XXXIX. TRANSPORTATION
I
THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE PORT OF MONTREAL--HERIOT’S DESCRIPTION IN 1815--T.S. BROWN IN 1818--THE ISLAND WHARF--THE CREEK--THE PRIMITIVE WHARVES--THE “POINTS”--THE RIVER FRONT--THE SPRING FLEET--FIREWOOD RAFTS--TOW BOATS--THE EVERETTA--AN ACCOUNT OF 1819--BOUCHETTE’S PLAN OF 1824--THE FIRST HARBOUR COMMISSIONERS, “THE TRINITY BOARD”--FIRST REPORT--LATEST REPORT--EARLY ENGINEERS--REVIEW OF HARBOUR IN 1872--A TRANSFORMATION FROM 1818--GRAIN ELEVATORS--NUMBER OF VESSELS--MARKET AND WOOD BOATS--THE BONSECOURS MARKET--1875 PLAN FOR IMPROVEMENT NOW CARRIED OUT--FLOATING DOCK--DESCRIPTION OF PRESENT HARBOUR--ITS FACILITIES FOR FURTHER DEVELOPMENT--THE DESIRE TO LENGTHEN THE SHIPPING SEASON.
II
HARBOUR COMMISSIONERS--THE HARBOUR COMMISSIONERS FROM 1830 TO THE PRESENT TIME.
III
CUSTOMS--SHIPPING FEDERATION--THE PILOTAGE AUTHORITY--IMPORTS AND EXPORTS.
I
THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE PORT OF MONTREAL
Heriot in his travels, thus describes the harbour front about the year 1815: “A natural wharf, very near to the town is formed by the depth of the stream and the sudden declivity of the bank. At the breaking up of the river, the buildings of the town, which are situated nearest the bank, are sometimes subject to damage by the accumulating of ice, impelled by the rapidity of the current.”
A description of three years later is to be found in a rare pamphlet entitled,
THE HARBOUR OF MONTREAL IN 1818 AND IN 1872
By T.S. Brown
I came to Montreal on the 28th day of May, 1818, in a Bateau from La Prairie--no steamer had made the trip at the time--and landed on a sloping, rough beach, exactly where the pier next below the Custom House runs out to the Island wharf and St. Lambert Ferry. What is now the Island wharf was then a rocky Island separated from the main land by a Channel about one hundred feet wide.
On my left was a small brook called the “Creek,” being the discharge of a wide open ditch that ran from the Champ de Mars, through Craig Street, round to Inspector Street and then down Commissioners Street to a stone bridge, crossing at the bottom of St. Francis Xavier Street. From this till near the river it ran between the wall of a rough stone building, on the site of the present Custom House, and another wall that supported Commissioners Street.
Above the brook a low narrow wooden wharf ran to Port Street, Common Street being supported by a wooden revetment, with gaps for sloping roadway to the river.
All beyond Port Street was the natural Bank, the same as in the front of country villages, except a small wharf opposite the north end of Youville Street, at which point, then called Pointe à Blondeau, there was a cottage, with garden in front, running down to the water.
Here, too, was a shipyard and the east wall of the Grey Nunnery. Further on, all was vacant, except some buildings at the corner of Grey Nun Street, and beyond here open fields, running up to Point St. Charles, with three windmills, the graves of three soldiers, shot for desertion, and the Nuns buildings at Point St. Charles, since used for offices, while Victoria bridge was in course of construction.
The Lachine Canal had not been commenced, and distances appeared so much farther than now, that the river front was divided into “Pointe à Callière,” “Pointe à Blondeau,” “Windmill Point,” and “Point St. Charles.”
Directly before me was a sloping beach running up to an opening or street between low houses, forming the east side.
On the square, now occupied by the old Custom House, and then by the “old Market,” so much frequented by Country people, that they blockaded the approaches, and had sometimes to be driven away by constables to the “new market,” then built on Jacques Cartier Square.
On my right the natural beach continued down to Hochelaga, or “the Cross” as it was then called. A wooden revetment held up Commissioner Street and St. Sulpice Street and thence downward there was nothing but the natural bank, on which weeds grew profusely. There may have been something more opposite the Barracks.
The buildings fronting on the river were mostly old, low and dilapidated. A good part of the space was occupied by walls and mean outbuildings of the houses fronting on St. Paul Street. The new buildings were the three-story brick stores just above St. Diziers Lane, and a three-story store just below.
The “spring fleet” mostly in port (a part may have arrived a few days later), consisted of, I think, half a dozen brigs of from one hundred and eighty to two hundred and fifty tons burthen, moored to the muddy beach; below them were some “Durham boats,” which we should now call small barges, navigators to Upper Canada, carrying a very large fore and aft sail and top sail. Wind then had to do what is now done by steam. Below these, opposite the present Jacques Cartier Square, were moored many rafts--mostly of firewood.
There were no steamboats, except those running to Quebec, clumsy things, with bluff bows, built on the model of sailing vessels, rigged with bowsprit, high mast and square sail; the deck flush, and cabins all below.
Their steam power was so small that they could not get fifty miles from Quebec unless they left with the tide; and oxen were frequently used in assisting them up the current, below the city. All the structure on the deck of the largest, called the “Car of Commerce,” was a square house over the stairway, which may still be seen, converted into a summer house, with gallery surrounding, at St. Catherines, that all may notice on the right side of the road, when riding round the mountain.
There were no tow boats then. Vessels from sea had to make their way to Montreal by wind which often took a month or more, the worst being the last mile where I have seen oxen used on a tow line, as otherwise the light winds would be insufficient to enable them to overcome the force of the strong current.
The “ship” of the period was the Everetta from London, which arrived some days after, and summer goods were advertised about the middle of June, there being no way of getting Spring and Summer “fashions” earlier, so that our ladies were always one year behind the age.
I have in my possession a bill of lading of goods by this ship, dated 25th of March, 1800. She brought the supplies to the “Northwest Company,” which then carried on the great Indian Trade, from Montreal, by canoes, up to Lake Superior, and onwards.
The Ship remained moored at the foot of St. Sulpice Street all summer, till the canoes returned with the year’s catch of furs, and carried them to England.
A traveller quoted by Mr. Sandham in “Ville Marie” as visiting the city in 1819 thus describes the activity of the water side:
“We crossed the river in a canoe hollowed out of a single log, and on landing we climbed a steep and slippery bank, and found ourselves in one of the principal streets of the city.”
“In the morning” continues the account “we witnessed a scene of considerable activity, caused by the carts and horses which are driven into the river as far as possible to obtain wood, etc, from the boats, and as they go out so far, the body of the cart is sometimes out of water and the larger sticks are drawn out with a rope.”
It would be hard to imagine a more hopeless outlook than existed in the Harbour of Montreal, as indicated on Bouchette’s plan of 1824. The first Lachine Canal was only completed in 1825, having a depth over the sills of 4½ feet, and is not shown on that plan.
Two stone windmills marked the progress of industrial development to the westward of what is now McGill Street. They were situated on top of the open beach.
The Grand Trunk Railway Company’s elevator now stands on the site of the water front of 1824.
A small wharf 200 feet long existed, providing a depth of water of 9 feet, in the position of the flood wall opposite the present Harbour Commissioners’ office.
Another irregular wharf known as Berthelette’s Wharf existed between the Harbour Commissioners’ office and the Custom House.
From the Little River, now the Custom House, downward, the beach was unimproved except by the construction of sloping roadways down to the water.
Shallow water, even points of exposed rocks, existed two-thirds of the distance across to St. Helen’s Island, in the early days before the Moffatt’s Island Wharf was built.
The size and type of the vessels trading to Montreal may be imagined from the fact that Lake St. Peter limited the draft to 11 feet, and even that depth was not available at any of the wharves in the Harbour.
The shipping trade of a whole season, eighty years ago, could have been carried in one or two of the modern ships which now frequent the port.
Sloping roadways down to the water where the river was so low as to permit of rocks showing above the current, a long stretch of beach where the children of those days romped and played, and the poorer women washed the linen using the big stones as washing boards, a long unbroken line of trees and shrubberies past Maisonneuve, where now the Harbour Commissioners’ powerful locomotives transport merchandise from vessels of 15,000 tons register to the various railway terminals, these were the features of the Port of Montreal long before Confederation had ever been dreamed of. In those days inland navigation commenced at Lachine. Goods for Upper Canada were carted to Lachine and from there taken up the Haldimand Canals in bateaux about thirty-five feet long and 5½ feet beam, built of the type of a modern raft boat with pointed bow and stern.
From 1824 to 1892 the development of the port progressed but slowly. Still, in the early days the development of the harbour was a very live question and it was on the 8th of May, 1830, that George Moffatt, Jules Quesnel and Capt. Robert S. Piper, R.E., were appointed commissioners under the Great Seal of the Province of Lower Canada and signed by His Excellency the Governor at the Castle of St. Louis; for the purpose of carrying into effect an Act of the Provincial Legislature, 10 and 11, Geo. IV., Cap. 28: “An Act to provide for the Improvement and Enlargement of the Harbour of Montreal.”
The first works undertaken were for the construction of wharves, ramps, slips for Durham boats, a revetment wall and a bridge to Oyster Island, which was to be the principal wharf.
In their first annual report the commissioners, who were called the Corporation of the Trinity Board of Montreal until 1855 when an act was passed changing the name to the Harbour Commissioners of Montreal and increasing the number of commissioners from three to five, stated that they confidently anticipated that the wharves undertaken, when completed, would be superior to any works of the kind in the Province, and would enable the City of Montreal to be advantageously contrasted with any other in North America for beauty, solidity and convenience of approach by water, and the present Harbour of Montreal rather justifies the modest boast of the commissioners of eighty years ago.
Writing in 1839, before the improvements had been made in the harbour by the commissioners, Mr. Newton Bosworth in “Hochelaga Depicta” quotes a New York traveller, who, on landing from a bateau which brought him from La Prairie, thus afterwards expressed himself:
“The approach to Montreal conveyed no prepossessing idea of the enterprise of its municipality; ships, brigs and steamboats lay on the margin of the river at the foot of the hill, no long line of wharves, built of the substantial free stone of which there is an abundance in the very harbour affording security to vessels and profit to owners; the commercial haven looked as ragged and as muddy as the shores of Nieu Nederlandt when the Guede Vrow first made her appearance off the battery.”
“Now,” remarks Mr. Bosworth in 1839, commenting on this “if he were to repeat his visit he would be constrained to make a different report, and find himself able to step ashore without more trouble than in walking across a room.”
The appropriation for the first three years amounted to $4,000, while at present the Harbour Commissioners have undertaken a series of improvements which are soon to be completed at an approximate cost of $6,000,000.
During the past ten years no less than thirty-eight million dollars has been expended to improve the local harbour and ship channel, nearly one-half of which immense sum has gone towards the establishment of harbour and terminal improvements.
Millions of dollars have been spent on lighthouses, light ships, submarine bell stations, whistling buoys, the dredging of the main ship channel from 27½ to 30 feet at low water, its widening and straightening have been carried out at a cost of $14,000,000, the reorganization of the pilotage system has cost $140,000, the establishment of fifteen land telephone stations between Quebec and Montreal has involved the expenditure of $150,000, while hundreds of thousands of dollars have been spent for other important projects.
Since 1830 some of the best Engineers in Canada, the United States and Great Britain, have from time to time been called upon to investigate and submit plans for improvements.
Messrs. Gzowsky, Keefer, Forsythe, Trautwine, Legge, Nish, and Slippell all submitted plans up to 1873.
A picture of the results of the improvements during the intervening period is to be found in Mr. T.S. Brown’s retrospect, already quoted.
“I visited it (the harbour)” says the same writer, “at the end of fifty-four years, on the 28th of May, 1872. And what did I see?[1]
“A canal of the largest dimensions coming in at Windmill Point, and the old fields converted into basins, filled with steamers, schooners and barges, one side fringed by manufactories, and the other by lofty warehouses, and platforms filled with merchandise.
“From ‘Pointe à Blondeau,’ or Grey Nun Street, to the Barracks, there is a high stone revetment wall, supporting Commissioners Street, with Ramps at convenient distances, leading to a broad platform or wharf running down to below the barracks and Dalhousie Square, along which is a track for Railway Cars, and from which project many piers, one connecting with the Island before mentioned, and others lower down, extending further out.
“This platform or line wharf, and the piers, are covered and filled with merchandise, of all discriptions, in bars, bundles, casks, cases, boxes and bales, a part being covered with temporary sheds.
“The quantity and weight is so immense that one wonders where it comes from, and where it goes to, but the immense mass extending along Harbour and Canal for a mile, is but a small portion of what is passing into or through the port, for while countless carts and cars, are daily removing from one side, steamers and ships fill up every space by discharging on the other, with steam power and regiments of laborers. The taking in of the cargo is going on at the same time and elevators alongside the ships are taking from propellors alongside from the west and far west thousands of bushels of grain. Instead of the half a dozen brigs of 1818, with an aggregate tonnage of twelve to fifteen hundred tons discharging slowly with skids on a rough beach, there lays one steamer that will measure more than the whole put together.
“In all there is in port, stretched along the wharves and piers from Grey Nun Street to below the Barracks, 21 Ocean Steamers, 22,612 tons; 20 Ships, 17,710 tons; 22 Barques, 12,409 tons; 3 Brigs, 760 tons; 4 Brigantines and Schooners, 278 tons, in all 70 Vessels with an aggregate tonnage of 53,769 tons.
“The shore (I have often seen it bare), below the foot of St. Sulpice Street has been dredged and wharfed to accommodate ships drawing twenty feet of water. A Quebec Steamer, not stumpy, low and flush deck, but long, built on a skiff model, with two stories of staterooms raised above the deck, is at a pier at the bottom of Jacques Cartier Square, stretching out beyond the limits of the old firewood rafts, brought down by farmers from Chateaguay and neighbouring regions, to be sold in June, when they were impatient to get home, for $2.00 a cord.
“Directly below is a fleet of ‘Market Boats,’ really elegant steamers, of modern build, that navigate to all ports down to ‘Three Rivers.’
“Mixed with these are a fleet of ‘Wood Barges,’ rigged on the principle of a ‘Chinese Junk’ (which some of them resemble on a small scale), with a very high mast, and very long square-sail yards.
“These bring up firewood, hay, grain, lumber, etc., from below, a trade little dreamed of in old times.
“Further down are piles of boards, planks, and other lumber, and ships being loaded with it for the South Atlantic, or perhaps Pacific, and work is in progress for continuing the wharves to Hochelaga where I have seen many ships launched.
“Where stood the ‘Mansion House’ (in 1818 our great hotel), a former residence of Sir John Johnson, and dwelling houses with small gardens, there is now the Bonsecour Market. The old walls and sheds, along the ‘front’ to ‘Pointe à Calliêre,’ are replaced by tall warehouses. An elegant Custom House on the Pointe replaces an old potash store. Other warehouses are built on the old ship yard, and the Grey Nuns having removed to their new establishment on Guy Street, their buildings are disappearing, St. Peter Street being continued to the harbour by cutting directly through their old church.
“Such was the aspect of the harbour of Montreal in 1818, and such it is today (1872) and I sincerely hope this article may be preserved to be republished half a century hence, accompanied by a description of the harbour as it then was.”
To continue the story of the developments of the harbour for the greater part of fifty years. In 1875 Mr. Robert Bruce Bell, Major General Newton and Mr. Sanford Fleming drew up a report and plan for the improvement of the Habour. Mr. John Kennedy, for so many years Chief Engineer of the Harbour Commissioners, has not only designed but carried out many of the improvements now existing.
Ten years ago there was no Alexandra Basin or wharf to speak of, there was no level harbour front, no permanent sheds, over a dozen of which have only been finished within the past four years.
Magnificent concrete wharves with corrugated iron sheds built on solid concrete foundations have been built opposite the plants of some of Montreal’s largest industries.
The Harbour Commissioners’ tracks pass behind the sheds affording direct communication all over the harbour, while excellent wharfage facilities permit of the circulation of any amount of traffic.
The greatest addition to the port in recent years, however, and urged by the Montreal Board of Trade since 1887, has been the huge floating dock, the “Duke of Connaught,” which was successfully towed across the Atlantic in the fall of 1912. It was dedicated by H.R.H., the Governor General on 18th of November, 1912.
H.R.H. the Governor General in replying to the Commissioners’ address well said that “by the arrival and installation of this great floating dock, the great reproach against the St. Lawrence trade route has been removed, and the largest vessels can now run up to Montreal, secure in the consciousness of entering a port which is in possession of a competent modern equipment for repair and examination.”
The dock is capable[2] of accommodating vessels of Olympic size or larger and necessitates the employment of a staff of 500 men, the majority of them skilled workmen. The dock can accommodate thirty vessels at present operating on the St. Lawrence route which are too wide of beam to be taken into any existing dock between here and Halifax, 1,000 miles away.
A ship building plant which is to be operated in connection with the dock is to give employment to about two thousand men.
The type of Port of Montreal is a combination of a protected tidal basin, riverside quays and pier jetties.
There is no rise and fall of tide, but the river level fluctuates to an extent of about 12 feet from high water in the spring to low water in the autumn.
During the winter, due to ice shoves, the water occasionally rises to an extreme of 28 feet above the low water level. An artificial embarkment, parallel to the shore, about one and one-third miles long, protects the whole of the upper part of the harbour, including the entrance to the Lachine Canal, from not only the currents of the river but from ice shoves. This constitutes the protected tidal basin in which the water rises and falls with the river level.
It has not been necessary to purchase any land above the high water mark on the beach, as all piers and wharves have been made artificially by building out into the shallow water and the berths formed by dredging.
From the entrance to the protected basin for about two and one-half miles downstream, to Hochelaga, the river channel is too much contracted to permit of the construction of piers or jetties, and this part of the harbour is developed as riverside quays, sufficient width for harbour purposes being obtained by building the quay-walls in deep water and filling in the area behind to give a width from 100 to 250 feet. Below Hochelaga, where the river section is larger, piers have been built out into the river, inclined so as to give an easy angle of approach from the ship channel.
The success of the port is due primarily to its early development, before any of the water front had been alienated from the crown, and to its geographical, physical and trade situation.
No rights or franchises stand in the way of further extensions, and the sentiment of the country is in favour of a continuance of the policy of retaining the whole harbour area in the public interests.
The facility of approach both by ocean vessels, inland vessels and railways to a convenient point of transfer makes Montreal almost unique, there being nothing in the way of close connection for traffic from all points, and almost in the heart of a large and growing city.
Montreal Harbour is also the terminus of the St. Lawrence Canal System, which affords navigation between Montreal and Lake Erie, a distance of 300 miles, for vessels of 14 feet draft and a carrying capacity of 2,500 tons. From Lake Erie to this head of Lake Superior vessels are able to navigate with a draft of 20 feet and a carrying capacity of 10,000 tons. The inland navigation centering in Montreal therefore commences either by the all lake route of 1,600 miles and vessels of 14 feet draft, or by the lake-and-rail routes, using the 10,000 ton boats to Georgian Bay ports or Port Colborne, and connecting with Montreal either by short-haul rail route or the St. Lawrence canals.
The following figures give the total trade in the Harbour from 1901 to 1914:
Sea-going Vessels Inland Vessels. Arrived in Port. Total Total Number Tonnage Number Tonnage 1912 736 2,403,924 12,586 4,649,767 1900 726 1,393,886 8,310 1,659,616
Total Trade 1911 $201,066,256 1901 $121,292,349 1914 $251,873,912
About two-thirds of the grain comes to Montreal in steamers carrying 2,500 tons on the 14 foot draft. These vessels cannot afford to wait, but must be unloaded at once if they are to be attracted to Montreal. The rest of the grain coming from the Georgian Bay ports by rail must also be unloaded quickly, as during the grain rush there is a constant railway car shortage. The storage and rapid handling of grain has thus become, in the last few years, a new factor in the problem of harbour economy. There are three modern grain elevators at present in the harbour and none of the older type. Of the modern elevators, one belongs to the Grand Trunk Railway. It had a capacity of 1,000,000 bushels, but has been enlarged to a capacity of 2,100,000. The others belong to the Harbour Commissioners. No. 1 in 1915 will be capable of storing 4,000,000 bushels; while No. 2, recently erected opposite Bonsecours Market, has a capacity of 2,600,000, and can handle 1,000,000 bushels a day. It is entirely built of reinforced concrete, and is the largest of this kind in the world.
