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John Molson

John Molson (28 December 1763 – 11 January 1836) was an English-born brewer and entrepreneur in colonial Quebec, which during his lifetime became Lower Canada. In addition to founding Molson Brewery, he built the first steamship and the first public railway in Canada, was a president of the Bank of Montreal, and established a hospital, a hotel, and a theatre in Montreal. Molson was also the "leader" (provincial grand master) of the freemason's lodge of Montreal up to three years before his death, from 1826 to 1833. The dynasty he founded, the Molson family, is still a wealthy and powerful force in Canada.

Early life
John Molson was born in 1763, in the parish of Moulton near Spalding, Lincolnshire, England. His father John Molson senior (1730–1770) had, in 1760, married Mary Elsdale (1739–1772), the eldest daughter of Samuel Elsdale (1704–1788), of Surfleet. Her brother, Robinson Elsdale (1744–1783), was a privateer, whose unpublished exploits formed the basis of the novel by Frederick Marryat, The Privateersman (1846). Before the marriage, John Molson senior inherited a property known as Snake Hall, in Moulton Eaugate which consisted of a house and various outbuildings associated with 38 acre of land.

John Molson senior died on 4 June 1770. His will bequeathed properties to his wife and five surviving children. Under their marriage settlement, Snake Hall went to Mary, and was to then pass on to his eldest son, John, upon her death. She died on 21 September 1772, and thus John was orphaned when eight years old. John senior had named four guardians and trustees for the estate; the young John Molson's financial affairs were overseen by his paternal uncle, Thomas Molson, but in September 1771 Thomas turned over the duties of trustee and guardian to Samuel Elsdale, possibly due to poor health, as he died the following spring. Under Samuel Elsdale's oversight, Snake Hall was rented out to the benefit of their trusts. John went to live with a man named William Robinson, and at age 12 in 1776 was consigned to the care of a Mr Whitehead, who was paid for his board and education until 1780, when he turned 16. Writers have criticized Samuel Elsdale for his oversight but he seems to have performed his duties prudently, although John Molson plainly chafed under his guardianship.

In 1782, at the age of 18, Molson immigrated to Quebec, in a ship that was leaking so badly he switched ships mid-ocean. In 1783, Molson moved into the home of Thomas Loid just outside Montreal, who had begun brewing beer the previous year. Molson became a partner in the brewery and took over on 5 January 1785, eight days after he had turned twenty-one. In 1786, he returned briefly to England, and it was during that year that Molson picked up the book Theoretic Hints on an Improved Practice in Brewing by John Richardson. Molson returned to Quebec with more money and a new mindset. Many Loyalists were immigrating to Quebec from the United States and this influx increased the demand for beer. Molson worked hard, staying up long into the night. He hired an apprentice, Christopher Cook, and a loyalist housemaid, Sarah Insley Vaughan. He married her on 7 April 1801 at Christ Church in Montreal after she had borne him three children.

Sarah (1751–1829) was the daughter of Thomas Vaughan of Harnham Hall, Morpeth, Northumberland. She was the niece of Wilmot Vaughan, 1st Earl of Lisburne and through her mother's family, the Aynsleys, a cousin of the Duke of Atholl. She emigrated to the American colonies with her first husband, David Tetchley, but ten years later left him, and reverting to her maiden name, she made her way to Montreal, penniless, until taken in by Molson.

Soon Molson's beer was in such demand that according to one of his diary entries "Cannot serve half my customers and they are increasing every day." One of the major reasons for this was the wide appeal of his beer to different classes of Montreal society. High British officers had been drinking imported London porters and the city merchants preferred Bristol. Yet Molson's beer was special as it was "universally liked" (a quotation from Molson's diary). It was at the Anglican church that he met many influential and wealthy businessmen like fur trader James McGill, Joseph Frobisher, founder of the North West Company, and Alexander Mackenzie.

Career success and later life
Between 1788 and 1800, Molson's business grew quickly into one of the larger ones in Lower Canada. Already in 1791, he sold 30,000 gallons of beer. During these years Molson and his wife had four children, John junior, Thomas (who died shortly after birth), another Thomas, and William (Billy).

The year 1800 marks the first recorded use of (imported) bottles by Molson. About this time arrived The Philosophical Principles of the Science of Brewing by Richardson, which marks the introduction of the thermometer and the saccharometer to the English craft. By the start of the 19th Century, his small brewery had grown tenfold. Molson now had the money to improve his business by buying new technology.

