Over thirty years have passed since my Mom died. Lately, she has been in my thoughts as I ponder a sad part of her life. Estelle Anita Jodouin, the eighth child of Louis Joseph Jodouin and Louisa Seraphina Fortin, came into this world on January 22, 1909, in Sudbury, Ontario.
During Labour Day weekend of 1930, at the age of twenty-one, she married a young Finnish mining engineer, and they settled in the area. Over the next eleven years, they had five children. Aunts and cousins were always around to give a helping hand with caring for the children, and they were a tremendous support for Mom, as at the time, Dad was working shifts.
Mom and Dad on their Wedding Day
In 1945, Dad was offered a job in Asbestos, Quebec, a mining town in the rolling countryside of the Eastern Townships. It was a promotion for him. It meant he would no longer be working shifts, but, rather using his skill at designing a shaft for the development of underground mining. At that time, the company had been concentrating on open pit mining of asbestos, a fibre that does not burn and is used in firefighters’ gear, brake linings in cars and home insulation. It was a job for which Dad was well qualified.
It was a difficult move for Mom. She did not know a soul, and her family support system had vanished. She missed her parents, sisters and nieces. Deep down, I do believe she was heartbroken and had difficulty coping with the move, far from family.
In the summer of 1947, Granny, her mother, and Aunt Ted drove down to Asbestos for a visit. Mom was delighted to welcome them. Shortly after their visit, Mom was hospitalized in Montreal for an extended period. Dad visited her regularly and made arrangements for Mrs. Robinson, an elderly lady, to care for us. ( I never knew the reason for the hospitalization as I was 7 years old at the time, and I still do not know all these years later. Was the hospitalization a mental breakdown or perhaps the loss of a child?)
Uncle Leo, Aunt Dickie, Aunt Ted, Gran, Mom,
Paul, Claire,and Cousin Denise
In the summer of 1948, Mom drove my sister Ruth, brothers John and Paul, and me to Sudbury to visit family. On the way, we stopped in Pembroke and visited Mom’s spinster Aunts and continued to Sudbury. Mom had learned to drive at the age of fourteen and was undaunted when undertaking such a long drive. After seeing the scorched land and forests fires we arrived and greeted relatives with open arms and warm hugs. Mom had finally arrived home.
We spent time with Granny Jodouin, aunts, uncles and cousins which created many fond memories. Mom was happy.
On our way home, we stopped in Senneville and visited with Aunt Aline, one of Mom’s older sisters and Uncle George, an avid stamp collector, where I learned about stamp collecting. We then continued our way home.
Around this time, (1948-1949) I vividly remember Mom sitting at the typewriter in the solarium where Dad had a large desk with his CB (Citizen Band Radio). She would be typing letters to Gran and her sisters. At Christmas time she would be in the kitchen making fruitcake to send to family in Sudbury.
For a long time she hung on to her thoughts of home and the family members she had left in Sudbury, so far way.
Her life and our family’s lives were changed. In January of 1950, when at the age of forty-one, Mom gave birth to a little sister, Vicky, while at the same time, Dad received a big promotion. Life was taking on new challenges. These positive events were the beginning of a new outlook on life for Mom. Her loneliness was slowly disappearing. She now had new challenges.
Mom and Vicky
Vicky’s arrival was a blessing for all of us. At 10 years old I now had a real live doll to care for.
Mom had help when a young girl, Ghislaine, came into our lives. She developed a close bond with Vicky, and Mom’s overall health was much better. Her loneliness no longer seemed to trouble her. Her health improved and before long she was able to travel. She visited New York City and attended Broadway plays , enjoyed shopping at Berdorf-Goodman, along with company jaunts to the Carribbean .
Mom in 1963
Over the years she visited Africa, Europe, Japan and became a world traveller with Dad.
Mom’s life was filled with many ups and downs, but with Dad’s support she overcame her difficulties. Her life had taken on a new look, and her loneliness was a thing of the past. She enjoyed life to the fullest!
Mom and Dad on their 50th Wedding Anniversary in 1980
Children the world over have been bullied at school and in their neighbourhoods. I was no exception. As a child in primary school, I remember kids calling me ‘Bullfrog’ which, of course, I hated!
Many years later, I am researching and doing genealogy, trying to find out the origin of the name I hated as a child. I always knew there was a camp in Wiltshire, England called Bulford Camp. Family members have visited the area, especially to take photos of the area name, posing proudly next to the sign.
My Uncle Roy Bulford. Circa. 1960’s. Marian Bulford. Circa 1990’s
From a quiet country road to a major motorway
Less probably, the name may have come from a lost place called Bulford in Strensall (North Yorkshire), presumed to have been located at a ford of a river near Strensall. Yet another reason the name “Bulford” may have originated from is “Bull’s Ford”, a crossing point of the River Avon in Wiltshire, where bulls were driven across. (1)
Bulford is a village and Parish in Wiltshire, England. It is near Salisbury Plain, close to RAF Upavon, where I was posted whilst in the WRAF (Women’s Royal Air Force). The Bulford Army camp is separate from the village but within the parish. It seems the Army camp is named after the ford that gave the village of Bulford its name. ‘Bulut ieg ford‘ is from an Old English phrase which means ‘ragged robin island ford” Why could we not have picked Robinford instead of Bulford??(2)
Bulford is recorded in the Wiltshire Charter Rolls of 1199 as Bultiford and as Bultesforda in 1270. It is then recorded as Bulteforde in the Ecclesiastical Tax Records of 1291.(3)
The village of Bulford has a history of Roman and Saxon settlements. In the 1086 Domesday Book, there were 39 households at Bulford. However, there are not actually any Bulford family names, as seen below with a page taken from the Domesday Book. Only the religious and the titled were included!