It is easy to see that Montreal Harbour, being the farthest inland ocean port of the Northern Continent and also the terminus of the inland Canadian canal and railway routes, is an important factor in the grain carrying trade of the Northern part of the Continent.
In 1914 about two million dollars have been expended by the Harbour Commission in dredging, renovating piers and wharves, building new sheds and wharves, and other work incidental to the five-year program of development undertaken by them at a total cost of $15,000,000. All this work has been under the direction of Mr. W.G. Ross, chairman, Mr. Farquhar Robertson, and Colonel A.E. Labelle, commissioners.
The great desire is now to lengthen the shipping season. Professor Barnes, of McGill University, has made the study of ice his specialty and he is at present carrying on experiments for the Canadian government. He is of the opinion that winter navigation is a possibility. At present the government has, on the St. Lawrence, two ice-breakers, which extend the time of navigation by a few days. The ice difficulty arises where the river widens into a lake, as at Lake St. Peter. Ice forms on the sides of the lake and is blown into the current. When the banks again converge, this ice jams, soon forming a solid ice-bridge. The ice-shoves which occur in the spring are caused in the same way. The solution of the problem is to have ice-breakers always suitably situated to break these bridges as soon as they form.
II
HARBOUR COMMISSIONERS
The following is a list of the Boards of Harbour Commissioners that have executed the duties of the Trust from 1830 up to the present time showing the interest represented by each member:--
* Indicates the President of the Board.
(c) Indicates the representative of the Corn Exchange. (t) Indicates the representative of the Montreal Board of Trade. (m) Indicates the representative of the City of Montreal. (s) Indicates the representative of the Shipping interest. (c de c) Indicates the representative of the Chambre de Commerce.
The members not indicated as representatives of the Corn Exchange, Board of Trade, City of Montreal, Chambre de Commerce or Shipping interest have been appointed by the Government of their time. From 1907 the members have been exclusively appointed by the Government.
1830 to 1836. Hon. George Moffatt.* Jules Quesnel, Esq. Capt. Robert S. Piper.
1836 to 1839. P.L. Letourneux, Esq. Thomas Cringan, Esq. Turton Penn, Esq.*
1839 to 1840. Turton Penn, Esq.* Thomas Cringan, Esq. William Lunn, Esq.
1840 to 1850. J.G. Mackenzie, Esq.* John Try, Esq. C.S. Rodier, Esq.
1850 to 1855. John Try, Esq.* Hon. John Young,* from 1853. Louis Marchand, Esq.
1855 to 1856. Hon. John Young.* H.H. Whitney, Esq. Sir George E. Cartier. Doctor Nelson. (m) Hon. H. Starnes. (t)
1856 to 1858. Hon. John Young.* H.H. Whitney, Esq.* Chairman pro tem. Sir George E. Cartier. Hon. H. Starnes. (m) Hon. L.H. Holton. (t)
1858 to 1859. Hon. John Young.* Sir George E. Cartier. H.H. Whitney, Esq. Hon. L.H. Holton. (t) J.A. Berthelot, Esq. (m)
1859 to 1860. C.S. Rodier, Esq. (m) Hon. John Young. H.H. Whitney, Esq.* Thomas Kay, Esq. (t) A.M. Delisle, Esq.
1860 to 1861. C.S. Rodier, Esq. (m) Hon. John Young. H.H. Whitney, Esq.* A.M. Delisle, Esq. Thomas Cramp, Esq. (t)
1861 to 1862. C.S. Rodier, Esq. (m) Hon. John Young,* Chairman pro tem in 1862. H.H. Whitney, Esq.* A.M. Delisle, Esq. E. Atwater, Esq. (t)
1862 to 1863. Hon. John Young. H.H. Whitney, Esq.* Hon. L.H. Holton. (t) A.M. Delisle, Esq. Hon. J.L. Beaudry. (m)
1863 to 1864. Hon. John Young.* A.M. Delisle, Esq. Thomas Cramp, Esq. (t) Hon. J.L. Beaudry. (m) Henry Lyman, Esq. (t)
1864 to 1865. Hon. John Young.* Thomas Cramp, Esq. Hon. J.L. Beaudry. (m) John Pratt, Esq. P. Redpath, Esq. (t)
1865 to 1866. Hon. John Young. * Thomas Cramp, Esq. Hon. J.L. Beaudry. (m) John Pratt, Esq. J.H. Winn, Esq. (t)
1866 to 1867. Hon. H. Starnes. (m) A.M. Delisle, Esq.* J. McLennan, Esq. (t) George Stephen, Esq. William Workman, Esq.
1867 to 1869. Hon. H. Starnes. (m) A.M. Delisle, Esq.* George Stephen, Esq. William Workman, Esq. Thomas Rimmer, Esq. (t)
1869 to 1870. Hon. H. Starnes. (m) A.M. Delisle, Esq.* J.H. Winn, Esq. (t) George Stephen, Esq. William Workman, Esq.
1870 to 1871. Hon. John Young. (t) Hon. H. Starnes. (m) A.M. Delisle, Esq. George Stephen, Esq. William Workman, Esq.
1871 to 1872. Hon. John Young. (t) A.M. Delisle, Esq.* George Stephen, Esq. William Workman, Esq. C.J. Coursol, Esq. (m)
1872 to 1873. A.M. Delisle, Esq.* George Stephen, Esq. William Workman, Esq. C.J. Coursol, Esq. (m) Hugh McLennan, Esq. (t)
1873 to 1874. Hon. John Young.* A.M. Delisle. William Workman, Esq. Hugh McLennan, Esq. (t) Doctor Bernard, (m) Victor Hudon, Esq. M.P. Ryan, Esq. Andrew Allan, Esq. (s) W.W. Ogilvie, Esq. (c)
1874 to 1875. Hon. John Young.* Thomas Cramp, Esq. John Pratt, Esq. Hugh McLennan, Esq. (t) Doctor Bernard. (m) Andrew Allan, Esq. (s) W.W. Ogilvie, Esq. (c) Peter Donovan, Esq. Adolphe Roy, Esq.
1875 to 1876. Hon. John Young.* Thomas Cramp, Esq. John Pratt, Esq. Hugh McLennan, Esq. (t) Doctor Bernard. (m) Andrew Allan, Esq. (s) Peter Donovan, Esq. Adolphe Roy, Esq. Charles H, Gould, Esq. (c)
1876 to 1877. Hon. John Young.* Thomas Cramp, Esq. Hugh McLennan, Esq. (t) Andrew Allan, Esq. (s) Peter Donovan, Esq. Adolphe Roy, Esq. Charles H. Gould, Esq. (c) Dr. W.H. Hingston. (m) Hon. J.R. Thibaudeau.
1877 to 1878. Hon. John Young.* Thomas Cramp, Esq.* pro tem 1877. Hon. J.L. Beaudry. (m) Hugh McLennan, Esq. (t) Andrew Allan, Esq. (s) Peter Donovan, Esq. Adolphe Roy, Esq. Charles H. Gould, Esq. (c) Hon. J.R. Thibaudeau.
1878 to 1879. Thomas Cramp, Esq.* Hon. J.L. Beaudry (m) Hugh McLennan, Esq. (t) Andrew Allan, Esq. (s) Peter Donovan, Esq. Adolphe Roy, Esq. Charles H. Gould, Esq. (c) Hon. J.R. Thibaudeau. Edward Mackay, Esq.
1879 to 1881. Hugh McLennan, Esq. (t) Victor Hudon, Esq. Andrew Allan, Esq. (s) Charles H. Gould, Esq. (c) S. Rivard, Esq. (m) Andrew Robertson, Esq.* J.B. Rolland, Esq. Edward Murphy, Esq. Henry Bulmer, Esq., *Chairman pro tem.
1881 to 1885. Hon. J.L. Beaudry. (m) Hugh McLennan, Esq. (t) Victor Hudon, Esq. Andrew Allan, Esq. (s) Charles H. Gould, Esq. (c) Andrew Robertson, Esq.* J.B. Rolland, Esq. Edward Murphy, Esq. Henry Bulmer, Esq.
1885 to 1887. Hugh McLennan, Esq. (t) Victor Hudon, Esq. Andrew Allan. Esq. (s) Charles H. Gould, Esq. (c) Andrew Robertson, Esq.* J.B. Rolland, Esq. Edward Murphy, Esq. Henry Bulmer, Esq. Honoré Beaugrand, Esq. (m)
1887 to 1888. Hugh McLennan, Esq. (t) Victor Hudon, Esq. Andrew Allan, Esq. (s) Charles H. Gould, Esq. (c) Andrew Robertson, Esq.* Hon. J.B. Rolland. Edward Murphy, Esq. Henry Bulmer, Esq. Hon. J.J.C. Abbott, Q.C., M.P. (m)
1888 to 1889. Hugh McLennan, Esq. (t) Victor Hudon, Esq. Andrew Allan, Esq. (s) Chas. H. Gould, Esq. (c) Andrew Robertson, Esq.* Edward Murphy, Esq. Henry Bulmer, Esq. Hon. J.J.C. Abbott, Q.C., M.P. (m) J.O. Villeneuve, Esq.
1889 to 1890. Hugh McLennan, Esq, (t) Victor Hudon, Esq. Andrew Allan, Esq. (s) Chas. H. Gould, Esq. (c) Andrew Robertson, Esq.* Hon. Edward Murphy. Henry Bulmer, Esq.* J.O. Villeneuve, Esq. Jacques Grenier, Esq. (m)
1890 to 1891. Hugh McLennan, Esq. (t) Victor Hudon, Esq. Andrew Allan, Esq, (s) Charles H. Gould, Esq. (c) Hon. Edward Murphy. Henry Bulmer, Esq.* J.O. Villeneuve, Esq. Jacques Grenier, Esq. (m) Richard White, Esq.
1891 to 1893. Hugh McLennan, Esq. (t) Victor Hudon, Esq. Andrew Allan, Esq. (s) Charles H. Gould, Esq. (c) Hon. Edward Murphy. Henry Bulmer, Esq.* Richard White, Esq. James McShane, Esq. (m)
1893 to 1894. Hugh McLennan, Esq. (t) Victor Hudon, Esq. Andrew Allan, Esq. (s) Charles H. Gould, Esq. (c) Hon. Edward Murphy. Henry Bulmer, Esq.* J.O. Villeneuve, Esq. Richard White, Esq. Hon. Alphonse Desjardins. (m) L.E. Morin, Esq. (c de c)
1894 to 1895. Hugh McLennan, Esq, (t) Victor Hudon, Esq. Andrew Allan, Esq. (s) Hon. Edward Murphy. Henry Bulmer, Esq.* J.O. Villeneuve, Esq. Richard White, Esq. L.E. Morin, Esq. (c de c) W.W. Ogilvie, Esq. N.A. Hurteau, Esq. John Torrance, Esq. (c)
1895 to 1896. Hugh McLennan, Esq. (t) Victor Hudon, Esq. Andrew Allan, Esq. (s) Hon. Edward Murphy. Henry Bulmer, Esq.* J.O. Villeneuve, Esq. (m) Richard White, Esq. L.E. Morin, Esq. (c de c) W.W. Ogilvie, Esq. N.A. Hurteau, Esq. John Torrance, Esq. H. Laporte, Esq. Frank J. Hart, Esq.
1896 to 1897. Hugh McLennan, Esq. (t) Andrew Allan, Esq. (s) L.E. Morin, Esq. (c de c) John Torrance, Esq. (c) R. Wilson Smith, Esq. (m) Robert Mackay, Esq.* Jonathan Hodgson, Esq. Robert Bickerdike, Esq. Alphonse Racine, Esq. Eustache H. Lemay, Esq. William Farrell, Esq.
1897 to 1898. Andrew Allan, Esq. (s) John Torrance, Esq. (c) R. Wilson Smith, Esq. (m) Robert Mackay, Esq.* Jonathan Hodgson, Esq. Robert Bickerdike, M.L.A. Alphonse Racine, Esq. Eustache H. Lemay, Esq. William Farrell, Esq. David G. Thomson, Esq. (t) Joseph Contant, Esq. (c de c)
1898 to 1899. Andrew Allan, Esq. (s) John Torrance, Esq. (c) Robert Mackay, Esq.* Jonathan Hodgson, Esq. Robert Bickerdike. M.L.A. Alphonse Racine, Esq. Eustache H. Lemay, Esq. William Farrell, Esq. David G. Thomson, Esq. (t) Joseph Contant. Esq. (c de c) Raymond Préfontaine, Q.C., M.P. (m)
1899 to 1901. Andrew Allan, Esq. (s) John Torrance, Esq. (c) Hon. Robert Mackay.* Jonathan Hodgson, Esq. Robert Bickerdike. M.L.A. Alphonse Racine, Esq. Eustache H. Lemay, Esq. William Farrell, Esq. Joseph Contant, Esq. (c de c) Raymond Préfontaine, K.C., M.P. (m) James Crathern, Esq. (t)
1901 to 1906. R. Mackay, Esq.* R. Bickerdike, Esq. J. Hodgson (resigned). A. Racine. E.H. Lemay. J. Crathern. (t) L.E. Geoffrion. (c de c) H.A.A. Brault. A. McFee. (c) W.E. Doran. H. Laporte. (m) H.A. Ekers. (m) J. Cochrane. (m) R. Reford. (s) resigned. Andrew A. Allen. E. Goff Penny.
1907 to 1912 G.W. Stephens.* L.E. Geoffrion. C C. Ballantyne.
1913 W.G. Ross.* F. Robertson. A.E. Labelle.
List of Secretaries of the Board of Harbour Commissioners of Montreal, from its establishment in 1830 up to the present time (1914).
Frederick Griffin, May, 1830, to May, 1831. Nicholas Charles Radiger, May, 1831, to April, 1837. W. Badgley, April, 1837, to January, 1838. Francis Badgley, January, 1838, to July, 1841. John F. Badgley, July, 1841, to February, 1852. John Glass, February, 1852, to October, 1855. Alexander Clerk, October, 1855, to May, 1863. H.H. Whitney, May, 1863, to January, 1877. H.D. Whitney, January, 1877, to June, 1887. Alexander Robertson, July, 1887, to December, 1898. David Seath, December, 1898, to present time (1914). Michael Fennell, Assistant Secretary (1909-1914).
List of Engineers and Superintendents in charge of the deepening of the Ship Channel between Montreal and Quebec, or otherwise prominently connected with the execution of the work up to 1914.
Capt. Henry W. Bayfield, R.N., in charge of the Admiralty Survey of the River and Gulf of St. Lawrence, made several special reports in connection with the deepening of Lake St. Peter.
Capt. Robert S. Piper, Royal Engineer, Consulting Engineer, 1830.
John Cliff, C E., Superintendent of Works and Draughtsman, 1830 to 1845.
C.M. Tate, C.E., Superintendent of Works and Draughtsman, 1845 to 1848.
David Thompson, Esq., C.E., made survey and estimate for deepening channel in 1841.
Charles Atherton, Esq., Civil Engineer in charge of the surveys and investigations made in Lake St. Peter, in 1842-3.
F.P. Rubidge, Esq., Civil Engineer in charge of surveys, investigations, etc., in Lake St. Peter, in 1847.
C.S. Gzowski, Esq., C.E., Engineer of the Harbour Works and Consulting Engineer to the Ship Channel Improvements, 1851 to 1853.
T.C. Keefer, Esq., C.E., Engineer of the Harbour Works and Consulting Engineer to the Ship Channel Improvements, 1853 to 1855.
Robert Forsyth, Esq., C.E., Engineer of the Harbour Works and Consulting Engineer to the Ship Channel Improvements, 1855 to 1864.
A.G. Nish, Esq., C.E., Engineer of the Harbour Works and Consulting Engineer to the Ship Channel Improvements, 1864 to 1875.
John Kennedy, Esq., C.E., M.I.C.E., Chief Engineer of the Harbour Works and the Ship Channel Improvements, 1875 to 1907.
Captain Vaughan, Superintendent of Dredging, 1844 to 1846.
Captain Bell, Superintendent of Dredging, 1851 to 1856.
Robert Forsyth, Esq., C.E., Superintendent of Dredging, November, 1856, to April, 1857.
Capt C.L. Armstrong, Superintendent of Dredging, 1857 to 1867, and in 1874-5.
Capt. Thomas McKenzie, Superintendent of Dredging, 1876 to 1883.
James Howden, Esq., Superintendent of Dredging, 1883 to 1888.
Frederick W. Cowie, M.J.C.E., Chief Engineer, 1907.
III
CUSTOMS AND EXCISE
IMPORTS AND EXPORTS--EXCISE DUTIES
THE PRESENT CUSTOM HOUSE--A MEMORIAL OF 1790 FOR A CUSTOM HOUSE INDEPENDENT OF QUEBEC--THAT OF 1799 RECANTING THE FORMER MEMORIAL--THE MONTREAL COMMITTEE OF TRADE OF 1831--STEAM VESSELS CHANGE CONDITIONS--FIRST CUSTOM HOUSE PROPER AT MONTREAL--THE COLLECTORS’ NAMES--THE SHIPPING FEDERATION--STATISTICS--EXPORTS AND IMPORTS SINCE 1842--TRADE OF PORT OF MONTREAL--CUSTOMS DUTIES SINCE CONFEDERATION--EXCISE DEPARTMENT OF MONTREAL.
The business of the Customs was conducted before 1840 in a building on Capitol Street. In 1836 the building now used by the Inland Revenue on Place Royale was commenced and opened for the customs office in 1845. It is of the Tuscan order and was designed by Mr. Ostell.
In 1790 in the fall the merchants of Montreal presented a memorial desiring the establishment of a custom house separate from that of Quebec on two grounds: (1) the necessity of having the goods landed at Quebec; (2) the want of authority in the surveyor of the ports to grant certificates for the exportation of pot and pearl ashes. This was strenuously objected to by the naval officers, on the ground that were the prayer answered the passage between Quebec and Montreal would be taken advantage of by the country merchants, shop keepers, publicans, etc., to carry on an illicit trade “to the injury of the revenue and the fur traders.” The complaints in the memorial state that the landing at Quebec of cargoes for Montreal “must be attended with very heavy expense for agents, wharfage and labourers, besides the waste that will happen on cargoes of liquor by landing. What is of still greater consequence, is the loss of time which may arise, it being well known that the delay of a few hours waiting for a clearance upwards has occasioned vessels to be many weeks in performing a voyage of sixty leagues.” This is, of course, an allusion to the sailing vessels then solely used. These inconveniences were removed and the application was not repeated. A further memorial, dated from Montreal the 21st of October, 1799, represents that certain modifications are all that are required and that “a separate and independent custom house may introduce intricacies, difficulties, delays and expense beyond what at present exists and can be foreseen and if so render the means of redress extremely tedious, not to say impracticable.” The names attached to the memorial are Isaac Todd, Forsyth, Richardson & Company, Auldjo, Maitland & Co.; Leith, Jameson & Company; John Gray; Samuel David; James and Andrew McGill; David David; McTavish, Frobisher & Company; J. Laing; Parker, Gerard & Ogilvie; Richard Dobie.
The introduction of steam vessels made new regulations necessary. In 1831 vessels coming to Montreal continued to report at Quebec. In consequence of remonstrances the superintendent of customs residing at Montreal was authorized by a provisional act to collect the provincial revenues there, but this was only a partial relief, as the crown duties had still to be settled for at Quebec, to the great loss of merchants, shippers and consignees. The Committee of Trade of Montreal represented in their memorial of 1831 that the navigation of the St. Lawrence between Quebec and Montreal was rendered speedy and certain by the employment of steam towboats, but the necessity of entering the vessels at the Quebec custom house caused a delay of one day and sometimes two days in unloading. The burdens laid upon the shipping coming to Montreal, the memorial states to have been exceptional for that city, no other instance being known of a merchant being compelled to pay duties on his importations at a distance of 180 miles from the port of discharge, the expense and inconvenience thence arising being equivalent to an extra tax. The memorial reveals the difference of the two ports today. It states that the vessels resorting to Montreal bore a small proportion to those entering Quebec, but the memorials already anticipated that by improvements in the river, vessels from sea would land at Montreal the whole of the goods for its own district, Upper Canada and the adjoining frontier of the United States.