Steamship pioneer
Molson toyed with the idea of buying a steamship after seeing Robert Fulton's Clermont go down the Hudson.. However, there was also another steamship commissioned by a group of businessmen from Burlington, Vermont, in 1808 to be built by two brothers in Burlington, Vermont, named John and James Winans. This ship was quite unsurprisingly called the Vermont and went into service in 1809. The Vermont ran in modern Canada, along Lake Champlain and the Riviere Richelieu to Dorchester (modern day Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu in Quebec). Molson's steamship would be the first in Canada. Molson teamed up with John Jackson and John Bruce who would build a ship for Molson in return for putting up the money and part ownership. Built in Montreal (with engines produced at Forges du Saint-Maurice in Trois-Rivières) in 1809, Accommodation became the first steamship to ride on the waters of the Saint Lawrence River. This was a great feat for Molson but, from a business viewpoint, it was a net loss, costing £4000 by 1810. Molson was determined to make money on his ships so he dismantled Accommodation and purchased in person two steamship engines from Boulton & Watt in Birmingham, England. He combined the two engines and the remains of Accommodation to create Swiftsure, a magnificent ship that was a vision of elegance and speed, traversing the route at an average of seven miles an hour. Swiftsure measured 130 feet on the keel and had a beam of 24 feet. The steamship provided a ready cash business, while the government in London had suspended the transfer of specie from 1800 to 1817. Most other Canadian business was carried on with London bills of exchange, and the transfer of those bills from Montreal to Quebec earned the Molsons up to 20 per cent. And since brewing occupied the months when the steamboats were laid up, a harmonious concordance of activities resulted.

Molson would have three other steamships constructed and utilized close to the end of the War of 1812 (for the first ship) and following the end of the war (for the remaining two), these ships were called: the Malsham (an archaic form of Molson) built in 1814 (going into service in September immediately after construction), the Lady Sherbrooke in 1816, and the New Swiftsure in 1817.

During the time leading up to the War of 1812 and within the war itself, Molson's business continued to grow and his sales were pushed even higher. Swiftsure was leased to the British Army and brought in a supplemental income.

Molson himself would be involved in the war, albeit through a full-time militia and not a regular force; however, some troops in the militia that Molson was a part of were volunteers and some were still conscripted. Each volunteer or conscripted man was nonetheless required to serve for one year only. Molson was ranked a lieutenant in the 5th Battalion of the Select Embodied Militia. There were 8 different battalion units in this militia with all expect for the 6th seeing action in either the Montreal or Lake Champlain sectors of the war front. The 5th Battalion was the first battalion that was formed after the War of 1812 had been declared officially, with the first four having been formed already in 1812 before the war began. Seven of the eight battalions (all except the 3rd) would be perpetuated within the Canadian Army and assigned to a varying regiment within - the 5th Battalion of which Molson was in was assigned to the Black Watch (Royal Highland Regiment) of Canada. Molson would eventually be promoted to captain on 25 March 1813. Molson would resign from this commissioned work within the same year, on 25 November 1813.

In 1815, Molson was elected to represent Montreal East in the legislative assembly on the platform of building a wharf. Molson Brewery is the second oldest company in all of Canada.

Plutocrat and banker
As Molson became more occupied by his multiple businesses and his seat in the assembly, his three sons began to take a much larger role in the companies. John Junior managed the steamships, Thomas was married in England and would frequently travel sending back tips and advice to his father, and William was in charge of the brewery. In 1816, the year he took his sons formally into partnership,  Molson built Mansion House Hotel which coincided with the Assembly's acceptance of the wharf. Molson's hotel was only for those who could afford luxury. The hotel offered Montreal's first library, boat rides on the river, well-furnished rooms and six-course dinners, famous throughout all of Montreal.

To the John Molsons and Sons partnership were leased at 6% per annum Molson's accumulated capital assets; the term was seven years. The four partners divided equally, share and share alike, the profits and the losses. If any insoluble difference arose between the partners, two indifferent arbitrators were to be appointed. By December 1816, Molson had accumulated £63,550.

In 1817, John Richardson and George Moffatt created the Montreal Bank. Molson declined a partnership in it as the backers of this project had been involved with multiple failed banks in the United States and he felt it was a risky investment. Molson changed his mind not long afterwards and the bank became fully Canadian-owned when the U.S. partners sold their shares after the U.S. financial crisis in the fall of 1818. By 1822, the bank had received a charter from Britain and changed its name to the Bank of Montreal. Between 1826 and 1834, Molson presided over its affairs.

