History of the Canadian Army out of Canada and the responsibility for defending the naval bases at Halifax and Esquimalt was assigned to the militia. The fact the Royal Military College in Kingston only offered instruction in English and English was the sole language of command ensured that French-Canadians were under-represented in the officer corps as English was generally not taught in Quebec's Catholic schools. Sir Samuel Hughes, who became the minister of defence and militia in 1911 after the Conservatives won the general election that year, become the dominating force in Canadian defence policy. Hughes was described by the Canadian historian René Chartrand as
French language in the United States sources have recorded as many as 13 million people claiming this ancestry. Most French-speaking Americans are of this heritage, but there are also significant populations not of French descent who speak it as well, including those from Belgium, Switzerland, Haiti and numerous Francophone African countries. There are three major groups of French dialects that emerged in what is now the United States: Louisiana French, Missouri French, and New England French (essentially a variant of Canadian French). Louisiana French is traditionally divided into three dialects, Colonial French, Louisiana Creole French, and Cajun French. Colonial French is traditionally said to have been