Aftermath
All of the crew survived, except for one sailor who may have died of blood loss after being hit by debris from the blast,[7] 20-year-old gunner Yves Quequiner.[8] Casualties included about 2,000 known dead and some 9,000 injured. More than 1,600 houses were destroyed by the explosion, with another 12,000 damaged. The explosion blew the Mont-Blanc into shrapnel, which may have injured many people in the blast zone; about 250 people lost an eye to either the shrapnel or in-blown window glass shards, and 37 people were blinded. The blast was regarded as the largest man-made explosion disaster in history until Hiroshima.[9] A judicial inquiry known as the Wreck Commissioner's Inquiry was formed to investigate the causes of the collision. Proceedings began at the Halifax Court House on 13 December 1917, presided over by Justice Arthur Drysdale. The inquiry's report of 4 February 1918 blamed Mont-Blanc's captain Aimé Le Médec, the ship's pilot Francis Mackey, and Commander F. Evan Wyatt, the Royal Canadian Navy's chief examining officer in charge of the harbour, gates, and antisubmarine defences, for causing the collision. Drysdale agreed with Dominion Wreck Commissioner L.A. Demers' opinion that "it was the Mont-Blanc's responsibility alone to ensure that she avoided a collision at all costs" given her cargo;[10] he was likely influenced by local opinion, which was strongly anti-French, as well as by the "street fighter" style of argumentation used by Imo lawyer Charles Burchell. According to Crown counsel W.A. Henry, this was "a great surprise to most people", who had expected the Imo to be blamed for being on the wrong side of the channel. All three men were charged with manslaughter and criminal negligence at a preliminary hearing heard by Stipendiary Magistrate Richard A. McLeod, and bound over for trial. Mackey's lawyer, Walter Joseph O'Hearn, asked a Nova Scotia Supreme Court justice, Benjamin Russell to issue a writ of habeas corpus. Russell agreed there was no justification for the charges and released the prisoner on 15 March 1918. As the captain had been arrested on the same warrant, he, too, was given a written discharge, though he had not spent any time in jail. Many people were most displeased with Russell's decision, including Attorney General Orlando Tiles Daniels. On 2 April, an attempt by prosecutor Andrew Cluney, on behalf of the attorney general's office to overturn the decision in the Nova Scotia Supreme Court (in banco) failed for lack of jurisdiction (as did two subsequent bids to indict Mackey on 9 April and 2 October 1918). Mr. O'Hearn pointed out the lack of jurisdiction from the outset of the proceedings. Four of the five justices, including Chief Justice Edward Robert Harris agreed. Justice Arthur Drysdale was the lone dissenter. Ultimately, Justice Russell's decision was final. The case, In re Mackey, was added as a citation to the Criminal Code of Canada beginning in 1919 under Section 262 entitled, Manslaughter defined. Russell also presided over the Commander Wyatt's grand jury hearing (19–20 March 1918) and trial (17 April 1918). The trial proceedings took less than a day and ended with an acquittal on both charges.[11]
In his autobiography, Russell reflected upon these particular proceedings. He stated: "Civium ardor prava jubentium gave me all that I could do in disposing of the cases with which I was bound to deal. One of these concerned the official in charge of the wiring across the mouth of the harbour. To suppose he had anything in the world to do with the disaster was an utterly lunatic notion. Yet, my impression is that the Grand Jury insisted on finding a true bill and placing him on trial. When the bill reached me, I got rid of it in the shortest and easiest way possible. It was simply nonsensical, and the fact a grand jury could find it was symptomatic of the condition of the common feeling."[12]
Drysdale also oversaw the first civil-litigation trial, in which the owners of the two ships sought damages from each other. His decision (27 April 1918) found Mont-Blanc entirely at fault. Subsequent appeals to the Supreme Court of Canada (19 May 1919), and the Judicial Committee of the Privy Council in London (22 March 1920), determined Mont-Blanc and Imo were equally to blame for navigational errors that led to the collision.[13]