Hospitaller
In 1819, Molson had a short bout of sickness. It was during this time that he noticed the only hospital in the city, Hôtel Dieu, only held 30 beds. Molson proposed to the assembly that a new hospital be established that would contain 200 beds. Although the assembly denied his request, there was much private support and soon donations came pouring in. By May the new hospital, the Montreal General Hospital, was opened on Craig Street (now Saint Antoine Street).

International beer and spirit merchant
A crisis almost struck the Molsons in 1821 when the Mansion House Hotel caught fire; some of the books from the library were saved but not much more was salvageable. Molson was undaunted by this and had ideas to build an even grander hotel, a true testament to his character. While John junior and William took care of the businesses within Canada, Thomas was busy working in England. Thomas brought over 237 gallons of beer to London, England. The response was encouraging and Thomas brought another 1385 gallons on his next trip. Molson's had its first international market.

The first Canadian distillery on an industrial scale was a Molson endeavour. It was in response to the economic collapse that occurred from 1817 to 1820, that Thomas convinced his partners to enter the distillery business, which was industrially a virgin land. From 1820 to 1866, one or another Molson partnership were the largest distillers in Canada. The trade in liquor was only wholesale in nature, because trade at the retail level had been forbidden the managers of a distillery under a law passed in 1794. The Molson company official historian maintains that until 1846, the single most substantial source of revenues were duties on alcoholic beverages. In those pioneer days, alcohol was the primary form by which was monetized grain, and in the absence of Scotch supply the British craved Canadian whiskey. One historian has concluded that, because the cost of transportation rises with volume shipped, Molson shipped concentrated alcohol to his British agents, Grayhurst & Hewat, who then cut it down for retail.

In 1828, the temperance movement in Canada was begun, with Methodist preachers setting up shop first in the Niagara Peninsula, then in Montreal and at Bedford, Nova Scotia. Prohibitionists called for the elimination of import, manufacture and sale of strong liquor for beverage purposes.

Theatre impresario
By 1825, Molson's hotel was completely rebuilt and renamed the British American Hotel. After the hotel was completed Molson built a theatre adjacent to it. By November, Molson's Theatre Royal was completed, the first theatre in Montreal. It seated 1,000 guests, presenting Shakespeare and Restoration authors and was also used for circuses and concerts. Edmund Kean and Charles Dickens both performed there before it was demolished in 1844 to make way for the Bonsecours Market.

Never resting, Molson continued to build his empire by purchasing multiple steamships and creating the St Lawrence Steamboat Company. This fleet of ships was so big that it outnumbered all of those operating in the United States. In 1826 Molson decided to run against a young Louis-Joseph Papineau but resigned quickly after discovering the amount of support Papineau had from the French and the Irish.

On 18 March 1829, Molson's wife Sarah Vaughan, died after treating her rheumatism with laudanum. Sarah became addicted to this opium-based painkiller and died from the effects. Molson sold the house they lived in together and moved on with his life. His four-year term as president of the Bank of Montreal (1826–1830) ended and Molson did not run for a second. Even at the age of 67 Molson did not contemplate retirement; one of his biggest projects still lay ahead.

Railway entrepreneur
Since 1825, Molson had followed reports of the first railways being built in England. Molson had told the head of this project, Jason Pierce, that he was interested. Pierce did not forget about Molson's interest and in 1832 Molson's request for a railroad was accepted by the Assembly. The Champlain and St Lawrence Railroad was to connect the St Lawrence to the Hudson River, making the trip from Montreal to New York much quicker. This was the first railway ever constructed in Canada. Molson became the Railroad's largest shareholder, when a cholera epidemic that struck Canada in 1832 and 1834 added to echoes of the economic depression caused by the crisis closure of the Second Bank of the United States. This all caused the railroad project to lose much of its momentum. Many businesses closed in Montreal but the Molsons continued work as usual. Construction of the railroad was begun in 1835, and was completed on Thursday 21 July 1836 with great pomp and ceremony, but without the senior Molson.

After his multiple successful proposals, John Molson was appointed to the Legislative Council of Lower Canada. He was considered part of the "Chateau Clique" as he was a rich English businessman. The people were losing their faith in English businessmen like Molson and were turning to men like Papineau and Robert Nelson, both members of the Patriote movement. In 1833 Molson's hotel burned down again. This time though, Molson decided not to rebuild it.

Freemason
Molson was appointed Provincial Grand Master of the District Grand Lodge of Montreal (Freemasons) by the Duke of Sussex by Letters Patent dated 15 May 1826 and installed in office by Claude Dénéchau on 5 September 1826; Molson resigned in 1833.

