Part 167

Another personage in this court is entitled to a favourable notice—Mr. T. M. Radenhurst. This gentleman lounges in his chair with an easy familiarity when in court—you would imagine that his soul was away into the fair land of romance, or feasting with the great jury consultists in his library, or arranging some circumstances that may have transpired in the domestic or social circle; but when he stands up, and is roused into action, you are both startled and pleased to find that all this seeming abstraction, has no reality—he shows that nothing has escaped his notice—his mind is found to be stored with important facts, all bearing upon the point at issue; in the management of these there is a complete absence of all clap-trap—he does not seek to terrify and bewilder a witness, but the witness finds that he is in the hands of a master, and that his only mode of escape is in giving a plain unvarnished tale. When he addresses the jury, he unfolds the capacity so valuable in an advocate, that he believes that there is such a thing as truth, and that he relies with full confidence for success of his cause upon the truth being told. The moral bearing of his case is then unfolded, and the conviction is triumphantly carried and established in every unprejudiced mind that whatever may be the merits of the suit the advocate is an honest man.

W. H. Radenhurst, the subject of our sketch, his eldest son, at present residing in Perth, was educated at Upper Canada College. He held the office of treasurer of Lanark for sometime after his father’s death, but afterwards studied law in the offices of the late Mr. Fraser of Perth, and of Sir Matthew Cameron in Toronto, and was called to the bar. He was a member of the town council of Perth, and mayor of the town from 1874 to 1878. He is now revising officer for North Lanark. In politics he is a Liberal-Conservative, and in religion an adherent of the Episcopal church.

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=St. Georges, Rev. Charles=, Parish Priest of St. Athanase, Iberville, P.Q., and Honorary Canon of the Cathedral of St. Hyacinthe, was born on the 13th March, 1834, at Varennes, Verchères county, P.Q. He was educated at the College of St. Hyacinthe, and ordained priest on the 15th August, 1858. The scenes of his early labors were successively Sorel, Granby, Abbotsford and St. Charles. Since 1868 he has been in charge of the Church of St. Athanase, Iberville, where his devotedness, zeal, and piety have gained for him the universal esteem and affection of his flock. His finer qualities, however, are known only to a few—his fellow-priests and the religious under his spiritual direction—by whom he is regarded as a model worthy of copying, and as a tender and loving pastor. Father St. Georges has been distinguished throughout his priestly career for the important part and interest he has taken in the education question. Finding on his arrival at St. Athanase, that the good Sisters of the Congregation de Notre Dame had established a convent there, he spared no sacrifice in aiding and seconding them in their noble efforts. For a long time it was his ardent wish to procure for the boys of his parish a suitable educational establishment; but it was not, however, until 1885 that this grand project was fully realized. In that year he had the happiness of seeing opened a Commercial College under the direction of the Marist Brothers, whose Mother-House is at St. Genis-Laval, France. The success which has already attended the scheme does credit to its promoter and principal supporter. At present it has about two hundred externs and fifty boarders. Father St. Georges’ life has been replete with all those noble virtues and fine qualities so often met with in the priesthood, and we hope he will be long spared to bless humanity.

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=Burrill, William=, Merchant, Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, was born at Drumbo, near Belfast, Ireland, on 30th June, 1802. He was the second son of Henry and Rosanna Burrill, and came to Yarmouth, Nova Scotia, in the year 1834, where he at once engaged in mercantile business which he successfully pursued until 1869, when he retired. During his lifetime he greatly distinguished himself for his zeal in the cause of temperance. He took a leading part in the organization of the first Division of the Sons of Temperance in Yarmouth, and was the second Grand Worthy Patriarch of the order in Nova Scotia. He was elected a member of the National Division of North America in the year 1851. He held the office of warden of the municipality of Yarmouth in 1857, and the following year was appointed a justice of the peace. He was a Liberal in politics, and a Presbyterian in religion. He died at Yarmouth, on the 9th April, 1883, greatly regretted by his fellow citizens, among whom he was held in high esteem. He was married to Catherine Sullivan, of Halifax, N.S., on the 28th of November, 1839.