Catalogue description Place name: Bulford, Wiltshire Folio: 68v Great Domesday Book: (4)
Reference:
E 31/2/1/2046
Description:
Place name: Bulford, Wiltshire
Reference:
E 31/2/1/2046
Description:
Place name: Bulford, Wiltshire Folio: 68v Great Domesday Book Domesday place name: Boltintone People mentioned within entire folio: Abbess of St Mary of Amesbury; Abbey of Sainte-Marie of Bec; Abbey of St Mary of Amesbury; Agenulf; Alweard; Alweard the priest; Beorhtric; Canons of Church of Lisieux; Church of Brixton Deverill; Eadgifu; Earl Harold; Hugh d’Avranches, Earl of Chester; Roger de Montgomery, Earl of Shrewsbury; Edward; Father of Agenulf; Gerald the priest of Wilton; Gilbert; Godwine; Abbey of Sainte-Marie of Grestain; Hamo; Hearding; Ketil; King Edward as lord; Nuns of Abbey of St Mary of Amesbury; Osbern the priest; Osmund, thegn; Queen Matilda; Regenbald the priest; Robert, Count of Mortain; Siward; Turold; William
Surnames in England were not used before the early Middle Ages, around the 11th to 12th centuries. Before that, people were known by a single name, usually according to their physical features, occupation, or their father (patronymic). To begin with, surnames were fluid and changed over time, or as a person changed his job. For example, John Blacksmith might become John Farrier as his trade developed. As the country’s population grew, it became necessary to distinguish between people.
Surnames in England began to be used during the early Middle Ages, around the 11th to 12th centuries. Before this, people were usually known by a single name. The earliest surnames were often derived from:
Occupations – for example, “Smith” (blacksmith) or “Baker.”
Geographical locations – such as “London” (someone from London) or “York” (someone from York). (I feel this is probably where my surname comes from.)
Patronymics – surnames based on the father’s name, like “Johnson” (son of John).
Physical features – such as “Brown” (for someone with brown hair or a darker complexion). (5)
Most of my paternal Bulford family live in and around Devon and Cornwall now; however, Ancestry.com tells me that from the 1700 Census and Voter lists, there were 127 Bulford surnames in America!
One of my paternal grandfather’s brothers, George, emigrated to work in the mines in Detroit, Michigan then ended his career working for the Ford Motor Company.
In 2016, I was in touch with his granddaughter, Barbara, my second cousin, on Ancestry. She invited me to her family tree, and we exchanged much information regarding her Bulford family. We had pleasant FaceTime and email exchanges, until her too-early passing in 2020 at the age of 66 years. I wrote about her here: https://genealogyensemble.com/2021/05/12/my-american-cousin/
The link above is to the Open Domesday Book, which also states that “Hundred of Bulford. (The next largest division from a “hundred”, and the one most recognisable today, are Shires. Devonshire, Wiltshire, Lancashire, etc). Status: No longer exists as a named location but can be identified on the ground’ There were 85 places in the ‘hundred’ of Bulford in the Domesday Book”
(Correction: I have been informed that is more likely that Reverend Henry Gordon took these photos, developed them and gave them to Miss Lindsay. The dog team photo would have been taken by Rev. Gordon during the winter and the fishermen in the boat must be south of Cartwright due to the lighthouse.)
Miss Lindsay’s baggage tag- June 1922
Just over 100 years ago, my great-aunt volunteered as a summer teacher with the Grenfell Mission in Cartwright, Labrador, under Henry Gordon. In August 1922, just days before she was due to return home to Montreal, Quebec, she disappeared. Her body was found four months later, in December 1922, with a bullet through her heart.
I already wrote and published her story in seven parts (links below) and thought I had gleaned every bit of information possible from my “dusty old boxes.” But our ancestors want their story told and my great-aunt, Marguerite Lindsay (1896-1922), had quite a blockbuster to tell. Perhaps it was she who “tweaked” my cousin to finally look into his unopened boxes of family papers and memorabilia.
You can’t possibly imagine my excitement when I received his email:
“Hi Lucy,
Apologies for taking so long to get to this. I attach scans of the small
black-and-white prints of Labrador scenes that I found in the box of
clippings and photos. I assume that this is from when Stanley (sic) visited
the area after Marguerite’s death but don’t know for sure. Only two had
writing on the back – the dog team at rest and the school house. I
scanned those too in case you recognize the writing.
Lots of love!
Doug”
Eureka!
It appears that Miss Lindsay had access to a camera while she was there! And yes indeed I recognized her handwriting! It matched the writing on the tag on her baggage that accompanied her when she travelled to Labrador in June 1922. She went there to look after the youngest students (orphaned by the Spanish Flu epidemic) along with another volunteer, Anne Stiles from Boston, while their regular teacher took their summer break. Between the two of them, they oversaw all the children’s lessons, meals and activities.
A few days before she disappeared that August, she mailed a letter to her brother Stanley in Montreal. That precious last letter shared a long and loving detailed description of her life in Cartwright. The five newly discovered photos seem to match several parts in her last letter.
1. The first photo is of Marguerite wearing a hat she fabricated to protect her from all the bugs. The cabin in the background was a family home as she shared a room with Anne Stiles in the school dormitory that summer. This photo along with the commentary in her letter helps me imagine being there myself.
Miss Lindsay wearing her bug hatoutside a family home beside the school in Muddy Bay
It is really cold here and foggy quite often, but very bracing, and I like it much better than heat; also when it is cold, there are no flies, and that means a great deal. I could compete with Sir Harry Johnson’s bugs in Africa, and match about even. The mosquitoesjust swarm: at first you think it is fog or haze, lying low over the marshes, till you try and walk through them. We bathe in citronella. About 50 of themwere getting free transportation on different portions of my anatomy, and Iremarked to one of the natives, that the mosquitoes were bad; at which helaughed, and said to wait till they hid the sun, then I would call them bad.
The children are terribly bitten, and wail all night when they are extra bad.Well, there is a species of black fly, and their team work with the mosquitois extraordinary. They don’t bother to pierce your epidermis for themselves,but follow exactly in the footsteps of the mosquitoes, and they hurt. I couldhardly turn my head for a day, the back of my neck was so bitten. I may havementioned that there are no such things as screens on our windows; but we put upsome surgical dressings, and tacked the gauze up as a slight protection. Aslittle extras there are deer flies, flying ants and sand flies.