Death and legacy
When things returned to normal after the second cholera epidemic, Molson's railroad project began to gain speed. Unfortunately, he did not live long enough to see his last dream realized. Molson caught a high fever in December 1835. He wrote his will on 11 January 1836, and died that day. In his will, Molson named John Molson junior, Thomas Molson, William Molson, George Moffatt and Peter McGill executors. His remains now rest in a family mausoleum at Mount Royal Cemetery.

In 1955, a historian noted that of the many and myriad businesses started in 18th-century Montreal, only three remained to that date. The Molson Coors Brewing Company still has the dominant share of the beer industry in Canada.

title: John Molson


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Daniel Albert Wyttenbach

Daniel Albert Wyttenbach (7 August 1746, Bern – 17 January 1820, Oegstgeest) was a German Swiss classical scholar. A student of Hemsterhuis, Valckenaer and Ruhnken, he was an exponent of the methods of criticism which they established, and with them he laid the foundations of modern Greek scholarship.

Early life
He was born at Bern, of a noble family, and was extremely proud of his lineage, particularly his descent from Thomas Wyttenbach, professor of theology in Basel at the end of the 15th and beginning of the 16th century, who had taught Huldrych Zwingli and other distinguished pupils. Wyttenbach's own father was also a theological professor of considerable note, first at the University of Bern, and then at the University of Marburg. He moved to Marburg in 1756, partly because he had studied there under the famous Christian Wolff, and embodied the philosophical principles of his master in his own theological teaching.

Young Wyttenbach entered the University of Marburg at the age of fourteen, and studied there for four years. His parents intended him to be a Lutheran pastor. The first two years were given up to general education, principally to mathematics, "philology", philosophy, and history. The professor of mathematics, August Gottlieb Spangenberg, greatly influenced young Wyttenbach. He is said to have taught his subject with great clearness, and with equal seriousness and piety, often referring to God as the supreme mathematician, who had constructed all things by number, measure and weight.

"Philology" in the German universities of that age meant Hebrew and Greek. These two languages were generally handled by the same professor, and were taught almost solely to theological students. Wyttenbach's university course at Marburg was troubled about the middle of the time by mental unrest, due to the fascination exercised over him by John Bunyan's Pilgrim's Progress. It was Spangenberg who helped him recover. The principal study of the third year was metaphysics, which took Wyttenbach entirely captive. The fourth and last year was to be devoted to theology and Christian dogma.

Up to that time, Wyttenbach had submitted passively to his father's wishes concerning his career, but he now turned away from theological lectures, and devoted his leisure to the task of deepening and extending his knowledge of Greek literature. He possessed at the time, as he tells us, no more acquaintance with Greek than his own pupils at a later time could acquire from him during four months' study. He had access only to the bare texts of the authors. Wyttenbach was undaunted, and four years' persistent study gave him a knowledge of Greek such as few Germans of that time possessed. His love for philosophy carried him towards the Greek philosophers, especially Plato. During this period Ruhnken's notes on the Platonic lexicon of Timaeus fell into his hands. David Ruhnken was for him almost a superhuman being, with whom he imagined himself conversing in the spirit.

At twenty-two, he determined to go elsewhere in search of the aids to study which Marburg could not afford. His father, realizing the strength of his son's pure passion for scholarship, permitted and even advised him to seek Christian Gottlob Heine at the University of Göttingen. From Heine he received the utmost kindness and encouragement, and he was urged to dedicate to Ruhnken the first-fruits of his scholarships. Wyttenbach set to work on some notes to Julian, Eunapius and Aristaenetus, and Heine wrote to Ruhnken to obtain his favourable consideration for the work. Before it reached him, Ruhnken wrote a kind letter to Wyttenbach, which the recipient "read, re-read and kissed," and another on receipt of the tract, in which the great scholar declared that he had not expected to find in Germany such knowledge of Greek, such power of criticism, and such mature judgment, especially in one so young. By Heine's advice, he worked hard at Latin, which he knew less thoroughly than Greek, and Heine praised his progress in Latin style to Ruhnken and Valckenaer.

He then wrote to ask their advice about his scheme of coming to the Netherlands to follow the profession of a scholar. Ruhnken encouraged Wyttenbach to follow his own example, for he too had been designed by his parents for the Christian ministry in Germany, but had settled at Leiden on the invitation of Tiberius Hemsterhuis. Valckenaer agreed, but added that Wyttenbach's letter would have been pleasanter to him had it been free from excessive compliments. These letters were forwarded to the elder Wyttenbach, with a strong recommendation from Heine. The old man had been in Leiden in his youth, and admired the scholarship of the Netherlands; so his consent was easily won.