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=Charland, Hon. Justice Alfred N.=, B.C.L., St. John’s, Quebec. This gentleman, who was raised to the bench of the province of Quebec, as one of the judges of the Superior Court, in November, 1887, was born at Iberville, province of Quebec, on the 28th May, 1842. He is a son of late Joseph Charland, merchant, of the same place, one of the oldest settlers of the county of Iberville, province of Quebec, and who was married to Elmire Duquette, of Chateauguay, sister of the renowned Joseph Duquette, a young patriot who was executed in 1838, when only twenty-two years of age, for being one of the “Sons of Liberty,” an order that existed at the time of the Canadian rebellion. This lamented young martyr for the cause of liberty was a supporter and bosom friend of the celebrated Papineau. Judge Charland was educated in St. Hyacinthe College. He studied the profession of law in the office of the late Hon. Charles Laberge and L. G. Macdonald, Q.C. (Laberge & Macdonald), in St. John’s, province of Quebec, and was subsequently a student in the office of Sir A. A. Dorion, now chief justice of the Court of Queen’s Bench. He received his degree of B.C.L. from McGill University, when Judge Torrance, Edward Carter, Q.C., and the Hon. R. Laflamme were his professors. He was admitted to practice in September, 1863, and settled at St. John’s, where he edited _Le Franco Canadien_ for two years, and commenced an extensive practice with E. S. Paradis, Q.C. In 1878 Mr. Charland was offered the judgeship of the quarter sessions for Montreal, by the Joly government, in the place of Judge Coursol, a position which, though honorable, he declined. The same year he was appointed Queen’s counsel by the Quebec government, and in 1886 had this distinction confirmed upon him by the governor-general in council at Ottawa. He was for several years actively engaged in politics, and fought the battles of the Liberal party till he joined the Conservatives as a protectionist and a partisan of the ruling policy of his friend, the Hon. J. A. Chapleau, then premier of Quebec province. Mr. Charland has particularly distinguished himself as a criminal lawyer, having for several years occupied the position of Crown prosecutor in the district of Iberville, and when not so employed has been entrusted with the defence in all the important cases which came up before the assizes of that judicial division. He obtained great success in several murder cases. He is considered as an authority on criminal matters. He is also acknowledged to be one of the most eloquent and forcible speakers in the province of Quebec, and perhaps the most correct and eloquent of our French orators. As such he has taken an active and prominent part in numerous political contests throughout the province, and greatly contributed to the success of his friends in many electoral strifes. The St. John’s _News_ of the 18th November, 1887, thus kindly speaks of him on the occasion of his elevation to the bench:—

News was received in St. John’s last Friday that Mr. A. N. Charland, Q.C., of this place, had been appointed judge of this district, in place of the Hon. Mr. Justice Chagnon, resigned. While general regret was expressed at the resignation of the latter gentleman, the appointment of Mr. Charland as his successor gave the most unqualified satisfaction to our community at large, and even many of those who had recently been most strictly opposed to him on political ground, were among the first to congratulate him on his preferment. We do not hesitate to say that Judge Charland will be an honor to the bench. Years ago he distinguished himself at the bar as a gifted pleader and as a clear, incisive, and brilliant reasoner. Along with a dignified and polished manner, he possesses that _savoir faire_ which so greatly adds to the charm of an intellectual man, and is so especially becoming to the occupants of high positions.

Judge Charland first married, in 1865, Aglaë Ouimet, sister of the Hon. Justice Ouimet. His second marriage was to Mary Lareau, of St. John’s, eldest daughter of L. Lareau, manufacturer, proprietor of the St. John’s foundry, and for a long time a councillor of said town.

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=Lefebvre, Guillaume=, Waterloo, P.Q., was born at Laurenceville, in the province of Quebec, on the 19th of February, 1856. He was educated at the Knowlton academy, afterwards taking a course at Bryant & Stratton’s business college, in Montreal. He was in the lumber trade from 1873 to 1877, with his brother, Joseph H. Lefebvre, and then bought him out. His business as lumber dealer and furniture manufacturer, at Waterloo, Quebec province, has continued to increase, and is now in a most prosperous condition, employing a large number of hands. He was married on the 16th of June, 1885, to Alphonsine Maynard, of St. John’s, Quebec, and they have one child.