2. The second photo represents not only the local day-to-day fishing activities but other adventures like the exciting one she described in her letter.
Local fishermen in boat with Iceberg, south of Cartwright(there were no lighthouses near Cartwright)
It would be a great help if we had ice; but none comes up the bay. Someof the men tried to capture a young iceberg, and tow it home from the outsidecoast—behind the motor boat, but the friction of the rope wore through theice, so it never arrived. Last Wednesday, Mr. Gordon told us we had beenworking so hard, we had better take a day off, and go up the bay with one ofthe fishermen, on an expedition for wood. We started off in a motor boat,towing an empty scow: just Anne and I, four boys of about 12, and the fisherman.
It was a perfect warm sunny afternoon, and Anne and I were almost asleep onthe sloping bow of the boat, when we came around the point into a heavy windand all but rolled off. It blew up very strongly, and Anne and I and the boysgot into the very bottom of the boat, under our rugs for warmth. I was wearingeverything I possessed; about what I wear for skiing. The fisherman was havinga very hard time with the scow. It looked once or twice as though water wouldcome down on our heads, when our boat got between the waves and it rested on the crest.
It took us over three hours to reach our destination – the point atWhite Bear river. There we went up to the warm cottage of some very kindfisher-folk, just as it started to pour, and thunder and lightning. We hadexpected to sleep on the floor, so had brought rugs; but Anne and I were givena bunk in a room about the size of a dugout, which was really comfortable afterwe had skillfully removed a pane of glass with a knife, the window being purelyfor ornament. They provided us with a feather bed in the bunk and warm dry rugsand fed us with smoked salmon and caribou meat. It was loads of fun.
3. The third photo shows the eager faces of a few of her students by the water’s edge hoping for a swim with Miss Lindsay that afternoon.
Some of Miss Lindsay’s summer pupils waiting for a swim
We are teaching the children to swim; the water is notso cold as you might think. There are some perfect walks around; nowhere arethe trees too thick to push through; so though we have got lost once or twice,it is never for long. It is rather fun climbing the mountains; your feet getdrenched, in the marsh, but we are used to that now. You would be amused to seeme giving the children drill, and getting them to breathe through their noses.
We are going across the bay to hold nutrition classes, and persuade them toorder whole wheat flour, instead of white.
4. The fourth photo is of a dog and sled team. According to her note on the back, it belonged to the Doctor from St. Anthony (about 570km away). She noted that two Labrador Huskies lead the team and made special mention of their curled tails and pointed ears.
Local dog and sled team delivering wood in the winter time to the public school in Muddy Bay with a handwritten note on the back
5. The fifth and final photo is of the newly constructed Labrador Public School in Muddy Bay, near Cartwright, which later burned down. The school in Cartwright today was named after her superior: The Henry Gordon Academy. To this day, the children are told Miss Lindsay’s story. Her handwritten note on the reverse side of this photo makes it that much more special for me.
Labrador Public School in Muddy Bay with handwritten note on the back.
I am so delighted about the recent discovery of these photos and very grateful to my cousin for finding these gems! I remain eagerly optimistic for more of Miss Lindsay’s undiscovered treasures to appear someday!
One spring day in 1819, a young man named Benjamin Workman stood on the dock at Belfast, Ireland, trying to decide where he should immigrate to in North America. He had relatives in the United States, but before he booked his passage, he wanted to check on the safety of the vessels that were scheduled to leave soon.
He noted that the captain of the New Orleans-bound ship appeared to be drunk, the mate of the ship going to New York swore profusely, and the crew of vessel going to Philadelphia ignored his questions, but the captain of the Sally, bound for Quebec, impressed him favourably, so that’s the ship he chose. He later noted that this had been a lucky choice since yellow fever was widespread in American port cities that year.1
Benjamin left Ireland on April 27 and arrived in Montreal a few weeks later. He was 25 years old and had 25 guineas (a coin worth one pound, one shilling) in his pocket.
This photo of Dr. Ben Workman appears in Christine Johnston’s book The Father of Canadian Psychiatry, Joseph Workman.
His choice of Canada turned out to be a good decision: within 10 years, all of his eight younger siblings and both of their parents had followed him. The Workmans were all hard-working, ambitious and smart, and they took advantage of the opportunities available to them in their new homeland. Four of Ben’s brothers (Alexander, Joseph, William and Thomas) became prominent in business, medicine and politics. His only sister, Ann (1809-1882), married Irish-born Montreal hardware merchant Henry Mulholland and was my great-great-grandmother.
Benjamin’s parents were Joseph Workman (1759-1848) and Catherine Gowdey (1769-1872). Ben was born on Nov. 4, 17942 in the village of Ballymacash, County Antrim, near Lisburn, where the family lived in a small house near the top of a hill.
Joesph was a teacher in Ballymacash, but he left teaching for a job as a manager for a local landowner, and as a deputy clerk of the peace for the area. Without its only teacher, the local school had to close, so young Ben started studying on his own, reading the Bible and geography books while his father helped him with arithmetic. When Ben was 11, Joseph apprenticed him to a linen weaver, but it soon became clear that Ben had no talent in that field. What he really wanted to do was study. Eventually, Ben went back to school, where he excelled in grammar and the classics. After he graduated, he found a teaching job in Belfast, then another position near Lisburn.
Ben’s decision to leave Ireland was influenced by an event that took place in 1817. As he was eating his evening meal at his parents’ home, a dozen beggars came in the gate and asked for food and money. Perhaps realizing how widespread poverty was in Ireland, he began to think about going to North America.3
Montreal suited Ben well: other Irish and Scottish immigrants arrived there around the same time, and there were work opportunities for all. He immediately found a teaching job, but after that school’s owner disappeared with its funds, several parents who had noticed what a good teacher Ben was started a new school, with Ben as headmaster.