Academic career
Wyttenbach reached Leiden in 1770. He spent a year learning the language of the people, attending the lectures of the great duumviri of Leiden, and collating manuscripts of Plutarch. At the end of 1771 a professor was wanted at Amsterdam for the college of the Remonstrants. On the recommendation of Ruhnken, Wyttenbach obtained the chair, which he held with great success for eight years. His lectures were wide-ranging. Those on Greek were repeated to the students of the university of Amsterdam (the "Athenaeum"). In 1775 a visit was made to Paris, which was fruitful both of new friendships and of progress in study.

About this time, on the advice of Ruhnken, Wyttenbach began issuing his Bibliotheca critica, which appeared at intervals for the next thirty years. The methods of criticism were in the main those established by Hemsterhuis, and carried on by Valckenaer and Ruhnken, and the publication was accepted by the learned all over Europe. In 1777 the younger Burmann ("Burmannus Secundus") retired from his professorship at the Athenaeum, and Wyttenbach was disappointed not to be chosen to succeed him. Only his regard for Ruhnken and for Dutch freedom (in his own words Ruhnkeni et Batavae libertatis cogitatio) kept him in Holland. For fear of losing him, the authorities at Amsterdam nominated him professor of philosophy in 1779.

In 1785, Toll, Burmann's successor, resigned, and Wyttenbach was appointed to succeed him. His full title was "professor of history and eloquence and Greek and Latin literature." He had hardly got to work in his new office when Valckenaer died, and he received a call to Leiden. Greatly to Ruhnken's disappointment, he declined to abandon the duties he had so recently undertaken. In 1787 began the internal commotions in Holland, afterwards to be aggravated by foreign interference. Scarcely during the remaining thirty-three years of Wyttenbach's life was there a moment of peace in the land. About this time two requests were made to him for an edition of the Moralia of Plutarch, for which a recension of the tract De sera numinis vindicta had marked him out in the eyes of scholars. One request came from the famous Societas Bipontina, the other from the delegates of the Clarendon Press at Oxford, England. Wyttenbach, influenced at once by the reputation of the university, and by the liberality of the Oxonians in tendering him assistance of different kinds, declined the offer of the Bipontine Society — very fortunately, since their press was soon destroyed by the French.

The first portion of Wyttenbach's work was safely conveyed to Oxford in 1794. Then war broke out between Holland and Britain. Randolph, Wyttenbach's Oxford correspondent, advised that the next portion should be sent through the British ambassador at Hamburg, and the manuscript was duly consigned to him "in a little chest well protected by pitch." After sending Randolph a number of letters without getting any answer, Wyttenbach in disgust put all thought of the edition from him, but at last the missing box was discovered in a forgotten corner at Hamburg, where it had lain for two years and a half. The work was finally completed in 1803.

Meanwhile, Wyttenbach received invitations from his native city, Bern, and from Leiden, where vacancies had been created by the refusal of professors to swear allegiance to the new Dutch republic set up in 1795, to which Wyttenbach had made submission. But he only left Amsterdam in 1799, when on Ruhnken's death he succeeded him at Leiden as professor and 13th Librarian of Leiden University. Even then his chief object in moving was to facilitate an arrangement by which the necessities of his old master's family might be relieved. His move came too late in life, and he was never so happy at Leiden as he had been at Amsterdam. Before long appeared the ever-delightful Life of David Ruhnken. Though written in Latin, this biography deserves to rank high in the modern literature of its class. Of Wyttenbach's life at Leiden there is little to tell.

The continual changes in state affairs greatly disorganized the universities of Holland, and Wyttenbach had to work in face of much detraction; still, his success as a teacher was very great. In 1805 he narrowly escaped with his life from the great gunpowder explosion, which killed 150 people, among them the Greek scholar Jean Luzac, Wyttenbach's colleague in the university. One of Wyttenbach's letters gives a vivid account of the disaster. During the last years of his life he suffered severely from illness and became nearly blind. After the conclusion of his edition of Plutarch's Moralia in 1805, the only important work he was able to publish was his well-known edition of Plato's Phaedo.

