A report on New Westminster and Colony of British Columbia (1858–1866)

The Colony of British Columbia (1858–1866) was subsequently founded by Richard Clement Moody, and by the Royal Engineers, Columbia Detachment, in response to the Fraser Canyon Gold Rush.

Moody selected the site for and founded the mainland colony's capital New Westminster.

Moody, who is considered to be the founding father of British Columbia, founded the Colony of British Columbia, when he was selected to 'found a second England on the shores of the Pacific' by Sir Edward Bulwer-Lytton, who desired to send to the nascent Colony 'representatives of the best of British culture' who had 'courtesy, high breeding, and urbane knowledge of the world'.

Moody founded the capital of British Columbia, New Westminster, and has been described as 'the real father of New Westminster'.

The Columbia Detachment of the Royal Engineers was a contingent of the Royal Engineers of the British Army that was responsible for the foundation of British Columbia as the Colony of British Columbia (1858–66).

He founded the new capital city, New Westminster, at a site of dense forest of Douglas pine that he selected for its strategic excellence including the quality of its port.

Sir James Douglas (August 15, 1803 – August 2, 1877), was a British Columbian fur trader and politician who became the first Governor of the Colony of British Columbia.

Upon his retirement, Douglas was honoured with banquets in both Victoria and New Westminster, the capital of the mainland.

The Colony of British Columbia was a British Crown Colony that resulted from the amalgamation of the two former colonies, the Colony of Vancouver Island and the mainland Colony of British Columbia.

New Westminster would welcome its first resident governor, Frederick Seymour, in 1864.

To exert its legal authority, and undercut any HBC claims to the resource wealth of the mainland, the district was converted to a Crown colony on 2 August 1858, and given the name British Columbia.

The increased conflicts between Douglas and the reformers, such as Amor De Cosmos, along with the growing desire of colonists in British Columbia to have a resident governor in their capital of New Westminster resulted in the colonial office easing Douglas into retirement in 1864.

The road runs diagonally from northwest to southeast, emerging from Vancouver's Main Street just south of East 7th Avenue and becoming 12th Street at the Burnaby–New Westminster border.

When the wagon road was built over it by the Royal Engineers between Vancouver's historic Gastown waterfront and the former capital of the Colony of British Columbia at New Westminster, as recommended by Colonel Richard Moody to facilitate troops movement between the two points.

The unrest threatened the rule of the Crown over the Mainland (or "New Caledonia" as it was called before the creation of the mainland colony.

By the start of the 1870s, an overland route from New Westminster was finally built - the Yale Road along the south side of the river.

From 1864 to 1866, he served as the second Governor of the Colony of British Columbia, succeeding Sir James Douglas.

He soon took up permanent residence in New Westminster, which first began as a survey camp of the Royal Engineers that became the colony's new capital.