Charles Bolton: Civil War Veteran and Pioneer of Embalming in Canada

1843–1930 
Prospect Cemetery 
Section 12 Lot 179

Charles Robert Augustus Bolton is widely regarded as the man who introduced modern embalming practices to Canada. Born in England and raised in Toronto, Bolton left home at 16 in the fall of 1861 with his friend Thomas Hughes, seeking work in the United States. Despite Britain’s Foreign Enlistment Act, which forbade subjects from joining foreign armies, both enlisted in the Union Army during the American Civil War, a conflict that drew an estimated 40,000–64,000 Canadians into service.  

Bolton’s early service remains unclear, but by February 1864 he appears as a bugler in Company “K” of the 11^th Ohio Cavalry, stationed at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, until his discharge in July 1866. During these years, Bolton likely worked burial details, where he encountered arterial embalming, a revolutionary technique pioneered by Dr. Thomas Holmes, the “Father of Modern Embalming.” Holmes’ method, developed during the Civil War, used chemical solutions pumped through arteries to preserve bodies for transport, a necessity for fallen soldiers whose burials could be delayed for unknown lengths of time. Bolton became a student of this practice, and his 1930 obituary noted: “While in the States he learned the undertaking business, and when he came to Toronto, he introduced embalming here.” 

Returning to Toronto in 1866, Bolton married Sarah Nurse and raised 11 children. He went into the funeral business, and it is claimed that he made the first casket used in Toronto, conducting the first funerals at Mount Pleasant and Prospect Cemeteries. A charter member of the Grand Army of the Republic (GAR), J.S. Knowlton Post 532, Bolton honoured his comrades by playing the Last Post at over 100 graves. He died on February 20, 1930, aged 86, remembered as a Civil War veteran, craftsman and innovator who transformed Canadian funeral practices. 

Sources: 
•  Mount Pleasant Group – Charles Bolton  
•  Veterans Affairs Canada – Canadian Virtual War Memorial
•  Esprit de Corps – Embalming in the Civil War: A Canadian Mortuary Tradition