The Union School, as it was called, was unique. For one thing, girls were admitted, although they were taught separately by a female teacher. It was also successful. By the spring of 1820, it had 120 pupils, and it remained the largest English school in Canada for 20 years.4 Several of its graduates went on to have distinguished careers in business and politics. In 1824, Ben became the sole owner of the school, but he eventually turned over the responsibility of running it to his brother Alexander, who had come to Montreal in 1820.
In 1829, Benjamin switched careers and became a newspaper editor, partnering with a friend to purchase a weekly Montreal newspaper, the Canadian Courant. It had been founded in 1807 as the Canadian Courant and Montreal Advertiser. Ben published the newspaper until 1834, using it to promote his liberal religious views, social welfare issues, and the temperance movement. When the paper ceased publication, Ben blamed distillers, saying that their advertising had dried up because of his support for temperance.
Meanwhile, Ben experienced several tragedies in his personal life, as he was married twice and became a widower twice. He married Margaret Manson, a teacher at the Union School, in 1823. The couple had no children and Margaret died seven years later. He married Mary Ann Mills on October 14, 1838, in Franklin, Michigan, and the couple had three children: Mary Matilda, born in July 1840; a son, Joseph, who was born in November 1841 and died at age 10 months; and Annie, born in July 1843. Mary Ann died two months after Annie’s birth, and Ben’s mother, Catherine, looked after his two daughters.
Soon after that, Ben took up his third career — as a druggist. For several years in the 1840s, Lovell’s city directory of Montreal listed “B. Workman & Co., chemists and druggists”, located at 172 St. Paul Street, corner Customs House Square.5 Meanwhile, he studied medicine at McGill University, graduating in 1853, at age 59. He was henceforth known as Benjamin Workman M.D., which helps differentiate him from several other Benjamins in the family.
During these years as a pharmacist and doctor, Ben demonstrated compassion and generosity, often providing care to people who were too poor to pay. Then, in 1856, he reinvented himself again and moved to Toronto, where he assisted his brother Joseph run the Provincial Lunatic Asylum, the largest and most progressive psychiatric hospital in Canada at the time.
Benjamin is buried in Montreal’s Mount Royal Cemetery, near the Workman family plot. JH photo.
Benjamin Workman is probably best remembered as the founder of the Unitarian Congregation in Montreal. In Ireland, the Workman family had attended the Non-Subscribing Presbyterian Church of Ireland in Dunmurry. Its members strongly believed in freedom of thought in religion.6
When Ben first arrived in Montreal, there were not enough Unitarians to organize a congregation, so he attended the St. Gabriel Street Presbyterian Church. When the city’s Unitarian congregation was permanently established in 1842, he played a key role.7
In 1855, Ben got into a disagreement with the congregation’s minister, Rev. John Cordner, a man he himself had recruited for the job. Benjamin argued that Cordner had excessive authority, and when the rest of the congregation sided with their minister, Ben withdrew from the church. Soon after, he moved to Toronto, joining the Unitarian congregation his brother Joseph had helped to found there. He got along well with the Toronto congregation’s members and their minister, and he ran the Sunday School there for many years.
Ben lived with his daughter Anne in Uxbridge Ontario at the end of his life, dying there on Sept. 26, 1878, several weeks short of his 84th birthday. He was buried a few days later next to the large Workman family plot at Montreal’s Mount Royal Cemetery.
The children of Joseph and Catherine Workman were: Benjamin (1794-1878), Alexander (1798-1891), John (1803-1829), Joseph (1805-1894), William (1807-1878). Ann (1809-1882), Samuel (1811-1869), Thomas (1813-1889), Matthew Francis (1815-1839).
Benjamin kept a journal in which he recorded his memories of growing up in Ballymacash, and an account of the Workman family’s 200-year history in Ireland.A large online database called A Family Orchard: Leaves from the Workman Tree, https://freepages.rootsweb.com/~database/misc/WORKMAN.htm, includes a family history going back to the 1600s, that was part of Ben’s journal. The late Calgary researcher Frederick Hunter prepared this site and database.
Catherine Gowdey’s name has been spelled in various ways, including Gowdie and Gowdy.
Thank you to Christine Johnston, former archivist and historian of the First Unitarian Congregation of Toronto, and author of a biography of Ben’s brother Joseph.
Sources:
1. Christine I. M. Johnston, The Father of Canadian Psychiatry: Joseph Workman, Victoria: The Ogden Press, 2000, p. 16.
6. Christine Johnston, The Father of Canadian Psychiatry: Joseph Workman, p. 15.
7. Christine Johnston. “The Irish Connection: Benjamin and Joseph and Their Brothers and Their Coats of Many Colours,” CUUHS Meeting, May 1982, Paper #4, p. 2.
As far as I can tell, Ismael Edgard Bruneau (1887 – 1967), my great uncle, was the first doctor in our family and maybe still the only doctor. His father wanted him to follow in his footsteps and become a minister, so when Edgar entered McGill in 1907, he registered for an Arts degree. During his university years, he decided he would rather be a doctor. He finished his Arts degree in 1910 while concurrently studying medicine and received that degree in 1912.
Edgar, as he became known, was the first of ten children of Ismael Bruneau and Ida Girod, my great-grandparents. He was born in Green Bay, Wisconsin, where his father served as a French Presbyterian minister. The family moved to Holyoke, Massachusetts, Quebec City and Montreal, where he did most of his schooling.
Ismael & Ida Bruneau with children Edgar top left, Hermonie, Helevetia, Sydney and Beatrice
He interned in Montreal and Ottawa and then practiced for a short time in Swift Current, Saskatchewan.
Dr Edgar Bruneau demonstrating techniques
When WWI began, he joined up with friends from McGill in the McGill Machine Gunners unit and was sent overseas in 1915. His father was unhappy with his decision to be a regular soldier and thought he should at least use his medical degree. Soon after arriving in England, he transferred to the Royal Army Medical Corp as a first lieutenant. This certainly didn’t keep him safe, as he served in France and Italy, being wounded twice and also severely gassed. Captain Bruneau was sent home to Canada in mid-1918. While in England, he visited with his Uncle Ernest Girod and became engaged to his cousin Marie but that relationship was over before he sailed home.