Many honours were conferred upon him both at home and abroad, and in particular he was made a member of the French Institute. Shortly before his death, he obtained the licence of the king of Holland to marry his sister's daughter, Johanna Gallien, who had for twenty years been his housekeeper, secretary and research assistant. The sole object of the marriage was to secure for her a better provision after her husband's death, because as the widow of a professor she would be entitled to a pension. Gallien was a woman of remarkable culture and ability, and wrote works held in great repute at that time. On the festival of the tercentenary of the foundation of the university of Marburg, celebrated in 1827, the degree of doctor was conferred upon her. Wyttenbach died of apoplexy in 1820, and he was buried in the garden of his country house near Leiden, which stood, as he noted, within sight of the dwellings of Descartes and Boerhaave.

Wyttenbach's biography was written in a somewhat dry and lifeless manner by Mahne, one of his pupils, who also published some of his letters. His Opuscula, other than those published in the Bibliotheca critica, were collected in two volumes (Leiden, 1823).

Evaluation
Although his work is not on the same level as that of Hemsterhuis, Valckenaer and Ruhnken, he was a very eminent exponent of the sound methods of criticism which they established. These four men, more than any others after Richard Bentley, laid the foundations of modern Greek scholarship. The precise study of grammar, syntax and style, and the careful criticism of texts by the light of the best manuscript evidence, were upheld by these scholars in the Netherlands when they were almost entirely neglected elsewhere on the Continent, and were only pursued with partial success in England. Wyttenbach may fairly be regarded as closing a great period in the history of scholarship. He lived indeed to see the new birth of German classical learning, but his work was done, and he was unaffected by it. Wyttenbach's criticism was less rigorous, precise and masterly, but perhaps more sensitive and sympathetic, than that of his great predecessors in the Netherlands. In actual acquaintance with the philosophical writings of the ancients, he has probably never been surpassed. In character he was upright and simple-minded, but shy and retiring, and often failed to make himself appreciated. His life was not passed without strife, but his few friends were warmly attached to him, and his many pupils were for the most part his enthusiastic admirers.

license: Creative Commons - Attribution Share-Alike - https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/

title: Daniel Albert Wyttenbach


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Paul de Chomedey, Sieur de Maisonneuve

Paul de Chomedey de Maisonneuve (15 February 1612 – 9 September 1676) was a French military officer and the founder of Ville-Marie, now the city of Montreal.

Early life
Maisonneuve was baptised on 15 February 1612 at Neuville-sur-Vannes in Champagne, France. He was the son of Louis de Chomedey, seigneur of Chavane, Germenoy-en-Brie, and his second wife Marie de Thomelin, the daughter of Jean de Thomelin, a king's counsellor and a treasurer of France in the generality of Champagne, and of Ambroise d’Aulquoy.

Paul de Chomedey grew up in the manor-house at Neuville-sur-Vanne, not far from the Maisonneuve seigneury which his father had acquired in 1614. He had two sisters and one brother. He began his military career at 13 in Holland, where he also learned to play the lute.

Just before his 30th birthday, Maisonneuve was recruited by Jérome le Royer de la Dauversiere, who was head of the Société Notre-Dame de Montréal. The latter claimed to have experienced a vision that inspired him to sponsor a mission on Montreal Island in New France. Maisonneuve was hired to lead the colonists and ensure their safety in the new land.

Governor of Montreal
In 1642 Ville-Marie was founded on the southern shore of the Island of Montreal, where a chapel and a small settlement were built. A hospital, under the leadership of Jeanne Mance, was also established. Maisonneuve was the first governor of Montreal.

The settlers maintained peaceful relations with the Algonquin people, one of the indigenous tribes of the area. The first year of the colony's existence was peaceful. In 1643 a flood threatened the city. Maisonneuve prayed to the Virgin Mary to stop the inundation and when it abated, he erected a cross atop Mount Royal. A cross has been maintained there to the current day.

Of the local First Nations tribes with whom these French settlers had contact with, the Mohawk, who were already trading with the Dutch and in New Amsterdam (modern New York City), resented French efforts to interrupt the trade. The Mohawk were based in present-day New York State, south of Montreal, and severely threatened the new colony. The Algonquin, in contrast, maintained peaceful relations with the newly arrived Europeans. Nevertheless, they were often at war with the Haudenosaunee (Iroquois), who discovered the existence of the new French settlement of Montreal, whose defence Maisonneuve commanded using his military training, only in 1643.