The first Custom House building situated at Place Royale was begun in 1836 and finished in 1838. Montreal, accordingly obtained its own completed Custom House in 1838. In 1870 the Government purchased from the Royal Insurance Company the present Custom House building at 1 Common Street. A newly erected Custom House is now (1914) in course of completion on Youville Square.
The Collectors of Customs at the Port of Montreal have been:
Wm. Hall, from 1838 to 1849: Tancrède Bouthillier, from July, 1850, to November, 1863; Benj. Holmes, from December, 1863, to May, 1865; John Lewis, acting, from May, 1865, to September, 1866; A.M. Delisle, from September, 1866, to October, 1873; W.B. Simpson, from November, 1873, to June, 1882; M.P. Ryan, from July, 1882, to January, 1893; W.J. O’Hara, acting, from January, 1893, to December, 1895; R.S. White, from January, 1896.
Montreal became a port of entry in 1842.
THE MONTREAL PILOTAGE AUTHORITY
In the early part of the eighteenth century an official knowing the navigation of the St. Lawrence boarded the king’s ships and brought them to Quebec, and in 1731 the first official pilot was appointed, and sent each season thereafter to Isle Verte, to await ships arrivals. This appears to have been the beginning of the St. Lawrence Pilotage.
After the British occupation, and during the term of General Murray’s governorship, in 1762, an order was issued requiring a number of pilots to be stationed early in each season at Bic, and to remain until the middle of October, also a further number at Isle aux Coudres. No person was to act as a pilot, unless he had passed a satisfactory examination, and had a certificate signed by the governor.
In 1805 there was passed an act entitled “An Act for the better regulation of pilots and shipping in the Port of Quebec, and in the harbours of Quebec and Montreal and for improving the navigation of the River St. Lawrence, and for establishing a fund for decayed pilots, their wives and children.”
This was the beginning of the Trinity House of Quebec and its jurisdiction then included the harbour of Montreal. Further acts were passed in 1807, 1811, 1812, 1822 and 1834, amending and extending the provisions of the preceding acts. By an act passed in 1832, a separate Trinity House was constituted for Montreal. This arrangement continued until the passing of the act in 1873, which made the Harbour Commissioners of Montreal the authority. They continued to be the authority till the passing of the Act of 1903, when the Minister of Marine and Fisheries became the authority, which he still continues to be.
THE SHIPPING FEDERATION OF CANADA
Montreal is the headquarters of the Shipping Federation of Canada. In 1903 in order to amalgamate those interested in the shipping business of Canada a charter of incorporation (3 Edward, VII Chap.), was granted to “Hugh Andrew Allan, representing the firm of H. & A. Allan; John Russell Binning, representing Furness, Withy & Company, Limited; James Thom, representing the Hamburg-American Packet Company; William I. Gear, representing the Robert Reford Company, Limited; Frank A. Routh, representing the firm of F.A. Routh & Company; David W. Campbell, representing the Elder-Dempster Company, Limited; James Gordon Brock, representing J.G. Brock & Company; Charles McLean; McLean, Kennedy & Company; and John Torrence, representing the Dominion Line of Steamships; and the Leyland Line of Steamships respectively, and such others as hereafter become members of the association.”
IMPORTS AND EXPORTS
Statistics of Imports and Exports since Montreal was made a Port of Entry in 1842:
In its fiftieth annual report the Montreal Board of Trade in 1892 presented tables of statistics showing as nearly as possible the development of trade in Montreal since 1842, when this city was made a port of entry.
The accompanying figures portraying conditions every ten years, were taken from that report and give an excellent summary.
Prior to 1850 the government did not publish blue book information of trade conditions, and the statistics referring to trade before that time were obtained from various sources. What early figures were obtained are accurate so far as could be determined, but there are unavoidable gaps where information could not be secured.
EXCISE DEPARTMENT
Previous to the confederation of the provinces, the excise duties, the canal tolls and the harbor dues were collected under the management of the Customs Department. The revenues from the other public works were collected either by the Department of Public Works or by the Crown Lands Department and the issue of bill stamps was managed by a Board of Stamps and Excise.
By the act constituting the Department of Inland Revenue, it was enacted that the Department should have the control and management
1. Of the collections of all duties of excise.
2. Of the collections of all stamp duties and the preparation and issue of stamps and stamped paper, except postage stamps.
3. Of Internal taxes.
4. Of Standard weights and measures.
5. Of the administration of the laws affecting the culling and measuring of timber and the collection of slidage and boomage dues.
6. The collection of bridges and ferry tolls and rents.
These conditions have at different dates been changed until now.
The Inland Revenue consists of Excise, Weights and Measures, Gas and Electric Light, and Food Inspections.
Excise is the branch which supervises and collects the duties from distilleries, malthouses, breweries, tobacco factories, cigar factories, bonding warehouses, compounders, bonded factories for the manufacture in bond of vinegar, acetic acid, perfumes, pharmaceutical preparations, soaps, fulminates, malt cereals, etc.
The Inland Revenue is divided into two services: the Inside and the Outside.
The Inside comprises all officials in the Department at Ottawa.
The Outside comprises all the rest of the staff, the officials who actually assess and collect the revenues and duties.
The Excise, Montreal, is officered by sixty-two men--forty-six of whom are permanently appointed, the rest, sixteen, are temporary employees.
There are licensed, in Montreal: One distillery, four malthouses, sixteen breweries, forty-one cigar factories, one acetic acid factory, five perfumes, six pharmaceutical preparations, fourteen bonded warehouses, twenty-one chemical stills and one wood alcohol manufacturer.
The Weights and Measures Inspection are responsible for the verification of all weights and measures used in trade.
Gas Inspection has charge of the inspection of all meters used by consumers of gas and the illuminating power and purity of gas.
Food Inspection deals with the purity of alimentary substances.
As a collecting office, the Inland Revenue, Montreal, is second only to the Customs, and collects nearly one-half of all the excise revenue of Canada.
The officers named by the British Government and who remained in office at Confederation were R. Bellemare, Inspector; P. Durnford, Collector, assisted by a staff of fourteen officers.
The first excise office was situated on St. James Street, on part of the site now occupied by “La Presse Building”; in 1871, it was moved to the present location, at No. 412 St. Paul Street, (the site of the first public square in Montreal).
The steady increase in collections of the Inland Revenue duties is one of the best indications of the growth of Montreal.
TABLE OF THE TRADE OF THE PORT OF MONTREAL FROM 1882 TO 1912
Sea-going Value of Value of Vessels arrived Total Merchandise Merchandise Years in Port Tonnage Exported Imported
1913-14 --- --- $99,238,107 $152,635,805 1912 736 2,403,924 87,679,422 148,977,605 1911 762 2,338,252 71,254,446 129,811,810 1910 747 2,234,722 71,642,648 114,473,845 1909 670 1,911,413 76,642,485 96,787,938 1908 739 1,958,604 80,583,171 79,851,814 1907 740 1,924,475 85,494,534 106,391,891 1906 820 1,973,223 89,616,459 89,376,259 1905 833 1,940,056 73,786,548 80,345,420 1904 796 1,853,853 57,947,045 76,056,830 1903 802 1,890,904 70,939,510 78,527,078 1902 758 1,541,272 59,755,673 70,737,832 1901 742 1,453,048 56,220,759 65,632,086 1900 726 1,393,886 62,496,431 64,071,590 1899 801 1,517,611 64,040,982 65,018,544 1898 868 1,584,072 62,729,180 61,117,703 1897 796 1,379,002 55,156,956 47,036,196 1896 709 1,216,468 49,160,364 45,900,270 1895 640 1,069,386 40,348,197 41,996,686 1894 734 1,096,909 40,401,392 42,514,582 1893 804 1,151,777 47,700,433 53,796,227 1892 735 1,036,707 45,638,275 47,670,361 1891 725 938,657 39,344,783 48,418,569 1890 746 930,332 32,027,176 45,159,124 1889 695 823,165 32,638,270 47,415,620 1888 655 782,473 24,049,638 39,856,283 1887 767 870,773 29,391,858 43,391,715 1886 703 859,699 27,925,916 42,086,266 1885 629 683,854 25,209,813 37,042,660 1884 626 649,374 27,458,775 41,859,299 1883 660 664,263 27,122,891 44,073,915 1882 648 554,692 26,503,001 50,527,497
The foregoing table does not include inland vessels, the figures of which for the season of 1912 were 12,586 vessels with a tonnage of 4,649,767.
CUSTOMS DUTIES COLLECTED AT PORT OF MONTREAL SINCE CONFEDERATION
1867-68 $4,009,675.56 1868-69 3,608,254.75 1869-70 4,128,051.89 1870-71 5,140,132.03 1871-72 5,358,701.13 1872-73 5,011,154.89 1873-74 5,633,705.88 1874-75 5,862,047.05 1875-76 4,292,057.10 1876-77 3,865,410.50 1877-78 3,814,864.77 1878-79 4,026,975.75 1879-80 5,232,802.19 1880-81 7,077,793.32 1881-82 8,100,341.40 1882-83 8,181,935.78 1883-84 7,041,306.18 1884-85 6,856,186.99 1885-86 7,353,009.24 1886-87 8,874,147.75 1887-88 8,548,737.15 1888-89 9,265,405.73 1889-90 8,776,875.22 1890-91 9,065,486.99 1891-92 6,627,526.11 1892-93 7,078,707.12 1893-94 6,653,299.34 1894-95 5,983,342.25 1895-96 6,779,879.74 1896-97 6,765,771.85 1897-98 7,207,005.29 1898-99 8,662,764.98 1899-1900 9,136,377.52 1900-01 9,018,659.84 1901-02 10,041,662.04 1902-03 11,803,298.00 1903-04 12,437,927.95 1904-05 11,591,656.70 1905-06 13,275,623.17 1906-07 11,433,595.61 1907-08 16,480,921.60 1908-09 12,935,098.62 1909-10 16,325,229.78 1910-11 18,327,198.73 1911-12 19,951,815.23 1912-13 25,655,340.42 1913-14 24,732,198.57
The variations in the amount of duties collected are due (1) to the growth of imports and (2) to changes in tariff rates.
IMPORTS AND EXPORTS
1842. 1850. Imports $8,075,840 $6,905,400 Exports 1,714,644 1,744,772 Ocean vessels-- Number 137 222 Tonnage 41,319 46,867 Exports-- Butter (lb.) 595,840 Cheese (boxes) 44 Breadstuffs (bushels), flour reduced to terms of wheat 1,091,435 Inland vessels--- Number 3,726 Tonnage 391,520
1860. Imports $15,334,010 Exports 6,020,715 Ocean vessels--number 259 Ocean vessels--tonnage 121,559 Inland vessels--number 4,558 Inland vessels--tonnage 348,652 Exports--Butter (lb.) 2,598,262 Exports--Cheese (boxes) 301 Exports--Breadstuffs (bushels) 4,563,206 Imports--Teas (lb.) 1,577,179 Imports--Raw sugar (lb.) 18,862,536
1870. Imports $25,680,814 Exports 19,100,413 Ocean vessels--number 680 Ocean vessels--tonnage 316,846 Inland vessels--number 6,345 Inland vessels--tonnage 819,476 Exports--Butter (lb.) 8,127,360 Exports--Cheese (boxes) 99,576 Exports--Breadstuffs (bushels) 13,691,310 Exports--Lumber (value) 528,793 Imports--Teas (lb.) 6,269,071 Imports--Raw sugar (lb.) 51,857,741
1880. Imports $37,073,068 Exports 30,224,673 Ocean vessels--number 710 Ocean vessels---tonnage 628,271 Inland vessels--number 6,489 Inland vessels--tonnage 1,044,380 Exports--Butter (lb.) 20,547,840 Exports--Cheese (boxes) 514,964 Exports--Breadstuffs (bushels) 26,091,130 Exports--Cattle 35,070 Exports--Sheep 64,592 Exports--Lumber (value) 673,481 Exports--Phosphates (tons) 8,667 Imports--Teas (lb.) 4,339,182 Imports--Raw sugar (lb.) 82,551,474
1890. Imports $45,934,406 Exports 31,660,216 Ocean vessels--number 746 Ocean vessels--tonnage 930,332 Inland vessels--number 5,162 Inland vessels--tonnage 966,959 Exports--Butter (lb.) 3,243,920 Exports--Cheese (boxes) 1,379,684 Exports--Breadstuffs (bushels) 13,550,974 Exports--Cattle 123,136 Exports--Sheep 43,135 Exports--Lumber (value) 3,039,963 Exports--Phosphates (tons) 23,488 Imports--Teas (lb.) 7,020,076 Imports--Raw sugar (lb.) 136,874,550
PORT OF MONTREAL
Combined Statement Showing the Number and Tonnage of all Vessels that Arrived in Port During Ten Years--1901 to 1913:
Trans-Atlantic Maritime Provinces Inland Grand Total Year Vessels Tonnage Vessels Tonnage Vessels Tonnage Vessels Tonnage
1901 449 1,016,918 293 436,130 8,450 1,683,186 9,192 3,136,334 1902 436 1,072,538 322 468,734 9,395 1,885,150 10,153 3,426,522 1903 484 1,418,156 318 472,748 15,358 2,415,791 16,140 4,306,695 1904 417 1,270,640 379 586,057 10,063 2,354,975 10,859 4,211,672 1905 442 1,354,829 391 585,227 11,112 2,785,551 11,945 4,725,607 1906 439 1,380,835 381 592,388 12,557 3,095,174 13,377 5,068,395 1907 381 1,339,014 361 586,972 14,420 3,620,950 15,161 5,546,936 1908 364 1,315,688 375 642,916 12,434 3,589,124 13,173 5,548,028 1909 371 1,436,963 299 474,450 10,991 3,146,494 11,661 5,057,907 1910 411 1,658,414 336 574,808 13,636 4,327,799 14,383 6,561,021 1911 401 1,695,613 361 642,639 11,670 4,275,019 12,432 6,613,271 1912 409 1,775,487 327 628,437 12,586 4,649,767 13,322 7,053,691 1913 477 2,020,333 343 670,202 13,426 5,703,467 14,246 8,394,002
Statement Showing Classification of Vessels that Arrived in Port for Ten Years, from the Lower St. Lawrence and Martime Provinces.
Steamships Barques Schooners Grand Total Year No. Tonnage No. Tonnage No. Tonnage Nos. Tonnage
1901 282 434,140 1 999 10 991 293 436,130 1902 311 406,671 ---- ---- 11 1,063 322 468,734 1903 303 468,100 ---- ---- 15 4,648 318 472,748 1904 366 582,819 ---- ---- 13 3,238 379 586,057 1905 364 580,485 ---- ---- 26 4,116 391 585,127 1906 367 588,980 ---- ---- 14 3,408 381 592,388 1907 343 579,930 ---- ---- 18 7,042 361 586,972 1908 350 640,244 ---- ---- 25 2,672 375 642,916 1909 273 470,936 ---- ---- 26 3,514 299 474,450 1910 346 572,022 ---- ---- 30 2,786 336 574,808 1911 330 639,752 ---- ---- 31 2,887 361 642,639 1912 292 625,099 ---- ---- 35 3,388 327 628,457 1913 299 666,053 ---- ---- 44 4,149 343 670,202
FOOTNOTES:
[1] “Canadian Antiquarian,” 1873, Vol. II, pp. 16-21.
[2] The Dock, one of the largest yet built, is capable of docking the largest existing vessel in the British Navy. It is of the double-sided self-docking type, on the principle known as the “bolted sectional.” It consists of a pontoon or lifting portion of the dock, and two parallel side walls, built on to and forming part of the same, and the whole length is divided into three complete and separate sections, which, when bolted together, form the complete dock. These sections are so arranged that when the dock is separated into its three parts, any two of them can dock the remaining third between them. For this purpose each section is fitted with its own independent pumping machinery, so that it can also act as an independent unit.
The general dimensions of the dock are as follows:--
Ft. In. Length over platforms 600 0 Length over pontoons 550 6 Width over all 135 0 Depth of pontoon at center 17 0 Length of side walls 470 6 Height of side walls above pontoon deck 42 0 Width of side walls at base 17 6 Width of side walls at top 12 6 Clear width between roller fenders 100 0 Draught of vessel 27 6 Lifting capacity 25,000 tons
The construction of the dock is such as to make it suitable for lifting a modern British battleship, the pontoon deck being specially stiffened to allow it to support a large portion of the weight of the vessel on side or bilge, as well as central, keels.
In the season of 1914, 27 vessels were repaired.
In addition a ship building yard has been built in 1914 with five or six miles of railroad connecting with the C.P.R., C.N.R., and G.T.R. lines. At present a gigantic million dollar ice breaker, the second in the world, is being built by this firm for the Dominion government to be launched in 1915. In addition a bucket dredge costing $835,000 has been ordered by the Government for delivery in June, 1916.
XL. TRANSPORTATION BY RAIL
IV
MONTREAL AND THE RAILWAYS OF CANADA
MONTREAL THE CENTRE OF RAILWAY COMMUNICATION--THE FIRST RAILWAY--THE SNAKE RAIL AND THE “KITTEN”--“THE CHAMPLAIN AND THE ST. LAWRENCE”--THE SECOND RAILWAY, THE ATLANTIC AND ST. LAWRENCE--THE AMALGAMATION INTO THE GRAND TRUNK RAILWAY COMPANY.
1. ITS HISTORY--ITS PRESIDENTS--AN INTERESTING REPORT AT CONFEDERATION--NEW FREIGHT YARDS--CHAS. M. HAYS AND THE GRAND TRUNK PACIFIC RAILWAY--THE BUILDING OF THE VICTORIA BRIDGES BY THE GRAND TRUNK RAILROAD.
2. THE CANADIAN PACIFIC RAILWAY--ITS FINANCIERS--TWIN TO CONFEDERATION--OPPOSITION TO PROMOTERS--EARLY FINANCIAL DIFFICULTIES--NO BIG FORTUNES MADE--ROLLING STOCK--A REAL EMPIRE BUILDER--HELPING NEW INDUSTRIES--HUGE LAND HOLDINGS--IRRIGATION OF BARREN LANDS.
3. OTHER SYSTEMS--THE “INTERCOLONIAL”--THE CANADIAN NORTHERN AND ITS MOUNTAIN TUNNEL.
Night and day from January 1st to December 31st, year in and year out, the heavily loaded passenger and freight trains pass into and out of the railway terminals of Montreal, bearing to their various destinations millions of human beings and thousands of tons of freight.
Altogether eight important railways have entrance to Montreal at the time of writing, while yet another transcontinental line, the Canadian Northern, is planning a new and imposing terminal in connection with the tunnelling of Mount Royal, which is the most important engineering undertaking in Montreal projected since the construction of the Victoria tubular bridge. At the present time the Canadian Pacific, the Grand Trunk, the Intercolonial, the Canadian Northern, the New York Central, the Rutland, the Delaware & Hudson, and the Central Vermont railroads are all running trains directly into Montreal. The railway freight yards are crowded with cars bearing the initials of practically every road of any importance on the continent.
This huge business in carrying, of such vital importance to the city of Montreal, yet so little appreciated, because of our familiarity with it, is less than a century old, for the success of the locomotive was not admitted until the opening of the Liverpool & Manchester Railway in 1830. On the news of this the first railway in Canada, the Champlain & St. Lawrence, was chartered in 1831 to run from La Prairie to St. Johns, P.Q., and opened for traffic with horses in 1836 and first worked by the locomotives in 1837. Its length was only sixteen miles.
The rails were of wood with flat bars of iron spiked on them, and from the tendency of this class of rail to curl or bend upwards as the wheels passed over it, it became known as the snake rail. The first locomotive used on the line was sent from Europe, accompanied by an engineer, who for some unexplained reason had it caged up and secreted from the public eye.
The trial trip was made by moonlight in the presence of a few interested parties and it is not described as a success. Several attempts were made to get the “Kitten,” for such was the nick-name applied to this pioneer locomotive, to run to St. Johns, but in vain: the engine proved refractory and horses were substituted for it.