Edgar opened an office in Montreal as a general practitioner where he stayed his whole career. He lived on Park Avenue and had an office in his house with reception rooms on the ground floor and living space on the upper floor.
He also volunteered at the Montreal Dispensary through the 1920s. This clinic, established in 1850, gave health care to the poor. It was in downtown Montreal on St. Antoine Street, run by volunteer doctors and supported solely by donations. In the late 1920s, the Dispensary had financial difficulties and nearly closed but survived when it received a bequest of $10,000.
In the late thirties, Edgar suffered from a tubular disease in which the kidneys were damaged by lack of oxygen and blood flow, and so, for three years, he had to give up his practice. He was a much-loved doctor, as his patients visited him whether or not they needed care.
Edgar married Marie Eveline Lemoine in 1923. Before their marriage, they were in a car accident. He was driving on a street with streetcars when the traffic policeman gave him the signal to proceed. Unfortunately, the way was not clear and the car was hit by a streetcar. Eveline was thrown against the windshield, badly cut and she lost vision in one eye. Edgar felt responsible for her, so they married. Still, the marriage lasted 31 years until her death in 1954. Edgar was very social and attended all family gatherings but Eveline never did..
Six of the Bruneau children; Back row, Herbert & Gerald. Front row, Sydney, Edmee, Helvetia & Edgar ~1960.
One night, in the late 1950s, Edgar fell, going downstairs to his basement to fix the furnace. He broke his leg and wasn’t discovered until his housekeeper arrived in the morning. His brother Herbert wrote that when he was found, his leg was black and although the doctors saved it at that time, it resulted in gangrene. Edgar, like most of his siblings, had developed type II diabetes, which resulted in poor circulation in his legs. He first had his toes removed, then later, after many operations, most of his leg was amputated.
Edgar spent his final years at the St Anne’s Veteran’s Hospital in St Anne de Bellevue, Quebec. My sister said she never wanted to visit him as one of us told her he hung his leg in a stocking on his door at Christmas. Edgar is buried in Montreal’s Mount Royal Cemetery alongside his wife
Notes:
Recollections by Victor Herbert Bruneau , May 19, 1976.
Edgar was a keen fisherman.
He joined the Masonic Order and became a Shriner.
He was very musical; played the organ for his father’s services from the age of ten and he could play any tune he heard on the piano. He was popular with his comrades during the war and a good host afterwards.
I have no pictures of Evelyn. Edgar went to all the family functions and was very social but never Evelyn. She did play bridge and was mentioned in the newspaper as an attende at Karnac bridges put on by the Shriners.
Every country has a foundation myth and so, too, have some families.
My mother’s family foundation myth was that her mother, Maria Gagnon Roy, was the daughter of a ‘master butcher’ and that she brought an enormous dowry of 40,000 dollars to her 1901 marriage to Jules Crepeau, a hardworking and ambitious 27 year old clerk at Montreal City Hall.
“Jules started out sweeping the floors at City Hall at eight years old,” my mom often said with a tear in her eye but according to his file there his first official post was in 1888 at 15 years old as messenger boy in the Health Department.*
My mother put so much store in this family myth that she even attributed her 5 foot 8 and a half inch height (tall for a French Canadian) to the fact she came from butchers. All that good steak they ate!
Left to right, Aunt Flo, my mom Marthe, Maria and Jules 1927ish.
The Father-in-Law: Maria’s Dad
My great-grandfather, Louis Roy, (circa 1843 to 1900) was the son of Pierre Isaac Roy and Natalie Jobin of Montreal and he worked as a butcher from 1860 to 1900. He came from a long line of butchers. In 1865 Louis Roy married Melina Gagnon, whose mother, Eleanore Ethier dit Lamalice,1 came from butchers as well.
At first Louis worked alone at St. Laurent Market and then from 1881 to 1896 he partnered with a J. Lamalice, likely his cousin. Roy et Lamalice had two stalls, 16 and 17, at that market in the south central part of the city near what is now Chinatown. Their partnership was dissolved in 1896 when Louis’s son, also Louis, entered the profession.
Louis Gagnon was a mason, all other men on Maria’s side were butchers.
L. Roy and J. Lamalice paid a good sum of money, perhaps 200 dollars a year a piece,2 to have these two stalls at St. Laurent Market.
According to a University of Laval thesis,4 butchers in Montreal were politically influential. Public markets were designed around their needs, in large part because of the slew of health regulations around the slaughter and sale of meat. Retail butchers also profited greatly at these public markets, more so than their private counterparts, sometimes only having to work 2 or 3 days a week to pay the bills.
Louis Roy and his ‘small’ French Canadian family, wife Melina, son Louis and daughters Eugenie and Maria, lived at various addresses early on, then moved to 357 Amherst around 1880 and then in 1890 to 515 Amherst, a brand new ‘small cottage.’
Price of meat Bonsecours Market, 1893
L. Roy et J Lamalice advertised regularly in all the Montreal papers, usually a little blurb like this.
Roy and Lamalice are very capable with very nice mutton, veal etc. Other ads focused on how beautifully the stall was decorated. (Clearly ladies did the shopping.)
They sometimes put in bigger ads
Choice beef, milk fed veal and mutton for Easter.
And they gave to charity, as well, Notre Dame Hospital and the Public Welfare are two examples I discovered.
It may be significant that in 1891 Roy et Lamalice brought the City of Montreal to court. They complained that the City wasn’t doing enough to keep private butchers the mandated 500 yards away from the public markets.
They pay a license fee for a stall of 200 dollars, say Roy and Lamalice, as reported in Le Minerve.
I have to wonder if this is where Louis Roy, master butcher, first met – or maybe locked horns with – the City Hall up-and-comer Jules Crepeau, messenger boy in the Health Department – but a boy gifted with a superb memory for regulations and by-laws.3
In 1896, Jules Crepeau, Second Assistant City Clerk, was assigned the post of Secretary of Public Markets, a suitable promotion considering his Health Department roots.