Already familiar with the terrain, the Haudenosaunee would often observe and engage the French settlers from the safety of the woods. That devastating strategy was the beginning of a long conflict between the groups as they were competing with each other for game and other resources. On 30 March 1644, the situation came to a head. Warned by their guard dogs as to the nearby presence of their enemies, a band of 30 settlers went into the forest to face their foes. Once in the woods, the French encountered 250 Haudenosaunee people in ambush, waiting for them. Retreating in the face of such uneven odds, Maisonneuve remained last so that the others could make it safely back to the fort, resulting in him being set upon by a Haudenosaunee chief. In this decisive moment, Maisonneuve fired twice on the chief, thus "killing him with his bare hands," as is sometimes quoted about the event, before returning to the safety of the fort amid much fanfare.

In 1645, Maisonneuve received news that his father had died, and he returned to France. There, he was offered the position of Governor of New France but turned it down, wanting to continue his leadership of Ville-Marie. Maisonneuve returned to Montreal in 1647, and the wars with the Iroquois continued. In 1649, Maisonneuve stood as godfather for the first white child baptized in the colony. She was Pauline Hébert, the daughter of the fur-trader Augustin Hébert and his wife Adrienne Du Vivier, who had come to Montreal in 1648 with Maisonneuve and their elder daughter Jeanne.

In the spring of 1651, the Haudenosaunee attacks became so frequent and so violent that Ville-Marie thought that its end had come. Maisonneuve made all the settlers take refuge in the fort. By 1652, the colony at Montreal had been so reduced that he was forced to return to France to raise 100 volunteers to go with him to the colony the following year. If the effort had failed, Montreal would have been abandoned and the survivors relocated downriver to Quebec City. When the 100 arrived in the fall of 1653, the population of Montreal was barely 50 people. They included Jacques Archambault, who dug the first well on the island in 1657, at the request of Maisonneuve.

Over time, the colony grew in size and eventually was large enough to be secure from the Haudenosaunee threat. Ownership of the colony was transferred from the missionary society to the Sulpicians in March 1663. As New France had been proclaimed a royal province in 1663, governance of Montreal was assumed by the Governor General and the Sovereign Council.

New France's governor general, Augustin de Saffray de Mésy, officially appointed Maisonneuve as governor of Montreal in October 1663. Maisonneuve objected, arguing that since the Sulpicians held the seigneurial rights, only they could appoint a governor. For the same reason, Maisonneuve objected to the establishment of a royal court at Montreal.

In September 1665, Alexandre de Prouville de Tracy, the Lieutenant Général of the Americas, ordered Maisonneuve to return to France on indefinite leave. After 24 years as head of the colony, he left Montreal for good.

Later life
Settling in Paris Maisonneuve lived in relative obscurity. In 1671, he welcomed Marguerite Bourgeoys at his home in Paris. With his encouragement she had established the Congregation of Notre Dame of Montreal in 1653, an order of teaching nuns that educated French and Indigenous children.

Maisonneuve died in Paris on 9 September 1676; at his bedside were his young friend, Philippe de Turmenys, and his devoted servant, Louis Fin. On September 10, his funeral and burial took place at the Church of the Fathers of the Christian Doctrine, near the abbey of Saint-Étienne-du-Mont.

Honours
After his death, Rue Saint-Paul Rue Saint-Paul in Montreal was named after Maisonneuve, who had built his home in 1650 on the early street.

Nuns' Island was once called Île Saint-Paul in honour of the founder of Montreal. The current name of the island appears starting from the 19th century and was exclusively used from the 1950s on.

The Maisonneuve Monument was erected in 1895 on Place d'Armes in Old Montreal, to his memory. It is the work of Louis-Philippe Hébert (1850–1917). An imaginary model was used to represent Maisonneuve, as no authentic portrait exists of the first governor of Montreal.

De Maisonneuve Boulevard and Rue Chomedey in Downtown Montreal are named for him, as are Maisonneuve Park, the Collège de Maisonneuve, the neighbourhood of Chomedey in Laval, and the Maisonneuve pavilion, a dormitory at the Royal Military College Saint-Jean.

Novels

 * Lise Baucher-Morency / Gaëtane Breton, La périlleuse fondation de Ville-Marie, (book with musical CD) Éditions Planète rebelle (link ) 2017

title: Paul de Chomedey, Sieur de Maisonneuve


text:
René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle

René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle (November 22, 1643 – March 19, 1687), was a 17th-century French explorer and fur trader in North America. He explored the Great Lakes region of the United States and Canada, and the Mississippi River. He is best known for an early 1682 expedition in which he canoed the lower Mississippi River from the mouth of the Illinois River to the Gulf of Mexico; there, on 9 April 1682, he claimed the Mississippi River basin for France after giving it the name La Louisiane. One source states that "he acquired for France the most fertile half of the North American continent". A later ill-fated expedition to the Gulf coast of Mexico (today the U.S. state of Texas) gave the United States a claim to Texas in the purchase of the Louisiana Territory from France in 1803. La Salle was assassinated in 1687 during that expedition.