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=McIlwraith, Thomas=, Hamilton, Ontario, Coal Merchant, and the leading Ornithologist in Canada, was born in Newton, Ayr, Scotland, on the 25th of December, 1824. He received an ordinary education at the schools there, and early in 1846 went to reside in Edinburgh, where he remained till about the close of 1848. Returning at that time to his native town, he remained there till the latter part of 1853, when he arranged to come to Hamilton, Canada, to superintend the gas works of that city. In October of that year he married Mary, daughter of Bailie Hugh Park, a friend of his school days, and he and his bride landed in Hamilton, on the 9th November, 1853, at a point very near the property he has since purchased, and where he now resides with his family. He remained in the position of manager of the gas works till 1871, when he bought the Commercial Wharf, with the coal and forwarding business then being carried on by John Procton, and has since continued to carry on this business in the same premises. He has been successful in business, and has brought up four sons and three daughters, the youngest of the family, K. C. McIlwraith, who partakes largely of his father’s love of nature, being now attending the University in Toronto. In politics Mr. McIlwraith has always been a Liberal, but he has never taken an active part in political contests. Since attaining manhood he has been a member of the Presbyterian church. He has held many prominent positions in the directorate of banks, insurance companies, etc., and was for many years president of the Mechanics’ Institute, and in 1878 represented the ward in which he resides in the city council. But it is as a naturalist that he is best known in Canada. Possessing from early childhood a strong love of nature in all its forms, the insects, plants, and specially the birds of Scotland were familiar to him at an early age. His first summer in Canada was therefore to him the entrance to a new world. The liberty of roaming at will through the woods without such restraints as exist in older lands; the new and varied forms of plant and bird life which he met were a continual source of delight, and made an impression which time has not been able to efface. His attention was now specially directed to the birds, and there being no published books to serve as guides to the identifying of the species he might find here, he prepared a paper on the subject, with a list of such birds as he had obtained, and read it before the Hamilton Association, which was organized about that time for the study of scientific subjects. The list appeared in the _Canadian Journal_ for July, 1860, and the paper in the same journal in January, 1861; they attracted the attention of ornithologists in the United States, and in 1865 he prepared, by request, an extended list of birds observed near Hamilton, which list appeared in the proceedings of the Essex Institute for 1866. During the years that succeeded, the study still occupied many of his spare hours, and was the subject of occasional notes to the magazines. In 1883 he attended by invitation a meeting of the leading ornithologists of the United States. This meeting, which was held in the library of the Central Park Museum, New York, was called to consider and revise the classification and nomenclature of American birds, resulted in the organization of the now well-known American Ornithologist Union, of which he had thus the honor of being one of the founders. In this connection he was appointed superintendent of the district of Ontario for the migration committee of the union, and did considerable work in appointing observers throughout Ontario to note the arrival and departure of the migratory birds. There being still a want of a suitable text book for beginners in the study of ornithology, he was urged by many to give the public the benefit of his knowledge on this subject. This he did in a book of 300 pages, in which upwards of 300 species of birds, with their nests, eggs, etc., are minutely and correctly described, the MS. of which he presented to the Hamilton Association. Sir William Dawson has highly spoken of it, and Dr. S. P. May, superintendent of Mechanics’ Institutes and Art Schools for Ontario, says:—“I have carefully examined the ‘Birds of Ontario,’ by Mr. McIlwraith, superintendent of the district of Ontario for the migration committee of the American Ornithologist Union. It contains a most graphic description of Canadian birds, their habits, nests and eggs, and distribution, and will be of valuable assistance to persons interested in the study of natural history. I may mention that, as an ornithologist, I have frequently been associated with Mr. McIlwraith during the past twenty-five years, and I consider him to be one of the most practical and best authorities on Canadian birds on this continent. The book should be in every mechanics’ institute and public library in this country, and I have great pleasure in recommending it for that purpose.” Mr. McIlwraith’s strong love of the subject led him at an early date to preserve and mount his own specimens. His thorough knowledge of the attitudes of the birds when in life enabled him to do this most successfully, and he has now one of the largest, if not the largest, and best prepared private collections in the Dominion. And what is more, he is always pleased to show it to those interested. He has confined his attention chiefly to birds of Britain and America, but has also a few from the far off islands of the sea.

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=Fiske, Edward=, Lumber Merchant, Joliette, Quebec, was born at Abbotsford, Quebec province, on the 5th September, 1841. His parents were Ebenezer Fiske and Eliza Bradford. He was educated in his native place, and received a sound commercial education. Adopting commerce as a profession, he was very successful, and is now possessed of large means. He holds land property in Montreal and St. Jerome, and at the latter place has a hardware store, conducted under the firm name of Treffle, Cote & Co., and in which a paying business is done. He is also owner of two saw mills in which a large quantity of lumber is shipped to the Montreal and other markets in Canada. In Joliette he has erected a handsome block of buildings, known as the “Fiske Block,” and this has turned out a good investment. In short Mr. Fiske may be classed among what some people call the “lucky ones,” but we are rather inclined to the belief that his luck has come from close attention to business, and making the most of favorable circumstances as they presented themselves, rather than from what he could not control. He went to Montreal in 1860, and was employed in a wholesale hardware store until 1865, and from there he went into the cotton business in Georgia and Florida for two years, and then returned to New York state, where he continued business, and remained until 1869, and since then at Joliette. Last year (1887) Mr. Fiske crossed the Atlantic, and visited Glasgow, London, Belgium, Germany, Switzerland, France, etc.; during those travels he was very observant, and picked up a store of useful information. On the 2nd October, 1867, he was married to Emma E. S. Elliott, daughter of John Elliott, wholesale grocer, Montreal.