It is related that a practical engineer being called in from “the States,” the engine which was thought to be hopelessly unmanageable, was pronounced in good order, requiring only plenty of wood and water. This opinion proved correct, for after a little practice the extraordinary rate of speed of twenty miles per hour was obtained. It was a “strap” rail until 1847 when the heavy T-iron was laid.
The Champlain & St. Lawrence Railway, thus inaugurated the railway era of Canada in the year 1832, and the line continued to be operated as a separate and distinct organization for just forty years. In 1872 it was made a part of the Grand Trunk Railway, and it is operated as a part of the Grand Trunk organization at the present time.
The Atlantic & St. Lawrence Railroad followed the Champlain & St. Lawrence. Although not a Canadian railroad, this line had a tremendous influence on the development of the country, since it gave the Canadian people access for the first time to an all-the-year-round port. Halifax and St. John were yet mere villages without any rail communication with the industrial heart of the country, separated from it by that vast stretch of then undeveloped and almost unexplored country which we now recognize as lower Quebec and upper New Brunswick. The Atlantic & St. Lawrence line gave access to the port of Portland, running from that city through a thriving agricultural country to Norton Mills, Vermont, just on the Canadian border. Norton Mills and La Prairie, now merely villages without any special importance, were at this period in Canada’s growth railway terminals of consequence.
The Atlantic & St. Lawrence road was built with a purpose. It was chartered in 1845, and long before it was completed, in 1852, to be exact, the Grand Trunk Railway of Canada was granted a charter by the Provinces of Upper and Lower Canada, which, with subsequent additions, provided for the construction of the present Grand Trunk line between Riviere du Loup, Quebec, and Sarnia, Ontario.
The Atlantic & St. Lawrence Railroad was completed about 1860, and was at once leased for a period of 999 years to the Grand Trunk Railway. This gave the Canadian people unbroken stretches of railroad from Portland, Maine, and from Riviere du Loup to Montreal, and on this foundation the present huge transportation business of this city has been erected. The people of Canada recognized the importance of this development by grants of cash and mail subsidies to the line.
In point of age, therefore, the Grand Trunk Railway claims priority over all the Canadian railways now existing, and the road may be said to be the pioneer railway of Canada.
THE GRAND TRUNK RAILWAY
The first meeting of the Grand Trunk Railway Company of Canada was held in the City of Quebec on Monday, July 11, 1853. The Hon. John Ross was appointed president of the road; Benjamin Holmes was made vice president, while Sir C.P. Roney became managing director and secretary-treasurer.
The following is a list of the presidents and general managers of the road, with their dates of service:
Presidents. Dates of Service. Hon. Jno. Ross 1852-1862 Sir Edward Watkin, Bart 1862-1869 Richard Potter 1869-1876 Sir Henry W. Tyler 1876-1895 Sir Charles Rivers-Wilson 1895-1910 Chas. M. Hays 1910-1912 E.J. Chamberlin 1912-
General Managers. Dates of Service. Sir C.P. Roney (Man. Dir.) 1853- T.E. Blackwell (Man. Dir.) 1853-1862 C.J. Brydges (Man. Dir.) 1862-1874 Sir Joseph Hickson 1874-1890 L.J. Seargeant 1891-1896 Chas. M. Hays 1896-1901 Geo. B. Reeve 1901- Chas. M. Hays (Vice Pres. and Gen. Mgr.) 1902-1912
(Since January 1, 1910, Mr. Alfred W. Smithers has been Chairman of the Board of Directors in London, England--a new departure in the organization.)
In order to gain insight into the conditions under which the railway was operating, Sir Henry Tyler, who later became president of the road, paid an official visit to the Dominion in 1867 under instructions from the Board of Directors. Sir Henry’s report gives some interesting information about the road as it then existed.
He found that the Grand Trunk at that time comprised a total length of 1,377 miles. In addition to the water routes hereinbefore mentioned, the chief competitor in Canada of the company was the Great Western Railway Company, extending from Niagara Falls to Sarnia, Ontario, and to Detroit, Michigan. As a result of this competition Sir Henry reported (1867) that the rates for freight service averaged 0.92 of a cent per ton per mile--flour being carried between Montreal and Toronto as low as a cent per ton per mile. The average rate on the Grand Trunk System for the year 1910 was 0.69 of a cent per ton per mile.
The average number of freight cars to a train was then reported as 15.5; the average net load of each train as 150 tons.
The records for 1910 show an average of 26.6 freight cars per train and the average weight of “revenue” freight carried, per train, was 299 net tons.
The original gauge of the Grand Trunk was five feet six inches, except that portion between Port Huron and Detroit, where the “narrow gauge” of four feet eight and one-half inches was used. Sir Henry’s report recommended the adoption of the wider gauge for the whole of the road, bringing it into conformity with the other lines on the continent.
The year of Sir Henry’s visit was also the year of Confederation, and this change, which had so tremendous an effect upon Canada’s history, had also an important bearing upon the history of the Grand Trunk Railway. The new Dominion Government, being desirous of opening up the country purchased on the 17th of July, 1879, that portion of the Grand Trunk road which lies between Riviere du Loup and Point Levis, with the object of making it a portion of the new Government road, which subsequently became the Intercolonial Railway.
With the proceeds of this sale the Grand Trunk agreed to construct a line between Port Huron, Michigan, and Chicago. The International Bridge Company undertook another great engineering feat in 1857, in the building of the Niagara River Bridge, between Fort Erie and Buffalo. This bridge was completed in 1873, and entirely rebuilt to accommodate the heavier traffic in 1900. The two systems of railways, the Grand Trunk and Great Western, were amalgamated into the present system under agreement dated August 12, 1882.
The directors started out in 1889 to make the Grand Trunk the longest double tracked system on this continent, and the line is now double tracked from St. Rosalie, a point thirty-eight miles east of Montreal and St. Johns, twenty-seven miles south, to Chicago, an unbroken double tracked run of 907 miles. With other double tracked lines connecting principal cities the Grand Trunk is now in possession of 1,037 miles of duplicate tracks.
The Grand Trunk owns and controls ten grain elevators in various parts of the Dominion and the United States, having a total capacity of 20,000,000 bushels of grain. The latest of these, an elevator with a capacity of 5,500,000 bushels, is located at Fort William, and was built in connection with the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway.
The four principal bridges owned by the Company, the Victoria Bridge, the Coteau Landing Bridge, the steel arch bridge across Niagara Gorge, and the International Bridge across the Niagara River, have a total length of 16,653 feet, and the railway owns other bridges in different parts of the continent, which have a total of 18.43 miles.
Recent improvements and developments of the line in the city and district of Montreal include the erection of the magnificent new offices on McGill Street and the promotion, in connection with the Jacques Cartier Union Railway, of a belt line around the city. Also, in 1892, the company secured control of the Canadian Express Company, which now operates over all the Grand Trunk and connecting lines from Montreal.
In order to better the existing conditions of handling its train service, and to relieve as much as possible the already heavily worked yards and general freight terminals, both at Point St. Charles and on the Mountain Street to Chaboillez Square freight sidings, the company has constructed two extensive systems of freight yard tracks. One of these is located at Southwalk, about two miles east of the passenger station at St. Lambert, and the other is at Turcot, in Notre Dame de Grace Ward of the City of Montreal. At St. Lambert there is an aggregate of about twenty-seven miles of new sidings, and at Turcot, twenty-two miles of new tracks have been laid down.
It is an interesting feature of these yards that no shunting or switching movements is done on the main lines.
So far this chapter has dealt exclusively with the Grand Trunk Railway System proper, and no mention has been made of that momentous period of the railway history of the Dominion in which we now live and which followed the agreement entered into between the Grand Trunk Railway and the Dominion Government. This agreement provided for the construction of a railroad clear across Canada, from Moncton, New Brunswick to Prince Rupert, British Columbia, wholly within Canadian territory. The project was conceived by the late President Chas. M. Hays, of Montreal, who was one of the victims of the Steamship Titanic disaster.
The new line, known as the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway, is now practically complete and is already operating over the major portion of its road, there being a fine passenger and freight service between Ft. William, Ontario, and Prince Rupert, British Columbia. Its construction marks the most important development of the Grand Trunk, since the amalgamation with the Great Western Railway of Canada, and it is expected to make the Pioneer Railway of Canada one of the greatest forces in the development of the country, the uniting of East with West into one huge harmonious whole.
The Grand Trunk Pacific Railway was incorporated October 24, 1903, following the contract entered into between the G.T.R. and the Dominion Government, on July 29th of the same year, providing for the construction of the line as a joint government and Grand Trunk enterprise.
Roughly the terms under which this huge work is being carried out are as follows: The railway is divided into two sections, Eastern and Western. The Western Division, extending from Winnipeg to Prince Rupert, is subdivided into the Prairie and Mountain sections, and the entire line has been constructed by the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway Company.
The Eastern Division, 1,804 miles in length, is being constructed by the Canadian Government, under supervision of the Commissioners of the Transcontinental Railway. It links Moncton with Winnipeg, and thus gives the company a clear coast to coast line. Upon the completion of the work, the Government leases the Eastern Section to the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway for a period of fifty years, on the following terms:
For the first seven years of the said term, the Company shall operate the same subject only to payment of “Working Expenditures;” for the next succeeding forty-three years the company shall pay annually to the government, by way of rental, a sum equal to 3 per cent per annum upon the cost of construction of the said division, provided that if, in any one or more of the first three years of the said period of forty-three years the net earnings of the said division, over and above “Working Expenditure” shall not amount to 3 per cent of the cost of construction, the difference between the net earnings and the rental shall not be payable by the company, but shall be capitalized and form part of the cost of construction, upon the whole amount of which cost a rental is required to be paid at the rate aforesaid after the first ten years of the said lease, and during the remainder of the said term.
All the branch lines of the Eastern Division will be constructed by and at the cost of the company.
The company is responsible for the construction of all lines west of Winnipeg, the Government guaranteeing the principal and interest of three-quarters of the cost of the main line from Winnipeg to the Pacific Coast terminus at Prince Rupert, B.C., for fifty years, but with the limitation that such three-quarters of the cost shall not exceed thirteen thousand dollars per mile on the Prairie Section--with no limitation, however, in regard to the cost of the Mountain Section. The Grand Trunk Railway Company of Canada has guaranteed the principal and interest for fifty years of the balance required to complete the main line of the Western Division.
The line has created a new seaport on the Pacific, which will give a further impetus to our already immense trade with Japan and the other commercial countries of the Orient, as well as opening a fresh route to Australasia which cannot but help bind in closer union the British Dominions of Australia and New Zealand, already closely related to us by the splendid sentiment of Empire. It opens up splendid new wheat fields in the Prairie Provinces of Manitoba, Saskatchewan and Alberta, and taps also immensely valuable coal and agricultural areas in British Columbia. Through its branches it reaches the already created industrial and commercial centres of the great West, while its fleet of steamships links Prince Rupert with the other Pacific Coast ports, both on the Canadian and the United States shores. With the example of the growth of the Western United States since adequate rail facilities were provided for their cities and towns before us, it is difficult indeed to see how the Grand Trunk Pacific Railway can fail to establish itself as a dominant factor in the growth of Western Canada, a growth which at this view it is impossible to estimate and which only time can show.
Before passing from the history of the Grand Trunk Railway, a place must be given to the record of the great engineering feat in transportation effected by them. Previous to the building of the first tubular Victoria bridge erected by this company over the St. Lawrence at Montreal, the only communication with the Grand Trunk lines hitherto, was by ferry to Longueuil, then the terminus. Passengers and freight were carried on barges across the St. Lawrence. In winter sleighs were used across the ice. In a period of one to three weeks in the spring this crossing was either abandoned or very dangerous in the break up of the ice.
THE VICTORIA BRIDGES
As early as 1847 the Hon. John Young had desired to erect a bridge. In 1851 he used the opinion and report of Mr. Thomas C. Keefer, a Canadian, on the practicability of building a bridge over the St. Lawrence in the position eventually chosen and based on the findings of his report.[1]
In 1852 Mr. A.M. Ross, C.E., the engineer of the Victoria Bridge, came to Canada on behalf of English capitalists. He was met at Quebec by Sir John Young who took him to Montreal to inspect the locality for a bridge. Mr. Ross suggested an iron tubular bridge, took soundings and plans of the bridge as designed by him and returned in the fall.
Mr. Robert Stephenson, the consulting engineer, and a son of George Stephenson, the great railway pioneer, came to Montreal in 1853 and at a complimentary dinner, he said:
“I cannot sit down without referring to the all-important subject of a bridge over your magnificent river. Abundance of information was brought over to me in England by my esteemed friend, Ross, during the last visit he paid to that country so that I was able to get a good notion of what the bridge was to be before I came out here.
“I had been here twenty-five years before and the St. Lawrence seemed to be like the sea, and I certainly never thought of bridging it.” On the same occasion he said: “I assure you I appreciate your kindness most amply and one of the proudest days of my life will be that when I am called upon to confer with the engineers of the Grand Trunk Railway on bridging the St. Lawrence.”
The stone for the first pier of the Victoria Bridge was laid on July 22, 1854, by Sir. C.P. Roney, the first secretary of the Grand Trunk, along with Vice President Benjamin Holmes, Mr. James Hodge, the builder, Mr. A.M. Ross, C.E., the engineer, and other gentlemen who were also joined by Lady Roney, Mrs. Hodge and Mrs. Maitland, each taking the trowel and assisting in preparing the mortar board for the first stone in the first pier in the great construction. Of the enormous difficulties in building it and the danger by accidents, a dozen at least having been killed, we say nothing beyond that the contractors had to contend with a rapid stream two miles broad and with enormous shoves of ice.
One of those employed on the construction says: “There were hundreds of men employed--many of them being Indians. The latter manned the rafts that brought the timber down from Nun’s Island, although, of course, it came from the west, at the first go-off. We got our timber from the west and our stone from Pointe Claire.
“The first year’s work was entirely swept away. We had made good progress with the under work and the crib work.
“Hundreds of men had worked all spring, summer and fall. The work was well advanced and the contractors were congratulating themselves that they would be able to fulfill their contract on time; but the ice came down in the winter with a rush and carried everything before it--crib work, material, coffer dams--everything that had been done or set up. The loss was great, but the loss of time was the most important.
“That necessitated another year in the duration of the contract. The latter called for completion in five years. It was now seen that six would be required. But nobody could be blamed, and the contractors set to work with a will, and did the work over again.”
The first crossing was made on November 24, 1859, when the first to cross were Vice President Holmes, Hon. George Etienne Cartier, James Hodges, A. M. Ross, Walter Shanly, Messrs. Gzowski, Macpherson, Forsyth, Captain Rhodes and others. The last stone was laid and the last rivet driven on August 25, 1860, by the young Prince of Wales, afterward King Edward VII. On the occasion a grand banquet was held near the bridge, at which addresses were given by the Prince, the Duke of Newcastle, Mr. A.M. Ross, Mr. Hodges and others. To commemorate the event Mr. Blackwell had a medal prepared by the chief engineer of Her Majesty’s seals, a gold one of which was presented to the Prince and a bronze one to each of the officers of the Grand Trunk Railway.
It bears a fine impression in relief of the Prince as he then was, and the words, “Welcome Albert Edward, Prince of Wales. Visited Canada and inaugurated the Victoria Bridge, 1860.”
The first train with passengers traversed the bridge December 17, 1859.
This structure was 9,184 feet long, of twenty-three spans of 242 feet and one in the center of 330 feet.
Sir George Etienne Cartier, before being knighted, was asked by Queen Victoria at Windsor, “Mr. Cartier, I hear that the Bridge at Montreal is a very fine structure. How many feet is it from shore to shore?”
The reply was pleasing to Her Majesty. “When we Canadians build a bridge and dedicate it to Your Majesty we measure it, not in feet, but in miles!”
The difficulties connected with the building of the bridge were greater than they would be today. The facilities and the machinery necessary were comparatively crude and inadequate. The bridge itself was in the nature of an experiment; nor was it designed in the original plan, for a tubular bridge. The plans were altered several times during the progress of the work. It needed the genius of George Stephenson, which had to be invoked, to make the plan realizable.
But when the bridge was completed, it was almost instantly seen what a boon it was to the whole country. Trade began to pick up. Population increased. The Grand Trunk was extended. Towns began to grow, and this great enterprise, brought to a successful conclusion, encouraged other enterprises to follow.
It may be said that the building of the bridge brought out the first of the British immigrants. Here and there, there might have been a few, but the bridge opened up such possibilities of expansion as encouraged people to come out, and especially skilled men, who began to settle in the neighborhood of Point St. Charles, forming the nucleus of that population which, today, preserves the sturdy characteristics of the men who founded what was then a distinct colony. The building of the bridge meant the extension of the Grand Trunk shops, the giving of increased employment, and the setting up of a big town on the other side of the canal.
Before many years the growth of traffic called for the replacement of this dark tubular bridge by the present openwork steel bridge, with double tracks, carriage ways and foot walks which now stand on the piers which held the old bridge. The Royal Victoria Jubilee Bridge was opened for traffic on December 13, 1908.
The chief engineer of this bridge was Mr. Joseph Hobson, now consulting engineer of the Grand Trunk Railway System. The contractors were the Detroit Bridge and Iron Company for the whole of the superstructure and for the construction of nineteen spans of it, including the center one. The remaining six spans were constructed by the Dominion Bridge Company of Montreal.
The masonry required for the enlargement of the abutments and piers was built by Mr. William Gibson.
The work was commenced in October, 1897, by the erection of the span on the west end, the structure being built completely around the tube of the old bridge, the latter being cleverly utilized as a roadway. Traffic never ceased except for twenty hours during the whole construction, the longest delay being two hours. The old bridge weighed 9,044 tons, the new 20,000 tons. The width of the old bridge was sixteen feet, the new one sixty-six feet eight inches. The height of the former superstructure was eighteen feet, that of the new superstructure over all is from forty to sixty feet. The new bridge ranks among the foremost constructions of present engineering progress.
On October 16, 1901, the son of Edward VII, the Duke of York, and Cornwall, now George V, visited the bridge with the Duchess, now his Queen.
Though the Grand Trunk Railway is the pioneer railroad of Canada, it was greatly assisted by English capitalists, although Montrealers played a prominent part.
THE CANADIAN PACIFIC RAILWAY
The history and development of the Canadian Pacific Railway shows, however, a still closer connection with Montreal. The great line was born in this city, reared through an infancy of tremendous difficulties here, and has always, and probably will always, have its headquarters in this city. Though four of the original syndicate, J.S. Kennedy, of New York; J.J. Hill, of St. Paul; Morton Rose and Company, of New York, and Kohn Reinach, of Paris, were not citizens, yet the four others were good Montrealers, Lord Strathcona, then plain Donald A. Smith, Lord Mount Stephen, then George Stephen, Duncan McIntyre, and R.B. Angus, who, as faithful guardians, risked their very financial existence that it should become a strong, self-supporting institution, able to stand on its own legs. That their belief in the future of this splendidly virile institution was justified, everyone now realizes, but it is nevertheless a fact that the general opinion of some of the wisest of Canada’s wise men at the time of its commencement was that the C.P.R. would never be finished, or if it should crawl through its first few years of existence, it would never earn sufficient net profits to pay its bills for axle grease.
Born in the midst of political turmoil, pulled through a puling and precarious infancy only by tremendous personal sacrifice on the part of those responsible for its existence, this organization is now one of the leading corporations of the entire world, its ramifications reaching clear around the globe and its annual income counted in figures which stagger the mind of the average man.
The C.P.R. owes its tremendous success to the imagination of its sponsors, and to nothing else. When it was brought into being, the developed portion of Canada was well served by the Grand Trunk Railway and its connecting lines. There was no room for another railway among the established markets of what is now called Eastern Canada. But the men who created the C.P.R. out of their hopes and their belief in the future of the country, looked beyond the East. Between Ontario and the Pacific Coast, according to popular superstition at that time there lay nothing but trackless, ice bound wastes, of no value to man or beast, and cut off from the balmy climate of British Columbia by the impenetrable fastnesses of the Rocky Mountains. The original syndicate and their executive led by William Van Horne, the great constructive railroad genius of the nineteenth century, thought differently. For one thing they had already had experience of the possibilities of the Western United States, because of certain railroad transactions conducted by them in that territory, and they believed that the possibilities of Western Canada were every bit as great. Neither ridicule nor abuse could shake them from their determination, and they literally rammed their convictions down the throat of an only half willing Dominion Government, to what end we all know.
