Search for ""

Roland-Michel Barrin de La Galissonière, Marquis de La Galissonière, naval officer, commandant general of New France (b at Rochefort, France 10 Nov 1693; d at Montereau, France 26 Oct 1756). He was born into a powerful family and rose to lieutenant-general of the French naval forces.

James Maurice Stockford Careless, historian (b at Toronto 17 Feb 1919; d at Toronto 6 Apr 2009). A graduate of the UNIVERSITY OF TORONTO (1940), James Careless had just begun graduate work at Harvard when he enlisted in the Canadian military effort during WWII.

Leif Eriksson (Old Norse Leifr Eiríksson, a.k.a. Leifr hinn heppni, Leif the Lucky), explorer, chieftain (born in the 970s CE in Iceland; died between 1018 and 1025 in Greenland). Leif Eriksson was the first European to explore the east coast of North America, including areas that are now part of Arctic and Atlantic Canada. Upon the death of his father, Erik the Red, Leif became paramount chieftain of the Norse colony in Greenland. The two main sources on him are The Saga of the Greenlanders and The Saga of Erik the Red. There are also references to him in The Saga of Olaf Tryggvason and The Saga of St. Olaf.

Without doubt he was politically inept but much criticism of him was unfair. He cannot be held responsible for the crisis in Lower Canada that led to the REBELLIONS OF 1837.

Lucien Bouchard, G.O.Q., lawyer, politician and premier of Québec (born 22 December 1938 in Saint-Coeur-de-Marie, Quebec). In the 1980s, Bouchard was a member of Brian Mulroney’s government, serving first as secretary of state and then as minister of the environment. Not long before the ultimate failure of the Meech Lake Accord, however, Bouchard left Cabinet after expressing his concerns with the process. With a group of Liberal and Conservative members of Parliament, he formed a new party, the Bloc Québécois, whose goal is to represent the interests of Québec in the House of Commons. A key figure in the 1995 Quebec referendum, Bouchard succeeded Jacques Parizeau in January 1996 as premier of Québec, a position he held until March 2001. He then returned to practising law.

Baillairgé Family, architects, sculptors and painters active in Québec for 5 generations until well into the 20th century, the most prominent of whom are Jean, François, Thomas and Charles.

Thomas Baillie, soldier, administrator (b at Hanwell, Eng 4 Oct 1796; d at Boulogne, France 20 May 1863).

Robert Bell, geologist, explorer (b at Toronto 3 June 1841; d at Rathwell, Man 17 June 1917). In 1857 Bell was junior assistant to the GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF CANADA.

Richard Cartwright, businessman, officeholder, judge, militia officer, author (b at Albany, NY 2 Feb 1759; d at Montréal, 27 July 1815). A committed LOYALIST, Cartwright was expelled from New York in October 1777.

Charles Murray Cathcart, 2nd Earl, general, governor general of British North America (b at Walton, Eng 21 Dec 1783; d at St Leonard's-on-Sea, Eng 16 July 1859). One of Wellington's staff officers in the Napoleonic wars, Cathcart

Sir Étienne-Paschal Taché, politician, doctor (born 5 September 1795 in Saint-Thomas [Montmagny], Lower Canada; died 30 July 1865 in Montmagny, Canada East).

After 1825, Talbot's power began to decline for reasons that included a popular spirit of reform, increasing bureaucracy and Talbot's eccentricity. Socially intolerant and exclusive, he lived alone and isolated in his Pt Talbot "castle.

Canada Committee, a British parliamentary committee established 2 May 1828 to settle political disputes which were paralysing representative government in Lower Canada and creating difficulties in Upper Canada.

Alphonse Verville, plumber, labourist, socialist, MP, president of the Trades and Labor Congress of Canada (b at Côte-St-Paul [Montréal], Canada E 28 Oct 1864; d at Montréal 20 June 1930).

Their expedition had some success, but the colony was abandoned in 1607 after the revocation of its trading monopoly.

John Bell, fur trader, explorer (b on the Isle of Mull, Scot 1799; d at Saugeen, Ont 24 June 1868). John Bell joined the North West Company as a clerk in 1818.

Arthur Ewert (b Germany 1890; d Germany 1959), early communist agent in Canada. Ewert immigrated to Canada with his wife Elise in 1914, was arrested in Toronto 23 Mar 1919 under the pseudonym Arthur Brown and expelled as a subversive alien.

As a young man, Biencourt was reputedly tactless in dealing with others, and his violent quarrels with Jesuit missionaries undoubtedly harmed the colony. His determination, however, was crucial to the survival of the French presence in Acadia after a disastrous English raid in 1613.

Montagu Wilmot, British army officer, governor of Nova Scotia (d at Halifax 23 May 1766). An officer from 1730, Wilmot served almost exclusively in Nova Scotia 1746-66 and was at the siege of LOUISBOURG in 1758 as a regimental commander.

Robert Nichol, businessman, politician, militia officer (b at Dumfries, Scot c 1774; d near Queenston, UC 3 May 1824). A successful merchant in Norfolk County, UC, he was elected to the House of Assembly in 1812, 1816 and 1820. During the WAR OF 1812 he served as quartermaster general of militia.