we fold whatever is happening into the design work that we have already started,” she said.
“I don’t know if it’s the weather events that we’ve had, because we have seen a lot of rain. What we are hoping to find out with this new inspection is where this new issue is coming from.”
Brock’s Monument is the resting place of Maj.-Gen. Sir Isaac Brock, the commanding officer of British forces in Upper Canada during the War of 1812.
He was killed on Oct. 13, 1812 at that location during an American invasion.
The current structure is the second monument to Brock and was constructed between 1853 and 1856 after the first was destroyed by a member of the Upper Canada Rebellion in 1840, said Parks Canada spokesperson Julia Grcevic.
“While not a part of the main rebellions of 1837 and 1838, a participant of those rebellions continued the cause (in 1840) with his attack on the original Brock Monument, which was seen as a symbol of the British empire,” she said.
