In 1862, Viscount Milton and Dr. Cheadle set off to cross western Canada to try and find a route through the Rocky Mountains that could be used for railways to transport gold from the British Columbia goldfields to eastern Canada. Behind that simple description lies one of the strangest yet at the same time most important 19th-century expeditions in North America. Strange? The two men were an odd couple to begin with and one of their traveling companions was so peculiar people thought he was fictional. Important? Important enough that their account became the best-selling book of the age, beaten only by the Bible--and the trip was instrumental in bringing the railroad from the east and ensuring that BC became part of the Canadian Confederation in 1871 and not part of the U.S. The intention in London was to hold fast to the rich and fertile land in the west and "to found a second England on the shores of the Pacific." Milton and Cheadle were part of the process, not least because Viscount Milton could later argue the case for the railroad and for confederation in Parliament.

Author (and expedition leader) Ernest Coleman has not only returned to the primary sources to retell the story of their eventful journey, he has also followed the entire route today. The centuries-long search for the northwest passage by sea never actually became a navigable trade route; it was the land route that fixed the political map of North America. Imagine how different the world might have been if the whole of its Pacific seaboard had been part of the U.S.