In 1900, a year before his marriage to Maria Roy, he would be involved in his first scandal at City Hall, one that involved butchers. Men in that trade claimed that aldermen were illegally charging them 50 dollars to have their stalls moved at the prestigious Bonsecours Market. Jules testified in Court and denied knowing anything about it.
In 1900/1901, the newly widowed Melina Roy rented out her Amherst house (yes, to a butcher) and moved to Notre Dame street to live with her married daughter, Eugenie, her husband Jacques (James) Deslauriers (son of a butcher who was deceased). She brought her young adult children Maria and Louis along. The Census man came around while she was there.
The 1901 census has my grandmother Maria and her brother Louis erroneously listed under Deslauriers. Laura Lacombe is an orphaned cousin. She would live with Maria and Jules until her death in 1921, just a few months before my Mom’s birth.
The Marriage of Jules and Maria
After my grandparents Maria and Jules got married on July 1, 1901, widow Melina and her grown up son Louis moved back into 515 Amherst with the newlyweds.
In late 1901, Jules applied for a permit to build a three story brick building worth 3,000 dollars at 513 Amherst next door and the next year he would rent it out to three different families.
Maria would very soon give birth to my Uncle Louis. (Louis was baptized exactly nine months after the wedding.) My Aunt Alice would arrive a year after that and in 1905 the Crepeau family would move to St. Hubert Street near Marie-Anne.
Melina Roy and her son Louis, Melina’s orphaned niece Laura, and possibly the Deslauriers would stay at 515 Amherst for a year until Melina’s death in 1906 upon which time Jules would sell the ‘small cottage.’
The Dowry
A notarial record reveal there was, indeed, a 1901 marriage contract for Jules and Maria from June 27, a few days before the marriage, but of course there are no details so no proof of a 40,000 dollar dowry.
It does look like Jules came into some money early in his marriage. He builds that brick triplex and then moves in 1905 to what is still a very tony area with tall elegant stone townhouses.
Before his marriage, Jules was making around 700 dollars a year at City Hall, a middling/good salary for a family man although at one point he asked for 248 dollars in overtime because “over a forty day period I worked 348 hours until four in the morning and on Sundays.”*
Still, a 40,000 dollar diary for Maria’s marriage seems highly unlikely. (That’s 1,500,000 in today’s money.)
I am doubly skeptical about the big dowry because I did not find any contract listing for the 1897 marriage of Maria’s older sister, Eugenie, to Jacques (James) Deslauriers, merchant. This suggests Eugenie received no formal dowry.
Why the second daughter and not the first?
Also, If Louis Roy, successful master butcher, left behind a large estate why did Melina Roy rent out her modest Amherst home after he died and move in with her daughter Eugenie and the husband. To help with the grandchildren?
A modest street in 1900, Amherst today is called Attikan. The only remnant of an early era is this little ‘French Canadian” cottage on the corner where everyone lived in 1901.
Lovell’s Directory to the Rescue.
When I first looked for Jules and Maria on the 1901 automated census I found neither one. Maria was erroneously listed under Deslauriers and Jules wasn’t there.
So, it took me years, but eventually I consulted Lovell’s to discover that prior to his marriage Jules was living on Mentana Street in the Le Plateau Mont Royale with his widowed mother, Vitaline Forget Despaties Crepeau, and his three brothers, the older Isadore and the younger Roderick and Paul.
Isadore in that era is already working in insurance – as he would for the rest of his life. In 1898 Roderick is listed as a plumber, then a year later as a butcher. His brother Paul makes the Lovell’s listing in 1899 and is listed as a butcher working at “R. Crepeau and Freres.”
It’s all very suspicious because the highly regulated butcher trade wasn’t something you could jump in and out of. I suspect older brother Jules, son of a mere house painter, pulled some strings to get his younger brothers a short cut into that lucrative trade. (Neither man would remain a butcher for long.) If my grandmother’s family tree proves anything, it’s that the butchers of Montreal liked to keep it in the family!
So, I still have no concrete proof but it would not surprise me if my grandmother Maria’s dowry, whatever the true amount, was provided by a group of butchers (perhaps all members of her extended family) in return for Jules’ support at Montreal City Hall.
Prior to his marriage to my grandmother, Maria Roy, as I said, Jules had had plenty of chance to interact with these ‘politically influential’ tradesmen.
Anyway, that was simply business as usual in those days.
Eleanore Ethier dit Lamalice was also a distant relation of Jules Crepeau through the Ethier line of Lachenai Seigneury. See my Why My Grandfather had a lot of Gaul on this site.
This is the sum that Louis Roy cites in his 1896 complaint as reported in the French papers. It’s called a license of 200 dollars to have a stall at St Laurent Market. In the 1920’s the sum is just 50 dollars a stall, I discovered in another online item but by then the butchers are paying hefty income taxes, so they mention how high this income tax is in their complaints.
Le Devoir says Jules’ mind was like a bank vault holding within all the city by-laws. This was in his 1938 obituary.
YVES BERGERON:LES ANCIENNES HALLES ET PLACES DE MARCHÉ AU QUÉBEC :ÉTUDE D’ETHNOLOGIE APPLIQUÉE. University of Laval Thesis Canadian Thesis portal
5. Newsy items courtesy of BANQ newspaper archive.
The Province of Quebec is breathtakingly beautiful. I have been all over the province and I am constantly amazed.
One of my favourite trips was when, in 1982, after we had moved into our first house, we decided to leave all the angst of being a first-time home owner at a young age and go on a road trip. We decided to visit the Gaspé Peninsula. We simply loved our trip. The countryside was stunning and the Gaspésians showed us a warm welcome.
