Author of the article: Beth Wilkins
Publishing date: May 10, 2021 • 1 day ago • 6 minute read • • IMG 0506 – Scrip Commissioners (Seated l-r) J.A. Walker and Jean Jean-Léon Côté and Scrip Commission Secretaries (Standing l-r) J.F. Prudhomme and Charles Mair. Photo from David Leonard’s book Delayed Frontier, The Peace Country to 1909, and Saskatchewan Archives Board Photo by SUPPLIED
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We leave David Thompson, who we and Charlotte accompanied across Canada in his surveying, map-making, and boundary pursuits. As you will recall, he died in 1857, age 86, destitute. Wife, Charlotte, age 72, mother of their 13 children, followed three months later. They were buried in the family plot of daughter Eliza’s husband, Dalhousie Landall, in Mount Royal Cemetery, Montréal. Although, initially in an unmarked grave, their site was, in 1927, recognized with a white Grecian-like column upon which was a brass sextant – later removed “for safe
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Thompson’s sight, compromised in his youth by the loss in his right eye, completely failed him by 1851, when he lost the sight of the left one. Although not a welcome situation, his complete blindness and years of misfortune did not diminish his belief in the ultimate goodness of Providence. Nor did it diminish the solace he found in wife Charlotte’s support and “unfailing care”.
On further researching the life of David Thompson, your scribe discovered it was not daughter Fanny, but rather daughter Eliza and her husband, Dalhousie Landall with whom David and Charlotte lived in Longueuil, near Montréal.
Weekly Ponderings: People brought character and culture to Peace River - Part 36 dailyheraldtribune.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from dailyheraldtribune.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
Author of the article: Beth Wilkins
Publishing date: Apr 28, 2021 • April 28, 2021 • 6 minute read • • Acc. No. 1972-26-735 Library and Archives Canada, C.W. Jeffreys illustration from The Picture Gallery of Canadian History Volume ll, p.148: The illustrations are of amateur artist Richard Dillon’s c.1808 drawing of Notre Dame in Montréal’s Place d’Armes and painter George Delfosse’s 1829 painting of the Old Church and the New. Photo by SUPPLIED
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We continue with what has turned out to be quite a long journey with David Thompson, wife Charlotte and their growing family. The trek across Western Canada in search of appropriate sites for the North West Company (NWC) fur trading posts was filled with adventure and for David, at least, exhilaration in doing what he wanted to do – surveying leading to mapmaking.
Weekly Ponderings: People brought character and culture to Peace River Part 35 fortmcmurraytoday.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from fortmcmurraytoday.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.