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=Barry, Denis=, B.C.L., Barrister, of Montreal, takes rank among the most distinguished Irishmen of Canada. Born in the city of Cork in the year 1835, he, early in life, emigrated from Ireland to America with his father, James Barry, who is still living at Rockwood, Ont. The Barry family is one of the oldest in the south of Ireland, and has furnished many brave and able men to the army and navy, the bench and the bar, and the other liberal professions of the United Kingdom. The father of the American navy, Commodore Jack Barry, belonged to that branch of the Barry family from which the subject of this sketch is descended. His mother, Hannah Kelleher, was a daughter of Captain Kelleher, who served with distinction in the service of the Hon. East India Company. Mr. Barry began his education at the common school and continued his studies at Rockwood Academy. Subsequently he went through a classical course at Regiopolis College, Kingston, Ont. Studied theology for some time at the Grand Seminary and at Laval University, and law at McGill University, where he graduated as B.C.L. Entered the volunteer service of Canada as lieutenant in the St. Jean Baptiste Company, Montreal, M. W. Kirwan, captain, in 1877; was promoted to the captaincy of the same company and remained in command thereof till the corps was merged in the 85th battalion, when he retired, went through the Military School, Montreal, and obtained the certificate that entitled him to his rank. Is now joint fire commissioner for the city of Montreal. Has been president of St. Patrick’s Society of Montreal, for four years consecutively. Is past-president of the Young Men’s Reform Club of Montreal. Has taken an active part in political contests, both provincial and federal; also in municipal affairs, having been an unsuccessful candidate for alderman in St. Ann’s Ward, Montreal, in 1882. Mr. Barry is of the same faith as his forefathers—a Roman Catholic—and has never changed his religious views. Mr. Barry had experience of backwoods life as a settler on a free grant farm on the Hastings road in 1856, at that time one of the wildest parts of Upper Canada, but now a beautiful and prosperous region. He also engaged in the lumbering business for some time on the York branch of the Madawaska river, Ontario; subsequently he was engaged in the crown lands office, on the Opeongo road, with Mr. T. P. French, now post-office inspector, Ottawa district. Since his adoption of the profession of the law, Mr. Barry has resided at Montreal, where he has achieved a very high position. He is particularly noted as a _nisi prius_ practitioner, and has conducted a large number of famous cases successfully. As a speaker, Mr. Barry is not surpassed at a bar distinguished for the oratorical abilities of its members, while, in his addresses before popular audiences, he comes up to the best standard of the times. Personally, the writer of this sketch can bear testimony, he is one of the most genial and kind-hearted of men. Ever foremost in all good works, and as the champion of his less fortunate countrymen, Mr. Barry is endeared to all who know him, and beloved in all the relations of home and friendship. He married, in 1869, Kathleen, daughter of the late Michael Morgan, merchant, of Sorel, P.Q., a lady distinguished as much for amiability and goodness as for her charming personality. The union has been blest with a large family.

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=Pettit, Rev. Charles Biggar=, M.A., Rector of Cornwall, was born at Grimsby, Ontario, in 1827. His father, Andrew Pettit, was an honest and successful farmer, a leading churchman and a tory of the old school. His grandfather was a United Empire loyalist, and one of the first settlers in the township of Grimsby. He was educated at King’s College, Toronto, graduated at McGill College, Montreal, and was ordained from the Diocesan Theological Institution, Cobourg, by the first bishop of Toronto. His first mission was that vast field lying between Guelph and the northern shores of Lake Huron—then almost a dense wilderness, now thickly settled and studded with churches. In 1852 he was admitted to priest’s orders, and appointed to Burford, in the county of Brant. In 1855 he was presented to the rectory of Richmond, in the county of Carleton, where he ministered for more than twenty-two years, and where he took an active part in the educational work of the county, and with what success an address presented to him in 1877 by one hundred and four leading men of the city of Ottawa and of the county of Carleton, accompanied by a large purse, only slightly indicates. In 1877 he was presented to the rectory of Cornwall, and also to a canonry in St. George’s Cathedral, Kingston, and shortly after appointed rural dean of Stormont. The most interesting event to the public in his parochial career at Cornwall was the consecration of the Bishop Strachan Memorial Church, which partook of a state ceremony and was attended by his Honor J. B. Robinson, lieutenant-governor, who read the _mandate_; by the Hon. George A. Kirkpatrick, speaker of the House of Commons; by the clergy of the town, by the judges, the sheriff, the mayor and members of the town council, and by a very large number of parishioners. In 1852 he married Helen Clara, only daughter of the late Colonel Thomas Parker, of Belleville, by whom he has three sons and five daughters.

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