Courtesy Tripadvisor
Did your ancestors settle or live on the Gaspé Peninsula? The first European to arrive in the Gaspé was Jacques Cartier when he landed in Gaspé Bay in 1534 to plant a cross and claim the land for the King of France. The Iroquois occupied the area. It is believed that the name Gaspé derives from a Micmac word meaning “land’s end.” 1
When the Gaspé belonged to New France, there were only about 400 fishermen living there. Harvests were plentiful and the coastal high winds were excellent for drying cod. However, James Wolf and his forces attacked the residents in 1758, destroying their homes and possessions and sending them back to France.2
Still, some Gaspesians managed to hide from the authorities and remained on the peninsula until 1763 when it became a British territory. They were joined by Acadians who fled from the British who had implemented a compulsory deportation order for all Acadians in Nova Scotia. In 1784, a significant number of Loyalists, fleeing the American Revolution, settled on the Gaspé Peninsula.3
If your ancestors came from the Gaspé, here are some sites that can help you with your research:
The Quebec Genealogy eSociety has extensive links and resources (requires a membership). Some of the resources include births, marriages, deaths and some census records, and newspapers: https://genquebec.com/en
GoGaspé is a site devoted to the Gaspé Peninsula with a tab that directs you to history and genealogy links and resources. Local Gaspesian genealogists and historians have contributed to this site: https://gogaspe.com/
On August 23rd, 1886 in St. John’s, Antigua, British West Indies Mary France, the wife of William Percival gave birth to a son, William France Anthony Percival, my Uncle Bill.
Little is known about his early years in Antigua. At the age of eighteen in 1904 he immigrated to Canada. Records indicate that on the 13th of June 1909 at the age of 23 he converted to Catholicism and was baptised at the Holy Rosary Parish in Toronto.
Baptismal Record
In 1914 Bill settled in Sudbury, Ontario and began working as a dispatcher and later became the Assistant Chief Clerk for Canadian Pacific Railway. A job he held for 33 years.
Bill began courting Alice Jodouin, the daughter of Louis and Louisa Jodouin. Before long the customary banns announcing the upcoming marriage of the young couple were published. Banns are a notice read out on three successive Sundays in a parish church, announcing an intended marriage and giving the opportunity for objections.
The banns
Uncle Bill and Aunt Alice were married on the 3rd of July 1917 in Saint Anne Church, the French Parish in Sudbury.
The church record of the marriage
The officiating Priest
The 1921 Canadian Census shows Uncle, Aunt Alice and their first daughter, Mary.was born in 1919.Later in 1921, Madge was born, followed by Frederica (Freddie) in 1923, then Natalie in 1925 and Willena (Billye) in 1927.
The 1921 Canadain Census
After raising 5 daughters they were hoping for a son. In 1934 Aunt Alice was expecting another child. Would it be a boy? The family would be complete with the son they had always wanted and a little brother for all the girls
Alas! It was not meant to be. John Allan was stillborn. This tragedy, the loss of a son caused many heartaches for the family.
The Percival Sisters Back row: Freddie and Billye Front Row: Natalie, Madge and Mary
I never knew Uncle Bill, however, he enjoyed quiet moments sailing on Lake Ramsey, according to my older brother Karl, who had the good fortune of knowing him. At the time I was too young and our family moved from Sudbury to the rolling hills of the Eastern Townships in Quebec. I do not remember Uncle Bill.
Shortly after retiring Uncle Bill passed away on December 8th, 1948 at the age of 62.
Aunt Alice surrounded by her many grandchildren.
Aunt Alice lived another 25 years after Uncle Bill’s passing and continued as the church organist. She died in 1973 and is resting beside him in the LaSalle Catholic Cemetery in Sudbury, Ontario
Over the years I have visited many relatives in Sudbury and have fond memories.
This is part two of my Great-Grand Uncle Arthur Symons’s experiences in WWI. Arthur emigrated to Canada in 1901, arriving in Halifax, Nova Scotia, on the SS Soman. (1)
When WWI broke out, Uncle Arthur enlisted in the 56th Battalion Canadian Over-Seas Expeditionary Force in 1915 in Calgary. He was then shipped back home to the UK to train. While there, he visited his sister Lilian and her daughter Edith, my Grandmother.
Arthur Symons with Edith Bevan his niece, my Granny.
Granny was 15 years old.
At Salisbury, Wiltshire, England, the Canadians trained for four months, most of it in terrible mud, as England experienced one of its wettest winters in decades. While most troops stood up well to the awful conditions, Canadian equipment did not. Much of it was soon discarded in favour of British types. The Canadians learned basic soldiering in England after a hasty mobilization and a difficult, uncomfortable winter. Their real training would come at the front.
After training, Arthur was sent to France and later Belgium. At the Third Battle of Ypres, better known as Passchendaele, the troops fought there from July to November 1917. Both sides suffered appalling conditions and heavy casualties. “The name Passchendaele has become synonymous with mud, blood and futility”. Arthur was wounded in 1917 at Passchendaele. (2)
The Government of Canada Library and Archives search had Arthur’s Attestation Papers and detailed medical treatments at “No. 4 General Hospital Dannes Camiers” (2) among many other hospital visits.
Searching for Dannes Camiers Hospital, led me to the Royal College of Surgeons of England and the following information. (2)
Shortly after the war broke out, McGill University organised the ‘No. 3 Canadian General Hospital’ to serve in France. The hospital was established at Dannes Camiers in the Pas-de-Calais area on 19th June 1915 under canvas. A staff of 35 Officers, 73 Nursing Sisters and 190 rank and file. Life under canvas that cold wet November was tough, with deep mud, storms, frost and collapsing tents. The conditions so undermined the health of one Lieutenant Colonel Yates that he was invalided to England where he died the following year.
Arthur’s admission to the Dannes Camiers Hospital was on the 29th of October 1917. The first line of his medical records states he is ‘Dangerously ill’ with GSW (gunshot wounds) R. Leg fracture and left foot.
By the 16th of November, Arthur is now ‘seriously ill’ There follows 99 pages – starting with his Attestation Paper – then very detailed treatments and x-rays from various hospitals in France, England and Alberta, Canada. It makes for fascinating reading.
Three pages from Arthur’s 99 pages of hospital notes and X-rays.
On the 30 of November 1917, Arthur was transferred to the 1st West General Hospital Fazakerly, Liverpool England. After 5 months of treatment, Arthur was again moved to the Canadian Special Hospital Buxton, Derbyshire, England.
