Quebec's secret biological warfare history
About this episode
This episode discusses the secret biological warfare history of Québec during World War II, focusing on the novel 'Horsefly' and the experiences of local residents involved in Project M.
In this episode of the Explaining History Podcast, we are joined by award-winning French Canadian author Mireille Gagné to discuss her acclaimed novel, *Horsefly* – a powerful, genre-defying work inspired by a top‑secret biological warfare laboratory that operated on Québec's Grosse Île during the Second World War. The novel draws on a forgotten chapter of shared Allied history. In 1942, British, American, and Canadian forces established a clandestine facility on Grosse Île – an island in the St. Lawrence River that had previously served as a quarantine station for European immigrants. Their mission: to develop anthrax as a weapon of mass destruction, producing enough to kill the world's population thirty times over. The operation, known as Project M, was part of a broader effort that included the infamous Gruinard Island tests in Scotland – where anthrax spores rendered the island uninhabitable for decades. But Mireille's story is not primarily about scientists and generals. It is about the ordinary people – the residents of neighbouring islands, many of them French Canadian, who were recruited as labourers, caretakers, and assistants. They slaughtered cattle, handled organs…
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