Nick Fonda - Richmond, Now and Then: An Anecdotal History from the Eastern Townships

H alf a century ago , the Richmond County Historical Society published a two-volume set entitled, The Tread of Pioneers, Annals of Richmond County. Volume 1 was published in 1966 and Volume 2 in 1968, the dates serving as bookends for Canadas centennial celebrations in 1967. It was a time of hope and optimism across the country, and a century of Confederation served to bring history more clearly into the collective consciousness. In Quebec, of course, Confederation wasnt necessarily something to celebrate. Quebec wasnt looking back so much as it was looking ahead at the new horizons being created by the Quiet Revolution.

Richmond, at the time, was still markedly English in character even if the demographic shift towards a French-speaking majority was clearly evident if not yet a fait accompli.

The Richmond County Historical Society had only recently been formed in 1962, on an initiative led by several of the local Womens Institutes and, in particular, Alice Dresser. The founding president of the RCHS was a brisk, energetic, committed and forceful personality. Her passing in 1965 served to spur on the writing of The Annals; her friends and colleagues penned their essays and reminiscences with Dresser as much in mind as the dawning of Canadas second century.

Just as 1967 was a celebratory year for Canadians, so too was 2017, the countrys sesquicentennial. It was a less noteworthy anniversary for the small town nestled on the St. Francis River in Quebecs Eastern Townships; incorporated as a town in 1882, Richmond was one hundred and thirty-five years old in 2017. This was not on a par with Quebec Citys four hundredth anniversary in 2008, nor with Montreals three hundred and seventy-fifth, nor even with other small Eastern Township villages, such as Warden which was incorporated in 1795. Still, one hundred and thirty-five years was worth noting.

Not all settlements survive. The sculpted metal tree commissioned by the RCHS that stands behind the Melbourne Township Town Hall bears the names of some three dozen places that were once nascent communities in Richmond County but that no longer exist. Places like Lisgar, New London, and Upper Flodden had their own churches and schools and even train stations. They were small clusters of houses and sheds where tinsmiths, cobblers and coopers set up shop to serve the farmers who were clearing land, sowing crops and raising families in the immediate vicinity. At a time when, even after the revolution of the railway, distance was determined by how far a man could reasonably travel by horse and wagon, it stood to reason that one would find hamlets, villages and towns growing up within a relatively close proximity to one another.

But industry supplanted agriculture; the car replaced the horse. Surviving for one hundred and thirty-five years must be at least a minor accomplishment. And the truth is that the place is much older. Even though Richmond was incorporated as a town in 1882, the first settlers started building homes and barns at the site in 1798, arguably making it almost two hundred and twenty years old. Along the same vein, the name Richmond has been used to designate both the town and its hinterland since 1820. And while counties have been replaced by MRCs (Municipalits rgionales de comt or Regional County Municipalities), the name Richmond continues to designate both federal and provincial electoral ridings.

The Annals are a rather eclectic collection of related writings and, to some extent, this book might be described the same way. The pieces that make up this collection are all from the same pen, but saw light over a period of four decades. They form an anecdotal history in that there is a chronological thread to the stories but its not a thread pulled taut and straight. To mix metaphors, if a formal history is a four-lane highway, this book is a meandering country road.

We wouldnt be here if not for the river.

Jacques Marin of Action St. Franois

T here is an irrefutable logic imposed on mankind by geography and history. The story of Richmond and its hinterland flows, figuratively and literally, from the St. Francis River, la rivire Saint-Franois. The geography drew the man, and the man created history. Without a river, without foothills, without vigorous vegetation, would that first man, and his family and clan and tribe, have had any reason to come and (much later) to settle here? Certainly when the first Europeans rushed to the St. Francis River Valley to take possession of arable acreage and river frontage, they came because they were being forced from their former homes by the recurring crises that make up history. But they came here because of the geography, and more particularly because of the river.

The St. Francis has a history of its own. It was formed some ten thousand years ago, a small scar left behind by retreating glaciers. Its a somewhat unusual river in that it first flows southwest out of Le Grand lac Saint-Franois for more than a third of its two hundred and eighteen kilometres before it abruptly makes a ninety-degree turn when it reaches Sherbrooke, and then flows northwest to its mouth at Pierreville, where it spills into the St. Lawrence. It has dozens of tributaries, of which the most impressive is the Magog River that thunderously joins it in Sherbrooke. It has a watershed that spreads over ten thousand square kilometres, roughly ten percent of which lies in the United States.

For most of its ten or twelve thousand years, the river evolved to the syncopated rhythms imposed by the seasons. In the spring, ice break-up, rainfall and snowmelt would cause the unfrozen river to rise and flow more quickly. In places it would scour its banks, stripping away soil and vegetation; elsewhere it would surge over its banks and flood low-lying lands, depositing debris that ranged from tree trunks and boulders to the fine, nurturing particles that create rich, alluvial soils. Through the summer and fall, the land would grow dry. The rivulets, brooks, streams and creeks would grow smaller, sometimes disappearing altogether, and so the river would shrink, creating sandbanks and islands. Through the drier seasons there were occasional downpours that resulted in flash floods, but generally the river would flow almost placidly. After the fall rains came winter and the river would freeze over solidly for four or five months, sometimes freezing to a depth of several feet. Then the spring sun would start the cycle again, provoking the ice to creak and groan and break up into pans the size of garden sheds that would be carried off by the floodwaters.