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.