NOTE: Amongst the patients at Buxton, was Frederick G Banting, who would return to Canada after the war to continue research into diabetes and the use of insulin in its treatment, for which he was awarded the Nobel prize.(3)
His last transfer was on July 11, 1918, to the 5th Canadian General Kirkdale, Liverpool, England.
Eventually, on the 20th of September, 1918, Arthur was Invalided to Canada. He was sent to the Ogden military convalescent hospital in Calgary, Alberta. A short visit to the Calgary General Hospital, then back to Ogden.
Finally, after nearly 2 years at 5 different hospitals, Arthur was sent to the Banff Rest Camp, and discharged on August 28, 1919, medically unfit for further service. He was 35 years old.
Arthur went on to marry and have two children and was employed in the Civil Service
This rather poignant note dashed across his discharge papers state ‘Deceased 24/7/40’
Excerpt from The Calgary Herald, July 26, 1940, page 2 Arthur Symons, 54, of 2409 Centre Street South, died in hospital here Wednesday afternoon. Born in Leicester, England, he came to Calgary 32 years ago and was employed in the civil service for 17 years. He is survived by his wife, Catherine, one son, Arthur, and one daughter, Dorothy.Alberta Death Reg. #1940-08-201498
Great-Grand Uncle Arthur Symons is buried in Burnsland Cemetary, Calgary Alberta, Canada. (Photo credit Ron Reine)
RIP Uncle Arthur.
Part 1 of Great-Grand-Uncle Arthur’s experiences in WW1:
My great-grandparents, Harriet Eva Gould and William Gardiner (WG) Anglin shared 48 years of marriage together, and their lives exemplify the saying “Behind every great man is a great woman.” In many cases, when we look into our family history, finding information about our female ancestors can be tough. After they marry, their maiden names are often forgotten, their careers aren’t recorded, and their lives tend to be defined by their roles as wives, mothers and community participants. Such was the case for Harriet too, as is clear from her obituary.
Mrs. Harriet Anglin – there passed away at her home on 52 Earl Street, on Saturday evening, Mrs. Anglin wife of Dr. W.G. Anglin, deceased, who was before her marriage Harriet Eva Gould, had lived in Kingston since her girlhood days. For the past year and a half, she had been ill. Mrs. Anglin who was of retiring nature, was most widely known through her membership in Sydenham Street United Church.
Surviving her are two sons, Douglas Anglin of Anglin-Norcross Construction Company, Montreal, and Wendling Anglin of the Johnston and Ward firm, Montreal; also three daughters Mrs. McLaren Ewert of Moosejaw, Sask.; Mrs. R. M. Horsey of Montreal and Miss Mary Anglin, secretary to the Principal of Queen’s University; also one sister, Mrs. John Hunter of Goderich and three brothers, George, Harry and William Gould. Ten grandchildren also survive.
Prior to meeting each other, Harriet and WG gained experiences that would serve them well when they married.
Harriet Joins Kingston Society
For the first decade of her life, Harriet grew up as the eldest child of William Gould and Mary Wartman in Ancaster, Ontario. When she was about 11 years old, according to the 1871 census, her parents sent her to Kingston, Ontario, to live with her mother’s sister Susanna, who was married to a wealthy businessman named James Richardson. It’s not clear why they made this decision, but it’s believed that the Gould family couldn’t support all their children. At the same time, Aunt Susanna, who had only sons, longed for a daughter.
The arrangement worked well for everyone: Harriet was raised in a comfortable home and Aunt Susanna got the daughter she always wanted. While living with her aunt, Harriet received a good education and was introduced to Kingston society. She became known for her connections to the prominent Richardson family and her Loyalist heritage through her mother’s side. This social standing would play a part in her future, especially when she married.
William Gardiner (WG) Becomes a Surgeon
Before their marriage in 1886, WG went to Edinburgh, Scotland, where he learned new surgical techniques from Dr. James Lister, a pioneer in antiseptic surgery. After his return and marriage to Harriet, WG was invited to teach at Queen’s Women’s Medical College. Surgeon and Mentalist
Career and Family Life
WG’s skill and dedication quickly earned him a spot on the prestigious faculty at Queen’s University. By 1887, he was appointed as a Professor of Pathology and head of the Clinical Surgery department. He shared the groundbreaking techniques he had learned in Edinburgh with his students, shaping the future of surgery in Canada.
He and Harriet had their first daughter, Mary (1888-1979), that same year. In the following years came Susan (1889–1982), Douglas (1890–1955), Wendling (1892–1955) The Stock Broker, and Ruth (1895–1976). It’s believed that Mary and Susan were named after Harriet’s Aunt Susanna.
1923 – Douglas, WG, Wendling, Susan, Ruth, Harriet, Mary
Throughout these years, W.G. ran a private medical practice from their home on Earl Street, which allowed him to spend time with the family. His name was even etched in stained glass in the window of their office building.
52 Earl Street with “Dr. Anglin” etched in top glass
Going to War
In 1915, WG left his teaching job and volunteered to go to Cairo, Egypt, with the Queen’s Stationary Hospital at 59 years old, in response to a plea from Lieutenant Colonel H.R. Duff, who needed someone with “experience and wisdom.” He caught Malta Fever and had to return to Canada a year later. Although he recovered a bit, the illness affected his health for the rest of his life. Duff, however, died of pneumonia in Cairo.
1915 – Cairo, Egypt, WG on the left camel
Community Leaders
After the war, WG continued working in medicine on a limited basis and served as an examiner for the Canadian Pension Board. He also worked at Kingston Penitentiary, where he introduced medical and administrative improvements and treated the inmates with dignity until he retired in 1928.
Harriet remained dedicated to her children, their families and her church. As a proud grandmother, she tucked a newspaper clipping of a photo of my father and his brother into a random book where it slipped out 90 years later into the hands of a distant cousin who then made contact with me!
In their later years, Harriet and WG were well-respected members of their Kingston community until he died in 1934. She died only two years later and they are now buried together in the Anglin plot at Cataraqui Cemetery.
Genealogy Ensemble 