The project of a line connecting the railway system of Canada with the seaboard of British Columbia was one of the chief inducements held out to that province to enter into Confederation. At several periods between Confederation and the year 1880 the Dominion Government had before it very strong schemes for the construction of a transcontinental line, but none of them proved effective until what was known as the Canadian Pacific Syndicate finally entered into a definite contract in 1880 for the construction of the road. The financial arrangements were largely in the hands of the Montrealers already mentioned, George Stephen, Donald A. Smith, R.B. Angus, and Duncan McIntyre.
As the Macdonald Government allied itself with the C.P.R. proposals, the railroad was for some time classed by the public as a Tory organization, but for the last twenty years the C.P.R. has held itself aloof from all party politics. In the early days, however, it was not surprising that opponents were vehement in opposition. They condemned the scheme unsparingly, declaring that it would never pay expenses. Their predictions of ruin and disaster and the pessimistic attitude of influential parties in England, no doubt, led the Canadian Government to grant a larger aid to the enterprise in order to increase the chances of ultimate success. The company was incorporated in 1881. Its endowment consisted of 25,000,000 acres of land in western Canada and $25,000,000 in cash. It was also presented with some 700 miles of railway, which the Government had constructed at a cost of $35,000,000. The railway mileage taken over represented less than one-fourth of the amount necessary to connect Montreal and Vancouver. The cash subsidy of $25,000,000 represented considerably more than a cash subsidy of that amount would represent today, for thirty years ago a dollar in cash had a much larger purchasing power. With reference to the land grant, it can safely be said that, when the company was formed in 1881, few realized its value.
The names of two men must be connected with the successful fortunes of the company, William Van Horne, who was elected general manager, and Thomas Shaughnessy, appointed purchasing agent. Their humble offices were first in the Imperial Building, on St. James Street, opposite Place d’Armes Square. The general offices were next removed to Victoria Square, to the old Albert Building. Things did not progress in the early stages, but fine optimism marked these men.
At one of the early annual meetings there was great consternation. The small stockholders were alarmed and Mr. Donald McMaster spoke out indignantly for them. Then up rose Sir Donald Smith and said:
“Gentlemen: I would be a richer man today if I had never touched or seen the C P.R.; but I am not going to go back on it now. On the contrary, my faith, which has never wavered, is stronger than ever. I fully and unwaveringly believe in the C.P.R. I believe in its future. I believe that in a very short time, it will be the greatest earner in the Dominion of Canada. Mark my words. Retain your holdings. Do not give way to depression. The moment is unpropitious, owing to the general depression; but the clouds will lift; and you will be thankful, in the course of a year or so, that you held on to your stock.”
The bad times passed, the corporation turned the corner, the earnings increased. Lord Mount Stephen retired, Sir William Van Horne became president, Sir Thomas Shaughnessy became first assistant, then general manager, and finally president. David McNicoll moved up from assistant passenger agent to general passenger agent until he became manager and vice president.
One remarkable feature of the history of the C.P.R. is that no one of the men who financed the road in the beginning, has made anything like a big fortune out of it, in spite of the tremendous success which has crowned the undertaking. Lord Mount Stephen sold the three or four thousand shares he held in the company when he retired in 1885, at fifty-three. Lord Strathcona, of course, retained his connection with the line, and drew his dividends on the five thousand shares he held, but he did not make what might be even considered a reasonable return for the staking of his financial existence, and the same thing applies to other men who have directed the affairs of the company from time to time.
At the time of the incorporation of the road in 1881 the capital was $5,000,000. Today it is $200,000,000 and every cent of it needed to provide for the development of the corporation. In 1882 two stock issues totalling $60,000,000 worth of stock were made, to complete the road. Three years later, on November 7, 1885, Lord Strathcona drove the last spike and the road was officially opened, and its splendid history began.
In 1886 the gross earnings of the road were $8,368,493. In 1911 the gross earnings were $104,167,808, crossing the hundred million mark for the first time in the road’s history. This growth has continued in corresponding ratio, though partially effected by the international war of 1914.
In 1886 the mileage controlled by the C.P. R, was 4,315 miles. Its rolling stock in its principal divisions in 1886, was totalled as follows:
Locomotives, 336; freight cars, 7,835; no steamships.
In 1914, the line owned rolling stock as follows:
Locomotives, 2,248; freight cars, 88,000; first and second class passenger cars, baggage cars and colonist sleeping cars, 2,174; sleepers, dining and cafe cars, 502; conductors’ vans, 1,427; work cars, shovels, etc., 5,850.
The total mileage owned and controlled by the line, up to June 30, 1914, was 18,050 miles, and the passenger cars could move simultaneously 165,000 people.
In the course of its development, the C.P.R. has been extremely fortunate in being able to secure for its directorate men of broad vision. Thus it is that this railroad which is more than a railroad, and this corporation which is in operation an Empire Builder of the truest type, has found occasion in the course of its existence to put its energy to work in directions which the average railroad never dreams of. The scope of a great transcontinental railroad is wide enough in ordinary circumstances, but the policy of the C.P.R. has been to extend its activities in every direction where it appeared that the interests of the Dominion, which are indissolubly united with the interests of the road, might be advanced. In pursuance of this plan we get its immigration and land development policy, which is unique on the Continent.
One of the first notable efforts of the road in this direction was its aid to the cattle ranching industry in Alberta. By means of low rates and the special facilities offered by the line to cattle ranchers the great beef industry which founded the prosperity of Alberta was nurtured and developed until it grew to be a feature of Canada in the minds of uninitiated Old Country people, and to the regular impression of snow and Indians which prevailed in the average Englishman’s mind in the ’80s, was added the romantic idea of cowboys. After cattle, came wheat and here again the railroad aided the farmers in all possible directions, realizing that in the prosperity of the inhabitants of the territory which it served, lay its own future greatness.
In a thousand and one ways the great railroad has advanced the various interests of the West. Its splendid immigration organization has seconded the efforts of the Dominion Bureau in London. Each year at harvest time it transports tens of thousands of labourers from Eastern Canada to the West to help harvest its crops, and as an instance of the lengths to which the road is prepared to go in order to advance the interests of the great community from which it draws the greater part of its wealth, there may be taken the case of the Winnipeg water scheme.
Some years ago the City of Winnipeg desired to install an expensive plant to improve its water supply. The undertaking was a huge one, planned to meet the needs of the rapidly growing city for many years to come and the cost was heavy. The C.P.R. donated $200,000 to help defray the expenses, and Winnipeg was duly provided with a water supply which cannot be bettered on the Continent.
The Company’s various interests, outside of its straight railroad work, would make by themselves a huge undertaking for any ordinary commercial organization. It owns coal, copper, lead, and gold mines, big smelting plants in British Columbia and enough timber limits to make any lumber company in the Dominion envious. The hotel section of the Company’s operations, originally planned to provide accommodation for passengers where such accommodation did not exist, have extended until they are a material factor in the Company’s wealth.
The Company’s tremendous land holdings in the West are regarded by many financial experts as its most powerful asset. When these grants were made, or at least such of them as were made to the Company in return for its services in opening up what was then regarded as a barren and trackless waste, it is not likely that anyone, not even excepting the directors themselves, realized the value of the grants. Since the original grants were made other valuable and extensive land areas have been acquired through the purchase of other railways which owned land grants. Altogether the Company now owns over seven million acres of land in Manitoba, Alberta and Saskatchewan and nearly four and a half million acres in British Columbia. These lands have steadily increased in value as the railroad itself developed the country. In 1905 the sales were 509,386 acres at an average of $4.80 per acre. In 1909 the sales of these same lands were 306,083 acres at an average of $10.96. In 1910 the inrush of settlers from the United States and Great Britain served to increase the demand for the C.P.R. lands and 829,609 acres of the unimproved lands sold at $12.78 per acre along with 145,421 acres of irrigated lands at $26.59 per acre. And in 1911, the sales of unimproved land were 631,777 acres at the average of $14.11; and of irrigated lands 19,097 acres were sold at the very satisfactory average of $33.63 per acre. This progressive rise in value is most impressive. Every year without exception shows an increase, and in some years the increase is considerable. It is to be remembered, too, that when the company sells a parcel of land to a good farmer-settler it is just beginning its profitable relations with him. For he will in all probability be a heavy shipper of grain outward over its lines in future years, and he will occasion the shipment of much merchandise inward as well.
The latest and perhaps the greatest work which the C.P.R. has undertaken in connection with its land holdings, is its irrigation scheme, which has transformed nearly one and a half million acres of barren land into fertile farm country, at an outlay of over $15,000,000. The rounding out of the irrigation scheme involves the bringing of the best class of farmers from the United Kingdom or the United States and planting them in the Canadian West, on farms which are “ready made” for them. Demonstration farms are provided to show the best methods of working the land, and everything possible is done to ensure the success of the newcomers’ enterprise. In this manner and by the sale of similar farms to residents of the United States desirous of settling in Canada, the C.P.R. in its latest undertaking is perhaps doing more than ever before to provide Canada with her most pressing need, sturdy self-reliant citizens, and so furthering the cause of Imperial unity which has been the guiding spirit of this splendid enterprise ever since those four Montrealers dreamed their dream of a new Empire plucked from the barren expanse of the Last Great West.
Of the C.P.R. steamship line we speak in its proper place. For the C.P.R. railroad and its attendant enterprises on land, there appears to be an almost limitless future. A rough estimate of the value of its railroad, shipping and hotel systems would not be far wrong if placed at $885,000,000. What the C.P.R. will be doing this time ten years from now, who shall say? With the inspiration of so glorious a past behind them, who can set a limit on the possibilities which will open up for the new rulers of the road’s destinies? The All Red Line so greatly discussed some years ago as a government project already exists in the C.P.R. It is possible to board a C.P.R. train at Windsor Street and to circle the globe, never leaving the sphere of influence of this tremendous organization. A splendid result surely to be attained by the little quartette of dreamers whose idea of a railroad line of Atlantic to Pacific met with so scornful a reception when it was first mooted a bare forty years ago.
THE INTERCOLONIAL RAILWAY
The Intercolonial Railway, which runs from Montreal to Halifax, and the two Sydneys, claims the distinction of being a successful government-owned railroad.
It was originally the North American and European Railroad, which was taken over by the government over half a century ago. There were at that time only about fifty miles of railway. This has been added to from time to time, until the road is now a very considerable one in size and importance. It travels through some of the finest scenery in Canada, and does a heavy tourist business, the sporting country it touches being famous the world over. It is connected with all the big Atlantic seaports, and has grain elevators at St. John, N.B.
The actual trackage owned by the Intercolonial extends westward only as far as St. Rosalie Junction. From there to Montreal the trains have running rights over the Grand Trunk tracks.
The Intercolonial is of importance to Montreal in supplying the means of communication to Halifax during the season of closed navigation.
THE CANADIAN NORTHERN RAILWAY
The Canadian Northern first reached Montreal under the name of the Great Northern Railway of Canada. Its history of the few years preceding is full of interest. Its success has been due to the financial and business ability of two Canadians, Sir William Mackenzie and Sir Donald Mann.
What is now the Canadian Northern Railway had its inception in December, 1906, when the Lake Manitoba Railway and Canal Company built one hundred miles of track between Gladstone and Dauphin, Manitoba, and ran trains over it. The line was a success from its inception, and next year Mackenzie and Mann, famous partners, built under the name of the Manitoba and South Eastern Railway, a line out of Winnipeg running in the direction of Lake Superior. The purchase of the Port Arthur, Duluth & Western line completed the entrance into Port Arthur. The lines of the Northern Pacific Railway in Manitoba were taken over by the Manitoba Government and leased to the Canadian Northern for a period of 999 years, which gave them terminal facilities in Winnipeg and connections to the International Boundary. In 1901, the company which started with one hundred miles of track and a payroll of $650 a month found itself owning and operating 1,200 miles of line and carrying 12,000,000 bushels of grain to the head of navigation at Port Arthur. Extensions to Edmonton and through the valley of the Saskatchewan were planned and the whole huge enterprise bloomed forth one fine morning as the Canadian Northern Railway.
The rapid expansion of this comparatively insignificant railway into a force to be reckoned with when discussing the growth of Western Canada in the short space of five years made even the optimistic Westerners sit up and take notice, but the activities of the two Scotch Ontarians did not stop here. By 1905 the new line had reached Edmonton, having built four bridges across the Saskatchewan River to get there, while in the same year Prince Albert was reached by way of the Swan River and Carrot River valleys. On the way across, the C.N.R. made a city out of Edmonton. When the line was first projected the town had something like 3,000 people. Today it has 45,000 and is still growing.
Saskatoon, Regina and Calgary quickly linked into the chain until the Canadian Northern line west of the Great Lakes had a total mileage of 5,000 miles. Construction joining Vancouver with Edmonton is now being pushed rapidly to completion through the Yellowhead Pass, and the Thompson and Fraser River valleys and will be open for traffic in 1915. Construction is also going on in Ontario which will link Montreal and Ottawa together in a direct line with Port Arthur and the West, the line between Toronto and Ottawa having been opened in January, 1914, making a total mileage of 7,800 for the system at the end of 1914.
The history of the Canadian Northern’s activities in Montreal, still fresh in the minds of our readers, gives a fair index of the spirit in which this line is conducted and managed. The C.N.R. desired an entrance to Montreal for its main line. It was vital that the terminal should be central. Accordingly, the property on Lagauchetiere Street was purchased and a freight terminal at the Haymarket.
So when it was pointed out that Mount Royal stood serene between the C.N. R. line and the C.N.R. terminal, the answer came back: “Run a tunnel through it.” And accordingly, the Montreal Tunnel is now being bored.
Typical also of the whole enterprise is the creation of the new model city of Mount Royal. Obviously a lot of open farm land at the northern entrance to the tunnel promised no profit for the C.N.R. So they bought the land and sold it again in building lots, and just as soon as the first electrical locomotive pulls the first C.N.R. passenger train through the Mount Royal tunnel there will be a new suburb--residences, and shops, and postoffice--all complete ready to feed business into this train and into the thousands which will follow. Of the Canadian Northern steamships mention is made elsewhere.
The other railways mentioned as coming into Montreal, do so on running rights with one or other of the above mentioned railroads.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Mr. Keefer’s name has not been sufficiently connected with those of Ross and Stephenson.
XLI. TRANSPORTATION BY ROAD
I
THE ANCIENT AND MODERN POSTAL SERVICE OF MONTREAL
ANCIENT ROADS--THE “GRAND VOYER”--GOOD ROADS MOVEMENT--THE EVOLUTION OF ROADS--“POST” MASTERS RECOGNIZED IN 1780--THE EARLY POSTAL SYSTEM OF MONTREAL AND BENJAMIN FRANKLIN--BURLINGTON THE TERMINUS--EARLY LETTER RATES--MAIL ADVERTISEMENTS--THE QUEBEC TO MONTREAL POSTAL SERVICE--EARLY POSTOFFICE IN MONTREAL--OCEAN AND RAILWAY MAIL SERVICE--THE PRESENT POSTOFFICE--ITS HISTORICAL TABLETS BY FLAXMAN--THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE POSTAL SYSTEM--THE POSTMASTERS OF MONTREAL.
The question of the transportation of the mails and the origin of the Montreal postal services makes some prefatory remarks on the road system necessary. The early roads were under the Grand Voyer of the province, a sort of surveyor general who had deputies “sous voyers” and surveyors under him. The roads were divided into three classes: (1) Chemins Royaux--post roads or “front” roads, the soil of which belonged to the crown; these generally traversed the “front” of the seignories. (2) Chemins de Ceinture et de Traverse--or back roads, the soil of which belonged to the seigneurs. These ran in the rear and parallel with the royal roads. (3) Chemins de Sortie et de Communications--called also “routes” and by-roads. These were crown roads connecting those in front and rear, also banal roads which were those leading to the seigneury mill.
The office of Grand Voyer was held as early as 1669 by Sieur de Bécanour. It had almost despotic power. This continued until 1832, when his powers were transferred to the road commissioners. In 1841 the roads came under the municipality. The condition of the early roads to Montreal and in Canada were deplorable, and Carleton was compelled to enforce the “individual responsibility” of proprietors and tenants to keep the post roads in repair. These roads were thirty feet wide and the cross roads maintained by joint labor were twenty feet wide. It was not until Sydenham’s time that much improvement was effected, owing to the passive resistance of the French-Canadian to enforced labour. By 1850 good roads ran over the Province in all directions. Not all of them were well made, but most of them were useable for stage traffic which had greatly increased.
The evolution of the Canadian roads (1) the bridle road, (2) the winter road, (3) the corduroy road, (4) the common or graded roads, (5) the turnpike, macadam, gravel and plank is as follows:
The bridle roads were made solely for the use of horsemen, before carriages had been introduced into the more unsettled parts of the country. By their aid the people found their way to religious ceremonies and transported their grain on pack horses to the neighbouring villages. They were made simply by clearing away the branches and trunks of trees so as to allow a horse to pass through the bush.
The winter roads were very important. The Canadian winter with its snow and frost was a blessing to the farmer, giving him a firm, smooth road over which heavy loads could be drawn with ease. Most of the heavy freight was not moved until the winter unless the water routes were accessible. It was in the cold weather that the lumbermen and builders transported their supplies and the farmer carried his crops to market.
The “corduroy” roads were made by placing tree trunks side by side and consequently could be constructed only where there was an abundance of timber. As these trees decayed with time and moisture the roads required constant repair and a great amount of valuable timber was wasted. It was not an uncommon thing for one of these roads to be destroyed in a single season by frost. In many places they actually delayed progress, as they were used as an excuse for delaying the construction of more durable highways. At their best they were rough, very slow and damaging to vehicles, “any attempt at speed being checked by immediate symptoms of approaching dissolution in the vehicle.” The effect on the driver and his passengers appears to have been equally disastrous, the “poor human frame being jolted to pieces.”
The common or graded roads were marked out by fences in the more settled and open districts, and in the woods by wide clearings. They were properly drained and bridged and an attempt was made to reduce steep hills. Although they did not possess an artificial road-bed, they were very serviceable except for the heaviest traffic. Their construction was expensive, however, as they were laid out in straight and direct lines with the idea of overcoming rather than going around obstacles in their path.
In the more settled parts of Canada the construction of the turnpike with its artificial road-bed began with the opening of the nineteenth century. The materials composing the road-bed varied. Gravel was used where convenient. In many districts plank roads were used after the Union, but unless they rested on a bed of sand were a failure owing to the expense of the frequent necessary renewals. The most satisfactory road-bed was of macadam, although in many places Canadian traffic was not heavy enough thoroughly to consolidate the materials used in its construction. The best roads of this kind were those outside of Montreal and Quebec. In Upper Canada the turnpikes were controlled by joint stock companies in the main and were kept in a miserable condition.
Before the War of 1812 the four principal roads in the provinces followed the routes taken later by the railways. The first, connecting Lower Canada with the Maritime Provinces, began at Point Levis, running thence to Temiscouata, whence it ran to Fredericton which it connected with St. John, terminating at Halifax, after traversing a total distance of 718 miles.
The second road followed the route taken later by the Grand Trunk and Great Western Railways, running from Quebec via Montreal, Coteau-du-lac and Cornwall, to Kingston and thence to York. From York it ran to Michillimackinac by way of Fort Erie and Detroit, a total distance of 1,107 miles.
The purpose of the third road, which ran from Montreal to the international boundary line en route to Boston, was later accomplished by the St. Lawrence and Atlantic Railway. The other road twenty-eight miles long connected La Prairie wtih Isle-aux-Noix.
