The township system (1792)

The French Regime uring the French regime, the Eastern Townships remained unsurveyed, as French settlers preferred to be as close to the St. Lawrence River as possible. Except for part of Missisquoi County, the area remained outside the seigneurial system, the French system of land tenure. After the American Revolution, the British government preferred to maintain the region as a buffer zone between the new American Republic and recently conquered Quebec.

The Township System In 1792, the British decided to open the unsurveyed parts of Quebec (Lower Canada) to settlement. The system of freehold land tenure in Britain and the United States would be employed in these areas, and would distinguish the Eastern Townships from much of the rest of Quebec. Instead of dividing the land into seigneuries granted to feudal lords, the British divided it into townships (10 miles by 10 miles) granted to “leaders.” The leader would agree to have his township surveyed into lots of 200 acres, which he would grant in turn to settlers known as “associates.”

The system was intended to make good land available at no cost to the government, and at little cost to hard-working pioneers. In theory, a leader would be granted a township only after he had demonstrated that he had enlisted a good number of associates. In practice, those in government and their friends awarded themselves many townships without having

Dany associates to settle the land.

One of the largest landowners was former Lieutenant-governor Robert Shore Milnes who, in 1810, was rewarded for his services with grants of 21,406 acres in Stanstead Township, 13,546 in Barnston, and 13,110 in Compton. By 1838, as few as 105 landowners held 1,500,000 acres in the Eastern Townships, only six of whom actually resided there. Corruption and speculation hindered the early development of the region. It also encouraged squatting.

American Pioneers: The Loyalists (1783-1800s)

United Empire Loyalists By the British government’s own definition, United Empire Loyalists were people who were living in the American colonies at the time of the American Revolution, who had voluntarily supported the British Crown (in many cases with resulting persecution and loss of property), and who had emigrated to Canada in 1783 or shortly after.

It is often said that the first settlers in the Eastern Townships were Loyalists. Some Loyalist families did settle in the western part of the Eastern Townships in the 1780s, in particular around Missisquoi Bay, but they were relatively few in number. Later when the sector began to develop economically, some Loyalists moved into the townships further east.

A number of Loyalists petitioners received grants of land (though not all of them settled on these lands). Among others, these men included: Thomas Dunn (Dunham, 1796); Nicholas Austin (Bolton, 1797); Asa Porter (Brome, 1797); Samuel Gale (Farnham, 1798); Josiah Sawyer (Eaton, 1800); David Steward (Clifton, 1800); Hugh Finlay (Stanbridge, 1800); Samuel Willard (Stukely, 1800); Isaac Ogden (Stanstead, 1800); John Savage (Shefford, 1801); Edmund Heard (Newport, 1801); Luke Knowlton (Orford, 1801); Gilbert Hyatt (Ascot, 1803); and Henry Ruiter (Potton, 1803).

Loyalists who received grants were expected to bring with them a certain number of associates to help settle the land. Actual settlement, however, was very slow.

French Canadians (c.1850-)

The crisis in the seigneuries The boom in the Eastern Townships coincided with a severe economic and social crisis in the seigneuries. By the 1820s, there was not enough seigneurial land left to settle French Canada’s rapidly growing population. Younger sons and daughters began leaving Quebec by the tens of thousands, mainly for the factory towns of New England. Political and religious leaders grew alarmed. Many of them thought it was a national tragedy that, while their younger generation was leaving, large parts of Quebec, including the Eastern Townships, remained unoccupied. They formed colonization societies to assist settlers and to pressure the government.

Catholic parishes A new law passed by the Legislative Assembly in 1850 allowed the creation of Roman Catholic parishes in the Townships. These parishes would have the right to tax Catholic property and build Catholic schools. This, combined with the new economic opportunities in the region, attracted thousands of French Canadians. The first arrivals found it difficult — they were strangers in a part of Quebec where the language was overwhelmingly English. English was also the language of business and opportunity. In time, however, more French Canadians arrived, enough to build churches and schools.

One of the peculiarities of Eastern Townships toponymy (which is the study of place names) is the result of the “grafting” of a French Catholic parish system to a previously existing English township division or village. Thus it is common to find names like Sainte-edwidge-de-clifton, which incorporates the name of a Catholic parish (named after a saint) and that name of the original township. There are countless other examples: Sainte-catherine-de-hatley; Saintcyrille-de-wendover; Notre-dame-de-lourdes-de-ham; Saint-mathieu-de-dixville; and so on.

Changing demographics By the end of the 19th century, French Canadians would be the majority in most parts of the Eastern Townships. Yet, over a century later, the region is still home to a significant English-speaking population. There are many bilingual and bicultural communities, and the region is frequently cited as a model for harmonious co-existence between the two cultures.