Trudeau casket leaves Ottawa for Montreal

Margaret Trudeau weeps Sunday in Canada's Parliament at the flag-draped casket of her former husband

OTTAWA, Canada (Reuters) -- A black-draped funeral train left Ottawa on Monday with the body of former prime minister Pierre Elliott Trudeau bound for his home town of Montreal.

A Guard of Honor had fired a 19-gun salute as the flag-covered casket left Parliament Hill, where more than 50,000 Canadians had paid their last respects on Saturday and Sunday.

Tears flowed down the face of his son Justin, while his other surviving son Sacha fought tears back. Canadian Prime Minister Jean Chretien and his wife, Aline, accompanied the cortege to the Ottawa station.

The four-car funeral train then proceeded slowly to Montreal, where the body was to lie in state on Monday afternoon ahead of a state funeral in Montreal on Tuesday. Sacha and Justin and old family friends, including former governor-general Romeo LeBlanc, were on board.

The flamboyant and often controversial Trudeau, prime minister from 1968 to 1984 except for nine months, died on Thursday at the age of 80.

Trudeau's former wife Margaret stayed behind on Parliament Hill, examining the hundreds of bouquets of roses -- a tribute to Trudeau's trademark wearing of a rose -- laid by the public as an enormous wreath around the Centennial Flame.

When a bystander reminded her that Monday would have been the birthday of her son Michel, who was killed in an avalanche in November 1998 at the age of 23, she rushed away and collapsed to her knees in grief on the parliamentary lawn.

Quickly surrounded by other members of her family, including a daughter from her second marriage, she eventually got up and left the scene.

Early on Monday morning, Chretien and members of the cabinet and Parliament had paid respects in Parliament's Hall of Honor.

Eight red-serged Mounties carried the casket slowly down the Parliament's front steps and into the hearse, a military band playing "O Canada," and some cabinet members or their spouses openly crying.

The band struck up "Auld Lang Syne" and the hundreds of Canadians standing by burst into applause with respect as Trudeau's body left Parliament for the last time.

"It's such an emotional day. He was the greatest prime minister. No one can equal him," commented Jenny Pfalzner, who started working in the Library of Parliament during the Trudeau era.

Trudeau's uncompromising passion for a liberal and united Canada won him widespread admiration but also many foes -- among those Quebecers who felt he betrayed them on constitutional issues, among Westerners to whom he flipped the middle finger and among social conservatives who remembered his liberalization of laws on abortion, divorce and homosexuality.

Others admired him for pushing human rights and for projecting a pacifist image of Canada on the world.

"People loved him. People hated him," Ray Hachigan, an Ontario municipal employee, commented. "He made Canada what it is today in many ways -- by far a much kinder and calmer place."

Sometimes described as Canada's Kennedy, he swept to power in 1968 on a wave of "Trudeaumania," captivating the nation as he drove around in an open sports car or pirouetted behind Queen Elizabeth.

Because of the crush of people trying to pay their last respects, government authorities had extended the visiting hours right through the night in Ottawa. The final guests filtered through Parliament at 5:25 a.m. (0925 GMT).

The state funeral in Montreal was set to attract dignitaries from around the world. The Ottawa Citizen reported that Cuban President Fidel Castro -- whom Trudeau embraced during a visit to Cuba in 1976 -- and former U.S. president Jimmy Carter would be among the guests.

Copyright 2000 Reuters. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

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Government of Canada
PM Chronological Biography:Pierre Elliot Trudeau

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