On these roads the conveyances were the calèche and the post chaise. The charge was high, varying from six and one-half cents upward per mile. The first stages in Upper Canada, running between Queenstown and Fort Erie, charged four cents per mile. The original rate from Kingston to York by stage was $18.00 more than the present return first class fare from Montreal to Toronto. The fare between York and Niagara was $5.00. On the roads near Montreal and Quebec moderate rates were charged and a considerable traffic maintained. In the Upper Province however the roads were controlled by Companies who not only charged excessive tolls but kept the roads in poor condition.
Maitres de Poste, or postmasters, were first recognized by law in 1780 and some half a dozen ordinances and acts were passed in their favour or to control them between that date and 1819, when their privilege ceased. The distance between Montreal commonly called sixty leagues was divided into twenty-four stages. The “Maitres de Poste” were obliged to keep four calèches and four carioles. They had the exclusive right of passenger traffic by land, charging twenty to twenty-five cents per league--twelve to fifteen dollars the journey between Quebec and Montreal. Benjamin Franklin when deputy postmaster general of North America in 1766 stated before a committee of the house of commons that the only post road then in Canada was between Montreal and Quebec. The origin of the postal system of Montreal dates from 1763 and is due to the enterprise of Benjamin Franklin, who was then holding an important position in the postal department of the American colonies. Franklin, on hearing that the treaty of Paris had definitely made Canada a sister colony, without waiting for official sanction hurried thither although a man of fifty-seven years of age, not fearing the hardships of the wild journey. In his diary he records that in the spring of 1763 he set out on a tour of inspection of the northern districts under his control and did not stop until he visited Quebec and Montreal where he opened postoffices and arranged for a weekly courier between these towns and New York. His prompt action was afterwards appreciated by the postmaster general of England.
It is difficult to locate the position of the “village” postoffice established by Franklin. The postal communication thus commenced between Canada and the American colonies continued except for a break during the war of 1775 till the colonies had obtained their independence. In November, 1783, a few months after the treaty of peace, mails were restored between England and Canada through the medium of the new postal office at Burlington. This latter now became the terminus of the Canadian courier service. In 1792 the first postal convention between Canada and the United States benefited Montreal, although it was stipulated that the transmission of letters should be by United States fast mail packets and land service by Burlington.
Letters were carried by the packets at four cents from Great Britain to New York, then twenty cents added for the journey to Burlington, with the further charge of twenty cents on to Quebec and twenty cents more was demanded for the further journey through Canada. A letter would then have cost Montrealers about forty-four cents and that only if it consisted of a single sheet of paper and weighed less than an ounce. Above that, the price was quadrupled. A letter that today cost two cents[1] from Liverpool then cost about a dollar and sixty-four cents. But if the British postal service had been used a letter under one ounce would have cost ninety-two cents and above the ounce $3.64.
An advertisement was put in the Montreal papers in 1797 on the 18th of June. “A mail for the upper countries, comprehending Niagara and Detroit will be closed at the office on May 30th at 4 o’clock in the evening to be forwarded from Montreal by the annual winter express on Thursday, 3d February next.” In 1809 an advertisement of this year states, “A passenger may go from Boston to Montreal, a distance of 312 miles, in four days and a half. This line is furnished with the new and convenient stages, good horses and careful drivers.” But the irregularity and slowness of the service in Canada itself called forth loud protests from many merchants who were forced to employ private runners to carry their mail. In 1811 Mr. George Heriot, then Post-Master General, investigated these complaints and his report is descriptive of local conditions:--“The mail is carried from New Brunswick and vice versa by two couriers, one setting out from Quebec and the other from Fredericton once a month in winter and once a fortnight in summer. The distance is 361 miles; the cost of conveying the mails £240. There is one courier once a week between Fredericton and St. John, N.B., eighty-two miles at a cost of £91.5s. There are two packets weekly across the Bay of Fundy between St. John and Digby, 36½ miles at £350. There is one courier twice a week between Digby and Annapolis, twenty miles, and one courier between Annapolis and Halifax once a week, 133½ miles. From the commencement of the present year a communication by post has been opened from Montreal to Kingston. The courier goes once a fortnight and has a salary of £100. A post to York is proposed for six months or during the close of navigation. The post between Quebec and Montreal is despatched twice a week from each of those towns. Eight pence is charged for postage on a single letter from Quebec to Montreal. There are on the road between Quebec and Montreal about twenty-seven persons whose houses are seven or eight miles distant from each other and who keep four or five horses each, not of the best description, and small vehicles with two wheels of a homely and rude construction hung upon bands of leather or thongs of unmanufactured bull’s hide by way of springs. They will with much difficulty contain two persons in front of which a man or boy is placed to guide the horse. The rate at which they go when the roads are favourable is not much more than six miles an hour. The roads are generally in a very bad state as no proper measures are taken for their repair.”
The mail system of that time was a part of the English postal service and the province had no voice in the matter. About 1815-1816 according to Borthwick, “The Montreal postoffice was a room about twelve feet square in St. Sulpice Street near St. Paul. There were no letter boxes; it was all ‘general delivery’ in its crudest form. The few letters laid scattered on a table and had all to be looked at at each application at the door. Very few letters came or went. The mail to Upper Canada was weekly and the seven days’ collection could be contained in one small mailbag. That to Quebec was oftener and larger. The English mail carried in sailing vessels arrived during the summer at periods of from a month and a half to three months apart. In winter it came by New York and was longer on the way. Postage was very dear, about 9d. to Quebec and 5d. to St. Johns, 1s. 6d. to western parts of Canada and 1s. 6d. to lower provinces.
“In 1820 there appeared in the various newspapers an official advertisement signed by a member of the English postal service giving a list of reduced rates between Canada and many foreign countries. The postage on a letter to the various countries of western Europe varying from 3s. 10d. to 4s. 4d. There were no money letters for indeed there was no money in the form convenient for sending thus. A recipient of a letter paid all the postage except in cases when it crossed the United States boundary, when the sender paid as far as the line. There was much private mail carrying, both for pay and free. Anyone traveling to the United States or Upper Canada was expected to fill half his baggage with letters and various articles to persons there.” About 1840 the postoffice at Montreal was at the southwest corner of St. James street and St. Lambert’s Hill.
Montreal and Quebec geographically being some hundreds of miles nearer European ports than New York and Boston, Canadians began on the success of the steam navigation to desire to handle their own mails directly, and on the foundation of the Allan Line in 1856 this was put to practice by fortnightly trips until 1859. In 1859 the Allan Line contracted for a weekly mail to and from Montreal and Quebec in the summer and Portland, Maine, in the winter. Thus began the ocean mail service to us, now so largely developed. The opening of the railway era also assisted the postal facilities. The next location of the postoffice at Montreal was the building constructed in Place d’Armes on the site of the present Banque Provinciale. It was followed by a new location on the southwest corner of St. Francois Xavier and St. James streets, to be followed in 1876 by the present imposing edifice on the corner of St. Francois Xavier and St. James streets, with the equally large annex erected later and situated on Craig and St. Francois Xavier streets. The Montreal postoffice is of proportionate size and efficiency to that of any of the great cities of the world.
The site of the present postoffice is historic and the following tablet has been recently placed to explain the four artistic bas reliefs on the exterior which commemorate it.
JOHN FLAXMAN
Author of these bas reliefs and GREATEST OF BRITISH SCULPTORS was born at York, England, July 6th, 1755. Designed the classical groups on wedgewood-ware. Made a great reputation in Italy. Was the first professor of sculpture at the Royal Academy. Executed the monuments of Burns, Kemble, Mansfield and Paoli in Westminster Abbey, Sir Joshua Reynolds in St. Paul’s, and illustrations of ancient Greek poets. He was elected a Royal Academician in 1800, and died December the 7th, 1826.
These bas reliefs were part of the facade of the building erected on this site for the Bank of Montreal in 1821; later on occupied by La Banque du Peuple from 1846 until 1873 and also of that now occupied by the General Post Office since 1876.
The subjects of the bas reliefs are:--
AGRICULTURE, MANUFACTURERS, ARTS, COMMERCE.
The Montreal postoffice has had under its control for many years subsidiary district postoffices as the growth of population demanded them. In 1900 there were only twenty sub-offices. Today there are ninety-four stations. Its growth can be seen from a few facts.
City Mail: In 1900 there were only 180 letter boxes and ten for newspapers. In 1910 they amounted to 350 and 142 respectively. In 1914 there are 562 letter boxes and 235 news boxes.
English and foreign mail: In 1900 the English mailbags received via New York were from thirty-three to forty-three. In 1910 the number was increased from seventy-five to one hundred. The Canadian steamers bring in at present from 200 to 235 bags. The Compagnie Generale Trans-Atlantique, which brought in ten to fifteen bags now brings forty to sixty. The German line adds seventy to eighty, and there are in addition thirty from other sources.
The directors or postmasters of Montreal have been:
1. 1763-1810 Edward William Gray. He combined the offices of sheriff and postmaster. 2. 1810-1816 F.W. Ermatinger, merchant of Montreal. 3. 1816-1827 James Williams. 4. 1827-1840 Andrew Porteous, dismissed by Lord Sydenham for delaying his Excellency’s courier. 5. 1841-1855 James Porteous. 6. 1855-1861 Jean Baptiste Meilleur. 7. 1861-1874 G.S. Freer. 8. 1874-1891 G. Lamothe. 9. 1891-1899 Arthur Dansereau. 10. 1899-1904 Cleophas Beausoleil. 11. 1904-1911 Henry S. Harwood, ex-M.P. for Vaudreuil. 12. 1911- Hon. L.O. Taillon, Ex-Premier Province of Quebec, and for a time postmaster general of Canada. (L.J. Gaboury in charge of the Eastern division.)
II
STREET TRANSPORTATION
MODERNIZING MONTREAL
MONTREAL IN 1861--THE STREET RAILWAY MOVEMENT--THE “MONTREAL CITY PASSENGER RAILWAY COMPANY” CHARTERED--THE HISTORY OF THE COMPANY--ITS FIRST PROMOTERS--EIGHT PASSENGER CARS, SIX MILES, HORSE SERVICE IN 1861--THE OPENING UP OF THE STREETS--WINTER SERVICE OF SLEIGHS--1892 THE BEGINNING OF ELECTRIC ERA--THE CONVERSION OF THE SYSTEM INTO ELECTRIC TRACTION--THE GRADUAL GROWTH OF THE COMPANY.
Half a century ago no one in his wildest imaginings could have prophesied the amazing growth of the Canadian Metropolis. In 1861, Montreal had a population of but 91,000 and with its suburbs 101,439. It was practically the ancient Montreal, which had scarcely outgrown the days when it was a fortified city crowded within walls to resist the incursions of hostile Iroquois. The city was bounded on the north by the old creek at Craig Street, and did not extend west of Victoria Square.
Today Montreal with its suburbs has a population of approximately 600,000, while the streets which marked its limits fifty years ago are the centre of the downtown business district. Thus within a scant half century the population of Montreal has much more than multiplied five times over, its street mileage has increased in even greater proportion, while practically the whole city has been remodeled and modernized.
They were men of courage and far-sighted ideas who in 1861 decided that the time had come when Montreal needed a street railway. The population was small, business was a mere fraction of that transacted today, and as forbidding as could be found in any city in the world.
But these difficulties did not discourage the founders of the Montreal Street Railway, who had ample belief in the future development of the city, and its consequent opportunities for street railway work. They builded more wisely than they knew however, and could William Molson, John Ostell, William Dow, Johnston Thompson and William Macdonald, the original directors of the company, return to Montreal, attend a meeting of directors at the board room in the Company’s handsome building on Craig Street, and then make a tour of the city in one of their magnificent modern electric cars, they would probably be lost in wonder and admiration. The company they founded used horses. Stables were its power stations, and in winter the service was kept up by sleighs, and in the late fall and early spring by omnibuses. They started with six miles of track, eight cars, a few horses and one stable. To-day they would return to an electric system with hundreds of miles of track extending all over the city and suburbs, huge power stations, an army of uniformed, well paid and cared for employes, and many hundreds of cars which are not merely modern, but so far in advance of the times that the greatest cities of the United States and the world are paying tribute by the adoption of the same style of cars for their service.[2]
The Montreal Street Railway was born with little ceremony, or anything else to mark the beginning of a new epoch for Montreal when, on May 18th, 1861, the Provincial Legislature adopted a law incorporating the Montreal City Passenger Railway Company “for the purpose of constructing and operating street railways in the City and Parish of Montreal.” The provisional directors named in the act of incorporation were William Molson, John Ostell, William Dow, Johnston Thompson, William Macdonald, John Carter, Hon. Thos. Ryan and William E. Phillips. All these have long since passed away, although they lived to see the riper fruition of the works they planned.
On August 9th of the same year a meeting of the subscribers was held at the “Mechanics’ Hall,” at which the following were present:--
William Molson, Thomas Molson, Hon. Judge Gale, Hon. L.H. Molson, William Macdonald, E.M. Hopkins, William McLaren, Charles Garth, J.H. Springle, G. Weaver, William Dow and John Ostell. At this meeting J.H. Springle was appointed the first secretary of the Company.
On August 17th, another meeting was held, at which Alex. Easton was awarded the contract for building the first section of road, comprising six miles of single track, and an equipment of eight passenger cars, a stable and car shed. This may be called the first attempt at modernizing Montreal.
Work was started in September, ground being broken on the 18th, for the line from St. Mary Street, near the Quebec toll gate, and considerable progress made. The arrangement was that Mr. Easton should build the line and operate it for a time under lease. By November 27th, 1861, part of the line was sufficiently advanced to be opened. The road met with immediate success, and was well patronized, although the service, naturally, was slow and the cars infrequent.
Matters having progressed thus far a meeting of the directors was held on November 5th, 1861, when the Company’s stock books were ordered closed, 2,500 shares having been subscribed for at $50 a share, representing a capital of $125,000. Another meeting was held on the next day, when the following were appointed directors: Thomas Morland, E.M. Hopkins, G.W. Weaver, E.S. Freer and John Ostell. Thomas Morland was elected president.
In the following year construction work was continued, and by June 10th, 1862, a line had been completed from Place D’Armes on Notre Dame Street westward, connecting with St. Joseph Street. This was equipped with three horse cars.
On this same day the Company declared its first dividend, at the encouraging rate of 12% per annum for the first year.
On July 4th, 1862, the Company terminated the lease with the contractor, and took over the actual operation of the road, with considerable profit, the earnings far exceeding the lease price.
At this time the head office of the Company was in a small building at the corner of Craig and Place d’Armes, owned by Rev. Mr. Toupin, but in 1863 the Company moved to Hochelaga. But shortly afterwards the head office of the Company was again at Place d’Armes Hill and Craig Street and remained there until 1894 when the present Street Railway Chambers were erected. Thus it may be said that the head office of the Company has been situated at the corner of Place d’Armes Hill and Craig Street since the incorporation of the Company. The terminus of the line was then Hochelaga and the Company spent $300 on an omnibus to connect the cars with the convent. The service in the city was, of course, only a day one, and the cars were pretty far apart. But even then the demands of the service on Craig and St. Antoine streets was such that improvements to the tracks were needed so as to permit of a more frequent service on these streets.
The advantage of the car line was so much appreciated by the public that in this year, 1863, the Company applied to the city for power to build lines on the following streets:--
Commencing at Papineau Avenue, along St. Catherine to Mountain Street with a line in St. Lawrence Street to the Toll Gate to connect with that now constructed on Craig Street, also commencing at St. Joseph Street along McGill Street to Wellington, to the Bridge and possibly to Point St. Charles.
During 1863 the Company carried 1,066,845 passengers, scarcely 1 per cent of the number carried to-day. It was regarded, however, as an excellent showing, and the Company started to build six miles more track, along Wellington, St. Catherine and St. Lawrence streets. The contract for this work was let to Messrs. Plunkett and Brady.
By May 1864 the St. Catherine line was finished, and opened, while eleven additional cars had to be placed on the Notre Dame Street route. Even the track difficulties were felt, and the line on McGill Street had to be renewed.
By the end of 1864 St. Catherine, St. Lawrence and Wellington street lines, comprising 5¾ miles, had been opened, and all proved revenue producers except the last. During that year 1,485,725 passengers had been carried, an increase of about a half a million for the year. In view of the progress made it was decided to issue more stock at par to the old shareholders. At this time the capital stock of the Company was $200,000.
The winter service was being kept up by sleighs, the tracks and appliances preventing the cars from running. The Company had eight sleighs at this time, with five more being built. There were no heating appliances, and in order to keep the passengers warm each sleigh was provided with about a foot of pea straw, in which the people buried their cold feet.
During the early days the cars were run in a rather happy-go-lucky fashion. Time was of little object. The cars would stop anywhere to take up passengers, and if one wanted to get off and talk to a friend or do a little shopping, the obliging conductors would wait and give their horses a rest. But the demands of business were getting too much for this, and in June, 1865, the board decided that in future the cars should not be stopped to allow passengers to go into stores and make purchases and return again, because this kept other passengers waiting.
It was found that the wages paid were too high, and in August, 1865, conductors were reduced from $30 to $25 a month. The conductors petitioned for a return to their old pay of $1 a day, but this was refused, and the Directors reduced the pay of drivers from $25 to $20 a month. At this time Mr. J.H.R. Molson found he had not time to attend to his duties as vice-president, and resigned.
In 1870 the Company celebrated its tenth birthday by issuing $10,000 of new stock pro rata to the old shareholders, and in 1873 $200,000 more was allotted at par.
For many years matters went along smoothly and quietly until the twenty-sixth annual meeting, in 1886, when an event occurred which subsequently meant a good deal for the Company, although little noticed at the time. This was the election of the present president, Hon. L.J. Forget, as a director. The board of directors was as follows:--
Jesse Joseph, president; Alex. Murray, vice-president, Dr. W.H. Hingston, Hugh McLennan, and L.J. Forget.
During all this time the mileage of the Company had not increased very greatly, only amounting to 12½ miles by 1892, although St. Denis Street had been double tracked in 1891. At this time the Company was operating eighty-two regular sleighs during the winter season.
The year, 1892, however, marked the most important period in the Company’s history, the beginning of the electric era, which has produced such wonderful results in the past two decades.[3] It was not without violent opposition that the subject was discussed. Several directors supported by many of the shareholders declared that the thing was impossible and would ruin the Company, and some of the directors even went to the length of resigning rather than countenance such a project. So if the first directors of the Company, in 1861, were men of courage and enterprise, how much more so were those who backed up the change to electricity in face of the great cost and doubtful outcome.
At the adjourned special meeting of Tuesday, May 17th, 1892, there being present Mr. H. McLennan, vice-president; Dr. W.H. Hingston and L.J. Forget, a tender for electric car service was submitted and considered clause by clause and finally approved of and adopted and ordered to be transmitted to the city clerk, together with the sum of $25,000.00 deposit.
The city accepted the Company’s terms, and the work of electrifying the service was started without delay.
The president and directors at this period were--
Jesse Joseph, president; Hugh McLennan, vice-president; L.J. Forget, H.A. Everett, Dr. W.H. Hingston, and associated with them in the enterprise was William Mackenzie, of Toronto.
The conversion of the system into one operated by electricity was commenced in 1892, and the work was especially interesting in this city, owing to the climatic difficulties to be overcome. Meteorological records had shown that the average snowfall for each of the sixteen winters from 1875 to 1891 was 118 inches; the greatest fall of 173 inches, or over 14 feet, taking place in the winter of 1886-7.
Another exceptional difficulty was that of grades. For instance Amherst Street rises 50 feet in a distance of 800 feet; St. Denis Street rises 47 feet in a distance of 700 feet; St. Lawrence Street rises 68 feet in a distance of 1,500 feet; Beaver Hall Hill, 60 feet in a distance of 900 feet; and Windsor Street, 70 feet in a distance of 1,500 feet; while on Guy Street and Cote des Neiges Hill there is a rise of 350 feet in a distance of 5,150 feet, with a maximum grade of 11 per cent for about 100 feet.
Before the introduction of electricity, the negotiation of some of these grades was almost a cruelty to animals, while upon other routes now readily, safely and quickly traversed, the old horse car service would have been an impossibility.
The progress under the electric regime was immediate and wonderful, and the business of the Company grew in such manner as to enforce frequent increases in its capital, while dividends at the rate of 8% per annum were paid.
