[2] Côté's father was a government land surveyor from Quebec who went west in 1903 to determine the frontier between Alaska and the Yukon, and he subsequently became active as a mining engineer in Alberta, enjoying much success in his field and then entered politics.

[2] The collège classique education put a strong emphasis on French, Latin, Greek, the classics, rhetoric, the letters, philosophy, math, European history and Catholic theology.

[3] In September 1924, his father died, forcing several of his older brothers to drop out of school to take jobs in order to support their younger siblings.

[8] Côté described McNaughton as a highly intelligent and charismatic soldier-scientist who was forever coming up with some new scientific idea and who was very popular with the men who served under him.

[2] From May 1941 onward, Côté was assigned to the staff of Major-General George Pearkes, a highly decorated First World War veteran who had been awarded the Victoria Cross in 1917, and was now commanding the 1st Division.

[10] In January 1944, Côté was of the few Canadian officers informed of the details of Operation Overlord and was told that the 3rd Division would be landing at a place code-named Juno Beach just beside the French village of Courseulles-sur-Mer in Normandy sometime in the spring of 1944.

[2] Côté recalled about the preparations for Overlord in Réminiscences et Souvenances: "For example, we had to plan our routes in advance, even where no paths existed; we had to bring road signs with us to indicate which way soldiers should go and to identify reinforcement gathering places and the supply stations for water, gasoline, diesel and ammunition, and we had to locate the premises of the first small field hospitals and finally predetermine the location of a cemetery.

"[12] By May 1944, Côté reported that his preparations for Overlord were complete and he felt confident that he and his staff were capable of supplying the 3rd Division when it landed in France with all its needs.

[2] In March 1944, one of Côté's old friends from the 'Van Doos', Captain Paul Triquet, won the Victoria Cross for his actions in the Battle of Casa Berardi in Italy in December 1943.

[15] As part of the preparations for D-Day, Côté insisted that the Catholic and Protestant chaplains attached to the 3rd Division all learn each other's prayers for the dead to ensure the prompt burial of those slain in battle.

[17] Côté stated that Keller's lack of leadership did not matter on D-Day because of the "division's brigadiers rock solid competent individuals" while the "performance of the brigades during and right after the landing was marvelous".

[17] During the Battle of Caen, which followed the D-Day landings, Lieutenant-General John Crocker, the GOC of 1st British Corps reported to General Sir Miles Dempsey, the GOC of the 2nd British Army, on 5 July 1944 that Keller was not a leader as he drank constantly on the job and spent too much time with his mistress in London instead of leading his division.

[21] In December 1944, he returned to Canada to be promoted colonel and given an array of senior jobs in the Department of National Defense in Ottawa as the vice-adjutant general of medical and dental corps.

[1] After the end of the war, Côté left the Army to pursue a diplomatic career, joining the Department of External Affairs as a second secretary.

[22] As a diplomat in the post-war era, Côté believed very strongly in the value of collective security, multilateralism, and of institutions designed to foster international co-operation such as the United Nations.

[3] Much to his disappointment, he discovered that Mackenzie King, who liked to present himself as the special friend of French-Canada, had no interest in changing the English-only work environment at the Ministry of External Affairs.

[3] In November 1945, he arrived in London as part of the Canadian delegation for the first ever general session of the newly founded United Nations.

[2] At the 1948 fall sessions of the United Nations held in Paris, the Canadian delegation was headed by the Prime Minister, William Lyon Mackenzie King, and Côté served as one of his advisers.

[2] In 1952, he also appointed legal counsel to the International Joint Commission in charge of waters shared by the United States and Canada.

[2] During this time, he oversaw the restoration of the Fortress Louisbourg in Cape Breton Island, negotiated a treaty with the United States concerning migratory birds and worked with the development of the St. Lawrence Seaway.

[25] In 1965, he was appointed by Prime Minister Lester Pearson to head the committee that planned the Centennial celebrations of 1967 to mark the 100th anniversary of Confederation.

[2] During the October crisis, Côté was in charge of a task force that reported to the prime minister Pierre Trudeau with the responsibility of analyzing intelligence about what was happening in Quebec.

[26] Côté role as a deputy solicitor-general caused much tension within his family with one of his children supporting the FLQ as "freedom fighters".

[24] Goyer appointed his mistress as his chief of staff despite her manifest lack of qualifications and awarded her various privileges such as a free pass with Air Canada, allowing to fly anywhere she wanted at the expense of the taxpayers.

On 20 April 2014, Côté returned to Caen to attend the premiere of the film Code Secret:Les Carottes Sont Cuites, a documentary directed by the Montreal journalist Alain Stanké.

[35] On 18 December 2014, a local thug and criminal named Ian Bush robbed Côté's home and tied him up with a plastic bag around his head with the intention of killing him.

[2] DNA testing subsequently showed that Bush was responsible for a brutal triple murder in June 2007 of an Ottawa judge Alban Garon, his wife Raymonde, and their neighbour, Marie-Claire Beniskos.

He belonged to this generation of men, always impeccably dressed...fond of rituals most probably acquired from his prolonged stays in Great Britain.

He embraced passionately his new role as a single dad when his dear Madeleine passed away, facing the culinary challenges of his sister-in-law, initiating family get-togethers and taking care of children, grandchildren, nephews and nieces".

[2] Durflinger, a historian at the University of Ottawa who interviewed Côté for an oral history project and who remained his friend for the last 15 years of his life recalled: "It is the humility I will remember the most.