Articles

The Meigs Pulpwood Co. Ltd. is a name that is no longer remembered in this area, although this company did participate in the local lumber industry for a short time in the early 1900s.

Just before the turn of thetwentieth century, three Fallow brothers from New Richmond Station (then called New Richmond Centre) -- George (Geordie), John and James -- formed the Fallow Lumber Company and went into the lumbering business.

In 1890, a companywas formed under the name of Cascapedia Manufacturing and Trading Company by Senator William C. Edwards. Angus MacLean joined Sen. Edwards about 1904. Some years earlier Sen. Edwards purchased 659 square miles of limits on the Grand and Little Cascapedia Rivers, to which he added another 558square miles in 1907, which he acquired from Robitaille.

The son of Ferdinand de Lesseps, the promoter of the Suez and Panama canals, Frenchman Jacques de Lesseps (1885-1927) was a pioneer of aviation. Second pilot to cross the English Channel in 1910, and the first to fly over Montreal and Toronto (in the same year), this hero was decorated for his endeavors during World War I (1914-1918).

As World War I was beginning, in October 1914; Gaspé Bay became the rallying point for an imposing Canadian war fleet on its way to Europe. The fleet included 31 ships, 31,300 men, 8,000 horses and some thirty trucks. At the end of the War, during the summer of 1919, the Cenotaph was erected in Gaspé to commemorate the 38 Gaspesians who fell on the field of honour.

This sculpture, by Québec artist Yves Trudeau, was completed in 1984 and offered to the Town of Gaspé by the Government of Québec in honor of the 450th anniversary of Jacques Cartier’s arrival in Gaspé. “Hard edge” in its expression and with “minimalist” tendencies, the Discovery Place Monument explores the historic events of 1534, reminding us of Cartier’s caravel with its forecastle, deck and sails - a ship’s prow, waves, a beach and the Indigenous settlement that once existed where the monument now stands.

The publication, Cemetery Heritage in Quebec: A Handbook, has just been released. The book, published by QAHN and written by Matthew Farfan, project leader of QAHN's Cemetery Heritage Inventory and Restoration Initiative (CHIRI), is available in softcover format.

The earliest recording of the Béchervaise name is that of Colinus of St. Laurent 1331 -- the first member of the family appearing in Jersey records.

The Mi’kmaq occupied this land centuries before the first Europeans arrived and were probably the first Indigenous people to have regular contact with Europeans.This may have occurred as early as the eleventh century with the early Viking settlements on the coast of North America.The Mi’kmaq were skilled hunter-gatherers, attuned to the shifting, seasonal resources of the area and were noted for their fishing skills and their distinctive birch bark canoes that were capable of crossing open water.

When the first settlers arrived on the Gaspésie forests covered the entire Coast and, although trees were a necessity, they were sometimes viewed as a nuisance by men trying to clear enough land for crops and animals. It was very easy to obtain all the wood they needed by going a very short distance to the dense forest that surrounded them with their axes, saws and a horse and sleigh.

One of the early settlers to whom the region, specifically the Cascapedia Bay area, is greatly indebted for its early development is William Cuthbert, a native of Scotland and descendant of that ancient Scottish family, of which theeighth century monk St. Cuthbert was a member.

The New Carlisle Postmaster’s Provisional Postal service in Canada began under the French regime in 1705 with delivery of mail by courier between Quebec City, Three-Rivers and Montreal.In 1763 it was taken over under the British Crown by Benjamin Franklin and formed part of the North American Postal System.

Fauvel Monument The Fauvel Monument was erected in honour of William LeBoutillier Fauvel (1850-1897), on the day of his burial 1897. Originally from Jersey Island, William Fauvel was without a doubt one of New Carlisle’s most illustrious citizens ever.Son of John Fauvel, he managed one of the town’s long disappeared landmarks, LeBoutillier Brothers Store.He was mayor of New Carlisle from 1889-1897. He was elected as the county’s first federal deputy in 1891, and re-elected in 1896.

Around the middle of the 19th century, the great Irish famine brought thousands of impoverished families to America. One of the immigrant ships, the Carricks of Whitehaven, went down off Cap-des-Rosiers in 1847. Of the 187 passengers on board, 87 perished at sea and 100 survivors were taken in by families in the village.

Since the Gulf of St. Lawrence was a strategic spot for enemy invasions (German submarines were known to be there starting in 1941), Gaspé became a strategic spot for the Ministry of National Defence. A naval base with 3000 men was built at Sandy Beach in order to patrol the Gulf. Strategic forts were sprinkled over the territory, and remnants of that time still exist today, such as the Fort Peninsula galleries at the entrance to Forillon National Park, the Fort Ramsay naval base at Sandy Beach, and the shoreline batteries at Cap-aux-Os and Fort- Prével.

The Jacques Cartier Monument National Historic Site is composed of six cast-iron stelae in shapes that recall the flat pebbles of the Gaspé Peninsula beaches, the mountainous profile of Forillon National Park of Canada and the standing stones of Brittany. The bas-reliefs on the stelae portray the principle scenes of the historic encounter between Europeans and Amerindians on July 24, 1534 when Jacques Cartier erected a cross on the shore of Gaspé Bay before a group of troubled Kwedech (Iroquois).

Although Jacques Cartier has planted five crosses during his travels from 1534 and 1535-36, only one, planted in Gaspé in July 1534, marks his official taking possession of the new territory on behalf of the king of France, Francis I. On August 25, 1934, during the 400th anniversary celebrations of the arrival of Cartier in Gaspé, the Historic Sites and Monuments of Canada unveiled a cross in Gaspé made of granite measuring 10 meters high and weighing 29 tons.

One day on the Gaspé in 1939 a man by the name of Esmond B. Martin caught the largest Atlantic salmon ever taken in North American waters, here on our own river the Grand Cascapedia. Although we take it for granted, this river is considered one of the ten best salmon fishing rivers in the world.