By 1895 the capital stock of the Company had increased to $4,000,000, with bonds of $973,333.33. In 1897 it was increased to $5,000,000, and in that year Mr. G.C. Cunningham resigned as director, manager and chief engineer. Later Mr. R.B. Angus replaced him as a director and Mr. F.L. Wanklyn as manager and chief engineer.
In 1901 the Company purchased all the bonds and a majority of the stock of the Montreal Park and Island Railway Company. In the same year the Company secured franchises from the towns of St. Louis and St. Paul, both now part of Montreal.
In the following year the Company issued $1,500,000 4½% bonds to pay for the Park and Island Railway. The capital at this time was $6,000,000, and no less than fourteen miles of new track were built and put into operation.
In 1903 another $1,000,000 of stock was issued.
Mr. James Ross resigned as vice-president and managing director, during this year, and was replaced by Mr. F.L. Wanklyn, later in that year Mr. Wanklyn resigned and Mr. K.W. Blackwell was elected vice-president, and Mr. W.G. Ross managing director. Mr. Duncan McDonald was appointed manager and Mr. Patrick Dubee secretary. The Company, pursuing its policy of rapid extension, secured a franchise in Delorimier (now part of Montreal), and an extension of their Westmount franchise. Also through another subsidiary company, the Suburban Tramway and Power Company, now The Public Service Corporation, they secured a franchise to Longue Pointe and the Village of Beaurivage.
In the following year, the Company secured an extension of the Maisonneuve franchise, and bought considerable property on St. Denis Street for building purposes.
In 1906, the Company entered into an agreement for the purchase of the stock and bonds of the Montreal Terminal Company, and also secured a franchise in Outremont, for the further extension of its system into the suburbs. By this time the capital stock had grown to $7,000,000. The purchase of the Montreal Terminal Company was concluded in the following year, while considerable additions and extensions were made, and to meet the increased demands the capital stock was increased to $9,000,000.
The Park and Island Company also secured a franchise in Notre Dame de Grâce, and started an extension of the Sault-au-Recollet line to opposite St. Vincent de Paul. The Cartierville line was also double tracked to the bridge.
In 1908 $292,000 debenture bonds were redeemed, and £460,000 ($2,238,666.67) debenture bonds, and another $1,000,000 of stock, were issued, bringing its capital up to $10,000,000 stock and $4,420,000 bonds where it stands today.
In 1910 the Company was capitalized at $10,000,000 stock and $4,420,000 bonds, operated over 144 miles of track, and controlled and operated subsidiary companies with some eighty-six miles of track, a total of 230 miles. On March 24, 1911, an act to incorporate the Montreal Tramways Company saw a new development, the incorporators of the charter being, E.A. Robert (president), J.W. McConnell (vice president), F. Howard Wilson (vice president), Hon. J. M. Wilson, Wm. C. Finley, J.M. McIntyre, Geo. G. Foster, K.C., D.L. McGibbon and N. Curry.
As an indication of the growth of the passenger service the account for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1914, gave the gross earnings as $7,147,804.19, the operating expenses, $4,206,114.57 and the net earnings as $2,936,689.62 while the total number of passengers carried, including “transfers” was 58,120,066. Such a story of rapid progress in the face of natural and other obstacles is one of which both the Company and the city may reasonably feel proud.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] The two-cent rate of the United States was introduced into Canada in 1899.
[2] The “pay as you enter” cars originated in Montreal on the invention of Mr. Duncan McDonald, of the Montreal Street Railway Company.
[3] The rapid growth of the city in population dates from 1891. 1861, City and suburbs, 101,439; 1872, 155,865; 1881, 178,237; 1891, 261,302; 1901, 376,402; 1910, 600,000.
Chapter XLII
1760-1841
CITY IMPROVEMENT FROM THE CESSION
UNDER JUSTICES OF THE PEACE
EARLY STREET REGULATIONS--A PICTURE OF MONTREAL HOUSES IN 1795--FURTHER STREETS OPENED--A “CITY PLAN” MOVEMENT IN 1799--HOUSES AT THE BEGINNING OF THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY--MAP OF 1801--CITY WALLS TO BE DEMOLISHED--CITADEL HILL REMOVED--FURTHER IMPROVEMENTS--ROAD COMMISSIONERS--PICTURE OF 1819--IMPROVEMENTS DURING THE TRANSITIONAL PERIOD OF THE JUSTICES AND THE MUNICIPALITY--PICTURE OF 1839 BY BOSWORTH.
In view of chronicling the efforts of the past, since the Cession, to make the city comfortable for the dweller and attractive to the visitor, the reader is now offered the following notes:
In 1676 an ordinance provided that each tenant should pave up to the middle of the road, every street passing by his home, but this was scarcely attended to and at the time of the British régime these regulations were in desuetude.
The earliest ordinances governing city improvement have already been mentioned in the ordinances of Governors Gage and Burton. Those following on the great fire of 1765 have also been treated elsewhere.
In the letter of an English traveller, dated March 22, 1795, occurs the following reference to Montreal: “Montreal is not equal in size to Quebec, but has considerably the advantage in point of cleanliness. On the whole Montreal has more the appearance of a middle sized country town in England than any place I saw in America. The principal streets are flagged. The houses are built of stone, on the French plan, with this exception that they are in general, much lower and present a greater appearance of neatness than French houses usually do. * * * The amusements of Montreal are exactly similar to those of Quebec. In winter, all is dance and festivity. * * * I have seen few places where a veteran officer of moderate income might entrench himself for life better than at Montreal.” (Canadian Antiquarian and Numismatic Journal, Vol. IX.)
In order to provide for a uniformity in the planning of the streets to meet the growth of the city and the suburbs the legislature by an act of 1799 (36 George IV, Cap. 5) authorized the appointment of a surveyor “who should draw plans of the city and land adjacent and that commodious streets should be opened and ground reserved for public squares.” At the same time an act was passed for the repairing and the changing of the roads and bridges of the country. Montreal was affected by this and was taxed accordingly.
“The houses at the beginning of this century,” says Mr. P.S. Murphy, writing in 1879, “were generally of ‘rubble masonry,’ or of wood, one or two stories high--the former with iron shutters. Some houses on St. Paul Street were two or three stories high, of Ashlar masonry. The buildings in the old city proper were generally of stone.”
At this period Simon McTavish’s castle was standing. He had died in 1805 and left it unfinished. There it stood deserted on the site now covered partially by the Allan property till the latter part of December, 1860--the abode of ghosts according to the credulous.
In 1800 Beaver Hall, the mansion of Joseph Frobisher, one of the founders of the North West Company, was built. It was then far in the country. Being of wood it was burned down in 1845.
A badly preserved map of the city of this period (1801), made by Louis Charland, inspector of roads, reveals that certain streets’ names were applied to localities since renamed. St. Marie was that given to the present Sherbrooke Street; St. James to St. Catherine; Dorchester to St. Jean Baptiste. The present names begin to appear in the map of 1825 by John Adams.
In 1800 an engineer was named by the legislature with a salary of £200 a year to direct the opening of new streets, and with jurisdiction beyond the city limits. The new engineer set to work to pave St. Paul and Notre Dame streets and then to open up others under the direction of the magistrates. In 1815 the road across the property of Etienne Guy was opened. In 1817 the opening was legalized of King, Queen, Prince, George, Nazareth and St. Gabriel streets. St. Paul Street was extended to McGill Street and St. Maurice Street was opened. In 1818 St. Helen, Lemoine and Dubord were opened. At the same time the construction of the fashionable esplanade of the period, the Champ de Mars, was begun and the demolition of the citadel erected under the French régime allowed Notre Dame Street later to be extended to St. Mary Street.
In 1802 His Majesty assented to the last reserved acts regarding the removal of the walls around the city of Montreal. In 1801 a bill for the removal of walls was passed by the legislature, with some amendments, but reserved by Sir Robert Milnes in case any further consideration from a military point of view might be thought necessary. On the 10th of June, 1803, a proclamation was issued giving effect to the reserved bills. Thus at last the fortifications were to be demolished! They had been threatened many years previously. Mr. Brymner (Archives Report for 1892) tells the story. “So far back as 1791 General Mann, then a captain of the Royal Engineers, reported that, while in the infant state of the colony the works around Montreal were useful as a protection against the Indians, they were no longer required for that purpose and that their ruinous condition made them rather a nuisance than a benefit. Part of the materials of the walls, he recommended, should be preserved, the rest to be used by filling up the ditch or for any other purpose in the reforming of the town. Citadel Hill, he considered, should be levelled and barracks built on part of it, or by levelling the hill to any easy slope Notre Dame Street might be opened to the Quebec suburbs, forming a good entrance and a great improvement to the town. The cross streets should lead to the mountain and a road be preserved along the front of the river, which in time would form a fine quay or promenade. * * * In July, 1793, Mr. Dundas approved of the removal of the walls, but directed Lord Dorchester to ascertain whether the owners of the adjoining property had or had not the right, as they maintained, to have their property extended on the removal. In 1797 Prescott, lieutenant governor, informed the legislature that the petition for the extension of the property consequent on the removal of the walls desired the assembly to take measures to prevent litigation between owners, past and present, and stated that the officer commanding the Royal Engineers would be directed to make a plan of the town and fortifications, which should show the reserves proposed to be made for the use of the crown.” In November, 1797, the colonial secretary wrote that the bill had been received and would be returned with such directions as might be necessary, which were sent in August, 1798. The rest of the history has been told above.
“From authentic sources,” says Sandham in his History of Montreal, Past and Present, “we learn that between the years of 1805 and 1816 there were sixty-four stone houses erected within the old gates. At the latter date there were forty-five wooden houses, of which four were erected by government during the American war. In 1814 seven stone and four wooden houses were built; in 1815 twenty-three of stone and twenty-one of wood; and in 1816 sixty stone and wooden houses were in the course of erection.”
In the meantime the city was developing its approaches[1] and special commissions were appointed. An old almanack printed at Quebec in 1815 mentions: “Trustees for improving, ordering and keeping in repair the road from the city of Montreal to Lachine through the wood.” (Honourable James McGill, Honourable John Richardson, Joseph Papineau, Isaac W. Clark, Louis Gugy and Jean Marie Mondelet.) The commissioners for the removal of the old walls of Montreal were J. McGill, J. Richardson, Jean Mondelet and L. Chaboillez. (Lachennais Bridge, Canadian Numismatic and Antiquarian Journal, Series N, Vol. I, pg. 881.)
A traveler visiting the city in 1819 describes the houses and streets thus: “The first impression of the city is very pleasing. In its turrets and steeples glittering with tin; in its thickly built streets stretching about one-and-a-half miles along the river and rising gently from it; in its environs ornamented with country houses and green fields; in the noble expanse of the St. Lawrence sprinkled with islands; in its foaming and noisy rapid and in the bold ridge of the mountain, which forms a back-ground to the city; we recognize all the features necessary to a rich and magnificent landscape and perceive among these indications decisive proofs of a growing inland emporium. The streets of the city are narrow except some of the new ones. The principal ones are St. Paul, which is the bustling business street, near the river, and Notre Dame, on higher ground, more quiet, more genteel and better built. The latter street is twenty-five feet wide and three-quarters of a mile long. Many of the houses are constructed of rough stone coarsely pointed or daubed with mortar and have certainly an unsightly appearance. Many of the stores and dwellings have iron plate doors and window shutters, fortified by iron frames, as a precaution against fire as well as robbery. An act of ’59, (George IV Cap. 8), obliges householders of Montreal whose houses have wooden roofs to whitewash or to paint them every two years.”
Previous to 1827 St. Paul, St. Francois Xavier, St. Sacrement, Notre Dame and others of our present business streets contained the private residences of many of our first citizens where stores and warehouses are now only to be seen. Not half a dozen of our merchants and prominent men lived out of the old city proper, viz. from McGill Street to Dalhousie Street and back to Craig Street, which was its northern boundary. At that time and even later St. James Street and its seven galleries, a terrace of one-story buildings, were the fashionable rendezvous of the military. The windows of the stores were little larger than those of the ordinary houses, but in 1839 more modern display windows were beginning to appear. The iron shutters for protection which are still to be seen on some of the old houses even in 1914, were then giving place to more elegant ones of wood. Puddles were allowed to remain in the street. The roads were very dusty in the dry weather and very muddy in the wet. To remedy the former sprinkling carts were recommended and for the latter wood paving. The streets were still badly lighted for although the old oil lamps were being superseded by gas, the city was not generally lighted.
During all this period under the justices of the peace, it may be remarked, that they had the power to make certain assessment for defraying the necessary expenses of the city and to enact and enforce such by-laws for its regulation as were not inconsistent with the statutes of the realm.
MONTREAL IN 1839
Writing in 1839 in “Hochelaga Depicta,” Mr. Newton Bosworth gives many interesting side lights of the civic improvement of the time preceding the municipality.
“An act passed the Provincial Legislature in 1832, forming Montreal into a Corporation and transferring the authority for the Magistrates to the corporate body; but in 1836, the Act of Incorporation having expired, the Government again passed into the hands of the Justices of the Peace.
“The city is represented in the Provincial Parliament by four Members, the East and West Wards into which it is divided, returning two each. The period of service in the House of Assembly is four years.
“Under the Corporation the city and suburbs were distributed into eight wards, for the more convenient arrangement and dispatch of business. These are East and West Wards, the Wards of St. Ann, St. Joseph, St. Antoine, St. Lawrence, St. Louis, and St. Mary. Another division of the city may be called the Military, according to which the battalions of militia, which are six in number, are collected from the portion of the city or suburbs in which they reside.”
Speaking of the appearance of the town in 1839, Bosworth remarks:
“Montreal, the second city in political dignity, but the first in magnitude and commercial importance, in British America, is situated in Latitude 45° 31' North, and Longitude 73° 34' West. Including the suburbs it covers about 1,020 acres, although within the fortifications the area did not much exceed 100 acres. Its local advantages for the purposes of trade, giving it a decided superiority over every other place in the Province, and its climate, though severe, is more genial than that of Quebec. On approaching it either on the river from below, or in descending from La Prairie, the tall and elegant steeple of the English Church, the massive grandeur of the French Cathedral, the spires of other churches and chapels, the spreading mass of habitations in the suburbs, and the well built and lofty stores in Commissioner Street, the stranger will be impressed with a very favourable idea of the city he is about to enter. If the entrance be by the Lachine road, a fine view of the city is presented just before descending the hill near the Tanneries, or the village of St. Henry; and another on coming along the road from Mile-end, north west of the city. * * * In the commencement of towns and villages, when no specific plan has been previously arranged, houses and other buildings will be erected where land can be obtained or convenience may dictate, without much regard to regularity or order; and hence in towns of any considerable standing, we generally find that the earliest streets are crooked and irregular. This may be seen in St. Paul Street in this city, which by its contiguity to the river, presents great facilities for trade, and, with the space between it and the wharf, would be occupied in preference by men of business.
“It contains many excellent houses, which would be seen to more advantage, had the street been wider. It reminds one of some of the central streets in London, but without their fog and smoke. From St. Paul Street, downwards to the river, was formerly called the lower town, and the rest of the city the upper; but though in some of the cross streets there is an evident rising in the ground, in others it is scarcely perceptible. The principal streets are airy, and the new ones particularly of a commodious width; some of them running the whole length of the town, nearly parallel to the river, are intersected by others generally at right angles.
“An Englishman when he enters the city, and in his perambulations through nearly the extent of it, is struck with the French names by which nearly the whole formerly, and the greater part now, of the streets are distinguished; the names of Catholic Saints, or eminent Frenchmen, will meet his eye in abundance.
“The Rue Notre Dame, extending from the Quebec to the Recollet Suburbs, is 1,344 yards in length and thirty feet broad. It is in general a handsome street, and contains many of the public buildings. St. James Street, Craig Street and McGill Street, are of still greater width, and when the yet empty spaces in each are filled up with elegant houses, they will be ornaments to the town. * * * The spirit of local improvement has long been in active and efficient operation and betrays no symptoms of langour or decline. Beside a multitude of new and elegant houses in almost every part of the city and suburbs, large spaces and several streets have been considerably improved.
“The covering of the creek, or rather ditch, an offensive and dangerous nuisance, in Craig Street; the levelling of McGill Street; the improvements in Dalhousie Place, in the French Square, and Notre Dame Street, and of that part of St. Ann Suburbs called Griffin Town, by which a large portion of swampy land has been raised and made available for building, may be adduced as specimens. The recent houses are almost universally built of the grayish limestone which the vicinity of the mountain affords in abundance; the fronts of the same material, hewn and squared; even the new stores and warehouses are finished in the same manner.
“Many of the houses are large, handsome, and in modern style, and some of them display great taste in design.
“The best houses and most of the churches are covered with plates of tin, a far better material for this purpose than the wooden shingles which are frequently used. In comparing the climate with that of Quebec, it may be observed that in general the winter is shorter in Montreal and the cold not so intense.
“In the latter city also the snow is seldom so deep, or remains so long, as in Quebec.
“The favourable situation of Montreal enables her to command the trade of a considerable portion of the lower Province, and the greater part of the upper. Her position, indeed, is such as always to ensure a profitable connection with every part of the continent where business is to be done.
“By some persons it has been thought, however favourable the situation of Montreal is at present, it would have been better had the city been founded a little lower down the river, so that the difficulty of ascending the current of St. Mary might have been avoided. The aid of steam navigation, however, by which ships of all burdens may easily be towed up to the city, renders this a consideration of much less importance than it was formerly.
“The civil government of Montreal is administered by Justices of the Peace, who are appointed by the Governor of the Province. They are at present forty-six in number, and have the power to make certain assessments for defraying the necessary expenses of the city and to enact and enforce such by-laws for its regulation and advantage as are not inconsistent with the statutes of the realm. For a short period the municipal affairs of the city were managed by a Mayor and Common Council.”
FOOTNOTES:
[1] The first bridge connecting the island at Bordà Plouffe, now Cartierville, with the north was Pont La Chapelle, built in 1834-5 as a private venture on his own grounds by M. Persillier-Lachapelle.
Chapter XLIII
1841-1867
CITY IMPROVEMENT AFTER THE UNION
UNDER THE MUNICIPALITY
GREAT STRIDES AT THE UNION--THE EARLY MARKET PLACES--THE BONSECOURS MARKET--OTHER MARKETS--PUBLIC PLACES--THE EARLY SQUARES--PRESENT PARKS--THE EARLY CEMETERIES--THE FIRST JEWISH CEMETERY--THE DORCHESTER STREET PROTESTANT CEMETERY--DOMINION SQUARE--MOUNT ROYAL--COTE DES NEIGES--OTHER CEMETERIES--GENERAL CITY IMPROVEMENT--AREAS OF PUBLIC PLACES.
The advent of the Municipality saw great strides in city improvements, especially in laying out of public places, such as markets and parks.
MARKET PLACES
The first market place was held in the first public square or Place Royale, opposite the little river, the landing place of Champlain and Maisonneuve, and on the site occupied by the custom house and the present inland revenue office. The date of this first market goes back as far as 1680. Under the English régime with the growth of the city the provision of further markets was further foreseen. The second market, between Notre Dame Street and St. Paul Street, was placed on the site originally occupied by the Château de Vaudreuil, which became the Collège de St. Raphaël, burnt in the great fire of 1803. An ordinance of 1807[1] (47 George III, Chap. VII) gave authority to borrow to the amount of £2,500 for construction of the market, which, however, was delayed for a time. In 1821 a new wing was added. The building was in wood and was demolished to be replaced by the Bonsecours Market in 1843, and its site, the Jacques Cartier Square of today, served for a public place.
The “new” market, Bonsecours, was established under the regulation of the city council of 1841 (May 22d). It was designed also to be the seat of the Council. It is in the Grecian Doric style of architecture. Its site is partially that of the intendant’s palace and that of the house of Sir John Johnson, commander of the Indians in the American Revolution, and son of Sir William Johnson, the Indian warrior. In 1845 the market at St. Lawrence and St. Dominique streets was also built. Other markets have followed in the following order:
1830--The first St. Ann’s Market owed its origin to the initiative of some private citizens who furnished the capital to the amount of nearly fifteen thousand pounds. It was afterwards leased to the government and became the house of parliament.
1830--About 1830 the market of Près de Ville on the north of Coté Street, near Chenneville and Vitré streets, was erected, but abolished in 1839.
1840--Viger, in St. James ward, bounded by Campeau, Craig, Dubord and St. Hubert; constructed in 1861; demolished in 1893.
1845--Papineau Market, on Papineau Road, between Craig and Lagauchetière; reconstructed in 1855; demolished in 1890.
1851--St. Ann’s Market, built on the site of the old parliament house, burnt down in 1849, in the rebel losses riots. It was demolished in 1900. Its site is now preserved by the gardens of Youville Square.
1860--St. Gabriel, bounded by Centre Street, Richmond, Richardson and Montmorency streets; abolished in 1900.
1865--St. Antoine, bounded by St. James, Mountain, Aqueduct and Adeline streets.
1865--The Haymarket, bounded by St. Paul, Inspector, William streets and Nolan Park.
1870--St. Jean Baptiste, bounded by St. Lawrence, Rachel, St. Dominique and Market streets.
1871--St. James, bounded by Ontario, Amherst, Wolfe and Houle.
1885--Cattle Market (East), at the head of Frontenac Street.
1885--Cattle Market (West), originally situated at St. Henri and removed in 1902 to St. Etienne Street (Point St. Charles).
1890--Weighing Station (Papineau), corner of Craig and Notre Dame streets.
1890--Weighing Station (St. Denis), corner of Carrière and Berri streets.
1890--Weighing Station (Hochelaga), on Desery Street between St. Catherine and Notre Dame Street. (In 1896 this became a fire station and later a repairing shop for fire appliances.)
In 1810 the regulations enforced by the magistrates concerning trade were reunited and sanctioned by the court of king’s bench. It is there decreed, among other things, that leathers, shoes, fish, meat, sugar, tobacco, cloths brought in by the “cultivateurs” should only be sold at certain places in the town under penalty of 5 shillings. The sale of fruit and vegetables was permitted on the streets. Other merchandise was forbidden to be sold on the street in order to prevent the obstruction of passage and the sale of them by auction which was reserved for market days. The slaughtering of animals was forbidden and there are other regulations pertaining to the cleanliness of the streets. That part of the water front from the northeast limit of the Montreal bridge to about opposite St. Victor Street, near the church of Bonsecours was declared the port for building and fire wood, with the exception of 100 feet reserved at the entrance of the new market for the bateaux, chaloupes, barges, and canoes bringing provisions to the markets.
PUBLIC PLACES
The movement for public squares was encouraged by His Excellency, Governor Lord Dalhousie, in 1821, when he gave the piece of ground on which Citadel Hill had so long stood, with its powder magazine. It was called Dalhousie Square. It is now covered by the Viger station tracks. The earth from the citadel was carted to the Champ de Mars to increase its size and to build it up.
The municipality, after the reestablishment of the corporation in 1840, turned its attention to the acquisition of more public places to meet the growth in population. The following is the history of the present parks or squares under the régime of the corporation of Montreal:
Custom House Square, now called Place Royale, the original Place d’Armes, Market Place and meeting ground of Montreal, was bought from Mr. William Dow on the 4th of April, 1845, at the price of $2,400.
Jacques Cartier Square, between Notre Dame and St. Paul streets, originally given to the city by virtue of an act of 1808 for the establishment of a market which was built and afterwards was taken down when Bonsecours Market was completed, was first used for its present purpose about 1845. The Nelson Monument was erected on this square in 1809.
Place d’Armes Square, opposite the Notre Dame Cathedral, had always been used as a public place from the early days of the French régime. In 1836 it was purchased by the city from the Gentlemen of the Seminary. In 1845 the city inclosed it and leveled the ground and paved the street around it. It has undergone several changes. The Maisonneuve Monument by Philippe Hébert was placed in the centre on June 24, 1895, and the railings have been removed and the whole square cemented during the last three or four years. This monument was erected to celebrate the two hundred and fiftieth anniversary of the founding of the city by Paul de Chomedey de Maisonneuve. On the question of a statue being raised, a delegation from the Numismatic and Antiquarian Society, consisting of de Léry Macdonald, W.D. Lighthall, D.J. Beaudry and the Vicomte H. de la Barthe, presented to Mayor James McShane on April 23, 1891, a detailed scheme of placques and bas-reliefs for a great monument. This was ratified by the council. The Maisonneuve Committee, presided over by Judge Pagnuelo, eventually adopted with slight modifications, the scheme of designs suggested by the above Archaeological Society.
Champ de Mars belongs to the Imperial government for military parades. It was originally but a small piece of ground situated in one of the bastions of the old town walls; when these were pulled down it was enlarged. In 1839 it formed a space of 227 by 114 yards and was one of the fashionable promenades. The parapet stone railing overlooking Craig Street was erected in 1913.
Victoria Square was bought in 1841 to increase the Haymarket then held there. It was then called Commissioner’s Square. It received its present name in 1860 on the occasion of the visit of Prince Albert Edward (Edward VII). The southern portion situated between Craig and St. James streets belonged to the city since 1825, except the strip on the west side, which was expropriated in 1888.
Phillips Square and Beaver Hall Square were ceded to the town in 1842 by Mr. Alfred Phillips. In September of 1914, the Statue of King Edward the Peacemaker, designed by Philippe Hébert, was unveiled by his brother, the Governor General of Canada, H.R.H. the Duke of Connaught.
Viger Garden, or Viger Square, was ceded to the city gratuitously in 1844 by Jacques Viger and P. LaCroix. It has been added to since. The site of this garden was originally a swamp or marsh and on an old map of 1758 it is marked as such. A portion of the square was used as a cattle market for many years. For years after its establishment as a public garden it was the principal square of the city where people congregated to hear the military bands two or three evenings every week.
Richmond Square has belonged to the city since 1844.
Parthenais Square was established in 1845 on a portion of ground belonging to the city. It was added to in 1858 by a piece purchased by Mr. McGill.
Papineau Square, established before 1845, was at first called Queen’s Square. Its new name was given by the council in 1890.
Lafontaine Park was bought by the Federal government on October 29, 1845, from Mr. James Logan, a merchant who had it from his father. This land was made part of the property commonly called Papineau or Monarch Farm. This property, owned by the federal government with the exception of a little strip, bounded by Rachel and Lafontaine Park, and a piece situated in the east of the Jacques Cartier Normal School has been left to the city for ninety-nine years on certain conditions for $1.00 a year. One of these is that the government can end the loan at any time, and another is the right to reserve for military purposes that part of the park situated to the north of Sherbrooke Street and to the east of Panet Street. The city conservatories originally erected on Viger Garden in 1865 were reconstructed on Lafontaine Park in 1889.
Wellington Square was bought from the Gentlemen of the Seminary in 1856.
St. Gabriel Square was bought in 1862, but its history as a public garden does not begin till 1893.
Western Square was bought as a public park from the gentlemen of the Seminary on December 31, 1870.
Cherrier Square, known under the name of St. Jean Baptiste Square, was acquired in 1870 and became a public park in 1875.
Dufferin Square, which had been a Protestant cemetery since 1799, was expropriated as a public park in 1871.
Mount Royal Park, the property of several owners, was originally expropriated at a cost of $1,000,000 in 1872. In 1875 Mr. Frederick Law Olmsted, a landscape architect from the United States, was entrusted with the preparation of a general plan for Mount Royal.
Fletcher’s Field, attached to this site, also dates its history to this period.
Dominion Square, hitherto the Catholic cemetery, was similarly expropriated in 1873.
St. Helen’s Island, in the St. Lawrence, and so named after his wife, Helène Bouillé, by Samuel Champlain, was established as a public park in 1874. Its extent is 128 acres.
Bellerive Square, established in 1880, became the property of the city definitely in 1893.
St. James Square, up to 1886 part of the St. James Market, became a public place in this year.
Nolan Square (Haymarket Square) was established as a park in 1896 on a part of the second Haymarket. This land was originally bought from the seminary in 1865.
Gallery Square was established as a public place in 1898.
Youville Square, so called from Madame d’Youville, who founded the Grey Nun’s Hospital originally adjacent, was transformed into a public space on the site of the old parliament building and afterwards St. Ann’s Market.
In 1913 parks were ceded to the city at Rosemount, Longue Pointe, and in 1914 in the St. Marys, Hochelaga, St. Denis, Notre Dame de Grâces, and Bordeaux Wards.
CEMETERIES
In the first volume the origin of the earliest cemeteries of Montreal has been traced. To resume; the first cemetery was established in 1643 at the southeast corner of the fort inclosure, known later as “Pointe a Callières,” today commemorated by a tablet on the present custom house building. The second was established in 1654 in the vicinity of the grounds of the Hôtel Dieu on St. Joseph Street (afterwards St. Sulpice Street), and was called the “Hospital Cemetery.” It occupied part of the ground occupied by the Place d’Armes and the present Notre Dame Cathedral. There was a mortuary chapel to receive the bodies which stood on the present site of the Bank of Montreal, and although the hospital cemetery had ceased to be in use in 1799 the chapel was not destroyed till 1816, when it was given over by the Fabrique of Notre Dame to the commissioners of fortifications of the city for the enlargement of St. James Street. Meanwhile a subsidiary cemetery, the third, was acquired about 1749 “on a site belonging to Mr. Robert near the powder magazine, containing about a quarter of an arpent in superfices.” It was granted at the request of the curé and the church warden of Notre Dame by the Marquis de la Galissonière, governor, and François Bigot, the intendant, as follows:
“Vue la requête, nous autorisons le curé et les marguilliers de la paroisse de cette ville (Montréal) à faire l’acquisition des terrains ci-dessous désignés pour servir à inhumer les pauvres de la dite paroisse.
“(Signé) LA GALISSONIERE BIGOT.”
By 1751 it was resolved to inclose it with a stone wall and to build a mortuary to house the bodies during the winter. In 1799 the hospital cemeteries and the powder magazine were discontinued. At this period the grand juries, recognizing that these cemeteries so near to the dwellings were unhealthy and a menace to the public health, addressed a report to the Procurator General Sewell asking for their removal. The latter approached the Fabrique and it was resolved to seek for other lands. An old plan of the powder magazine cemetery shows that it ran from St. Peter Street, taking in a portion of St. James Street, and the block of buildings occupied by the Canada Life Building and the Canadian Bank of Commerce and terminating in Fortification Lane at the city wall.[2] This cemetery was that used by Protestants and Catholics alike. Historically it may be called the first cemetery for Protestants.
At this same period there was already a Jewish cemetery in a lot on St. Janvier Street, near the present Dominion Square. The deed of sale was signed by the congregation of “Shearith Israel” in 1775, and the first interment was that of Lazarus David on October 22, 1776.[3] This was the first Jewish cemetery on the American continent.
The more remote site chosen for the next cemetery was that belonging to Pierre Guy in Coteau St. Louis and the St. Antoine suburbs, and covered four arpents. St. Anthony cemetery, as it was called, occupied a part of Dominion Square of today. An increase of ground was subsequently added on the part now occupied by the Archbishop’s Cathedral. This cemetery was used till 1854, when again its nearness to dwellings caused its removal to the slopes of Mount Royal.
For long the Protestant community had been desirous of its own exclusive burial ground. In 1799 a meeting was held in the courthouse on the 21st of June, when for the purpose of purchasing a piece of ground on Dorchester Street for a Protestant burying ground, Messrs. Edward W. Gray, Isaac W. Clarke, Arthur Davidson, John Russell, and William Hunter were chosen trustees. On the 15th of June, 1811, an order was issued for all bodies to be removed from the old cemetery before the 7th of July. In 1824 a considerable addition to the cemetery was made. The site is preserved today as Dufferin Square. It continued to serve its purpose as the “old” Protestant cemetery till about 1847. Many prominent Englishmen were buried here, such as the Hon. James McGill, whose body was afterward transferred to McGill College grounds. In 1871 it was expropriated as a public place.
The transition of the Protestant cemetery from Dorchester Street to Mount Royal may be now briefly told. Somewhere about 1845 or 1846 it was felt that the Dorchester Street burying ground was becoming overcrowded and a body known as the Montreal Cemetery Company incorporated with a charter granted in 1847 obtained some land at the top of Coté des Neiges Hill on property belonging to a Mr. Furness. A few burials only took place here as circumstances rendered it unsuitable. The project was then abandoned, and public meetings were held to obtain a more appropriate site. The Montreal Cemetery Company was succeeded by another incorporated by 16 Victoria, Cap. 56 (1852) under the name of the Mount Royal Cemetery Company. This company of stockholders has developed a beautiful mountain cemetery so that it may be considered one of the parks of Montreal and its garden of sleep.
The first interment in the Mount Royal Cemetery was that of the Reverend Mr. Squires, who died of cholera in 1852. Since 1910 an additional cemetery has been added in connection with the Mount Royal Cemetery Company, situated at Hawthornedale on the road to Bout de l’Ile.
The purchase of Mount Royal cemetery for the various Protestant denominations of Montreal was followed, by that of Notre Dame des Neiges adjoining, by the Catholic community. A committee of five appointed on July 17, 1853, to find a suitable location for a cemetery reported to the Fabrique of Notre Dame Cathedral on July 31st the desirability of acquiring 115 arpents of land on Coté des Neiges Road belonging to Dr. Pierre Beaubien at the price of £3,000. This land was bought, but the project of finally settling it as a cemetery was not executed till the next year, since in the meantime a counter proposition had been gratuitously offered by the Sulpicians at Coté St. Luc. The original recommendation, however, being ratified, work was begun and the cemetery was opened to the public in 1855. The cemetery was enlarged in 1865, 1872, 1907 and 1909, and now covers over four hundred arpents of land.[4] It is being constantly beautified, adding a beautiful garden to the adjoining mountain park. The name of Notre Dame des Neiges was chosen in remembrance of the little chapel built on the Mountain Mission under that title to be a souvenir of the placing of the great cross which Maisonneuve planted in 1643 on the day of the Epiphany, but which the Iroqouis afterward destroyed. There is no doubt that this name for the chapel was chosen by Marguerite Bourgeoys, who had a special veneration for the shrine of that name in France. Three of her Iroquois maidens were called by her Marie des Neiges. The neighbourhood has borne the name of Coté des Neiges for the same sentimental reasons, it being said that several of the first farmers settling there came from the district of the same French shrine.
The oldest Protestant cemetery in the city still existing is that on Papineau Road, where in 1816 land was purchased at a cost of £500 and was known as the “new” burial grounds. A portion of the latter, known as the military burial grounds, still exists as such and, owing to the efforts of the “Last Post” Association, the federal government has lately renovated it with needful repairs. Here there are several interesting monuments, among them being that of Sir Benjamin D’Urban, the first governor of Natal, who was sent out here to take command of the troops when the friction caused by the Oregon question threatened to bring on a war between Great Britain and our neighbours to the south.
There is also a military burial ground at St. Helen’s Island. It was discontinued in 1825. It is said to have been used for a hundred years and to contain between one thousand five hundred to two thousand remains. A further burial ground is preserved in memory by the great boulder of Point Charles at the north end of the Victoria Jubilee bridge, where the fever-stricken Irish emigrants were hurriedly buried in 1847.
OTHER IMPROVEMENTS
Beyond the establishment of the public places and cemeteries during this period other civic improvements have to be accredited to this period before Confederation.
In 1852 the laws against wooden buildings were enforced. At this time St. Lawrence Main Street was the fashionable boulevard for the French citizens.
A review of the year 1856 says: “There has been an intense energy manifested during the year and is still visible. The business streets are being paved in the most substantial manner; the avenues to the city and the roads in the outskirts are graded and macadamized; handsome fountains have been erected, trees are being planted out, rows of dwelling houses of elegant and substantial descriptions are going up in various quarters; a number of stores and warehouses of the largest, most substantial and at the same time most elegant kind are approaching completion. The great wharf for ocean steamships is finished as are the railway buildings at Point St. Charles. Labourers, mechanics, manufacturers and merchants--in a word all classes are at work with all their might and the results make their appearance with almost magical celerity. Nor in all this material advancement are the pulpit, the press, the college, or the school neglected.”
The year 1864 marked great building operations. No less than seven church edifices were commenced, viz., Trinity church on Viger Square; the Church of the Gesu, Bleury Street; three Wesleyan churches; the American Presbyterian church; Knox church on Dorchester Street, and Erskine church on St. Catherine Street. The Protestant House of Industry and Refuge, Dorchester Street, and the Molson Bank, St. James Street, complete the list of public buildings, while in addition to these 1,019 dwelling houses were erected.
The extension of Notre Dame from Dalhousie Square to McGill Street was made from 1864 to 1868. Ontario Street was opened in 1864 and at the same time St. Catherine Street was extended between St. George and St. Lawrence streets.
PUBLIC PLACES, SQUARES AND PARKS
Wards. Names. Areas. Notre Dame de Grace Vaillant 2-9/10 acres MacDonald 8-3/10 acres Trenholme 13-3/5 acres Notre Dame de Grace 10-9/10 acres Windsor 20,900 square feet Emard 1-3/10 acres Saint Denis Crémazie 26-1/2 acres Lamoricière 1/10 acre Molson 4-2/5 acres Laurier Lahaie 1-1/10 acres St. Mary and De Lorimier Baldwin 28-3/10 acres Saint Mary Parthenais 1 acre Bellerive 1-4/5 acres Lafontaine, Papineau and Duvernay Lafontaine Park 95 acres Lafontaine Saint Jacques 3/5 acre St. Joseph and St. Andrew Richmond 2/3 acre St. Joseph Victoria 1-3/10 acres Papineau Papineau 2.84 acres St. Louis Viger Square (a part) 1/4 acre St. Louis 2-9/10 acres Place St. Jacques 2/5 acre St. Louis and St. Jacques Viger Square 6-3/5 acres Hochelaga St. Joseph 1/4 acre A Square 6-7/10 acres Déséry 3/4 acre A Square 3 acres Hochelaga St. Joseph 1/4 acre A Square 6-7/10 acres Déséry 3/4 acre A Square 3 acres Mount Royal Mount Royal 18-2/5 acres Troie 1-9/10 acres Saint Henry Sir Geo. Etienne Cartier 6 acres {1 4-1/2 acres Playgrounds {2 1-1/5 acres {3 16,380 feet St. Henri 1-1/3 acres Jacques Cartier 1-2/5 acres West Youville 3/4 acre Centre Place Royale 1/11 acre Place d’Armes 1/3 acre East Champ de Mars 3-2/3 acres Jacques Cartier 1-1/5 acres Saint Gabriel Monaghan 12-9/10 acres Saint Gabriel 3-9/10 acres De Lorimier Fairmount 1-3/5 acres Saint Cunegonde Iberville 1/3 acre Saint Laurent Dufferin 2 acres Mance 1/5 acre Saint George Dominion 6-1/4 acres Phillips 1/2 acre Beaver Hall 1/9 acre Victoria 1-1/3 acres St. Jean Baptiste Vallières 1/3 acre St. Ann Haymarket 3-1/5 acres Gallery 1-1/4 acres St. Patrick 2-1/2 acres Tausey (Alma) 10,000 feet Saint Andrew Western 1-2/5 acres Mount Royal Park 708-1/2 acres Saint Paul King Edward 1-7/10 acres Rosemount Drummond 29 acres Longue Pointe Thibaudeau 1/2 acre St. Helen’s Island 135 acres Ile Ronde 34 acres Ile Verte 16 acres A total of seventy-five parks and public places.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] In 1815 (55 George II, Chap. 5), the justices of the peace regulated the price of bread and enforced the stamping of it.
[2] Mr. G. Durnford, who gives me this memory sketch of the plan, adds that evidence of this cemetery has been found from time to time when excavating for foundations, when skeletons and parts of skeletons have been dug up.
[3] The remains of Lazurus David were subsequently removed to the present cemetery when the first was closed. Cemeteries were afterwards purchased at the “Back River,” but of late years a portion adjoining the Protestant cemetery of Mount Royal has been used for Hebrew burials.
[4] A table of Catholic burials in Montreal from 1642 to 1910 prepared by Simeon Mondou, ex-secretary-treasurer of the Fabrique of Notre Dame, reaches the total of 362,315.