Although Joliet and Marquette preceded him on the upper Mississippi in their journey of 1673–74, La Salle extended exploration, and France's claims, all the way to the river's mouth, while the existing historical evidence does not indicate that La Salle ever reached the Ohio/Allegheny Valley.

Early life
Robert Cavelier was born on November 22, 1643, into a comfortably well-off family in Rouen, France, in the parish Saint-Herbland. His parents were Jean Cavelier and Catherine Geest. His older brother, Jean Cavelier, became a Sulpician priest. When Robert was young, he enjoyed science and nature. In his teens, he studied with the Jesuit religious order and became a member after taking initial vows in 1660.

Required to reject his father's legacy when he joined the Jesuits, La Salle was nearly destitute when he traveled as a prospective colonist to North America. He sailed for New France in the spring of 1666. His brother Jean, had moved there the year before. At La Salle's request on March 27, 1667, after he was in Canada, he was released from the Society of Jesus after citing "moral weaknesses".

La Salle was granted a seigneurie on land at the western end of the Island of Montreal, which became known as Lachine. La Salle immediately began to issue land grants, set up a village and learn the languages of the Native people, several tribes of Iroquois in this area.

Sieur de La Salle
Sieur de La Salle is a French title roughly translating to "Lord of the manor". Sieur is a French title of nobility, similar to the English "Sir," but under the French seigneurial system, the title is purchased rather than earned, and does not imply military duty. Robert Cavelier took the title with his seigneurial purchase of Lachine from the Sulpician order at Ville Marie around 1667. It refers to the name of a family estate near Rouen. However, the phrase La Salle has become iconic, and associated with the person as if it were his name; he is therefore often called Robert La Salle, or simply "La Salle".

"Ohio" expedition
The Seneca told La Salle of a great river, called the Ohio, which flowed into the sea, the "Vermilion Sea". He began to plan for expeditions to find a western passage to China. He sought and received permission from Governor Daniel Courcelle and Intendant Jean Talon to embark on the enterprise. He sold his interests in Lachine to finance the venture.

La Salle left Lachine by the St. Lawrence on July 6, 1669, with a flotilla of nine canoes and 24 men, an unknown number of Seneca guides: himself and 14 hired men in four canoes, the two Sulpicians Dollier de Casson and Abbé René de Bréhan de Galinée with seven new recruits in three canoes, and two canoes of Natives. Having travelled up the St. Lawrence and across Lake Ontario for 35 days, they arrived at what is called today Irondequoit Bay on the southern shore of Lake Ontario at the mouth of Irondequoit Creek, a place now commemorated as La Salle's Landing.

There they were greeted by a party of Natives, who escorted them starting the next day to a village some leagues distant, a journey of a few days. At the village, the Seneca vehemently attempted to dissuade the party from proceeding into the lands of their enemies, the Algonquins, telling of the dire fate awaiting them. The necessity of securing guides for the further part of the journey, and the refusal of the Seneca to provide them, delayed the expedition a month. A fortuitous capture by the Natives in the lands to the south of a Dutchman who spoke Iroquois well but French poorly, and was to be burned at the stake for transgressions unknown, provided an opportunity to obtain a guide. The Dutchman's freedom was purchased by the party in exchange for wampum.

While at the Native village in September 1669, La Salle was seized with a violent fever and expressed the intention of returning to Ville Marie.

At this juncture, he parted from his company and the narrative of the Jesuits, who continued on to upper Lake Erie. Other accounts have it that some of La Salle's men soon returned to New Holland or Ville Marie.

Further evidence
Beyond that, the factual record of La Salle's first expedition ends, and what prevails is obscurity and fabrication. It is likely that he spent the winter in Ville Marie. The next confirmed sighting of La Salle was by Nicolas Perrot on the Ottawa River near the Rapide des Chats in early summer, 1670, hunting with a party of Iroquois. That would be 700 miles as the crow flies from the Falls of the Ohio, the point supposed by some that he reached on the Ohio River.

La Salle's own journal of the expedition was lost in 1756. Two indirect historical accounts exist. The one, Récit d’un ami de l’abbé de Galliné, purported to be a recitation by La Salle himself to an unknown writer during his visit to Paris in 1678, and the other Mémoire sur le projet du sieur de la Salle pour la descouverte de la partie occidentale de l’Amérique septentrionale entre la Nouvelle-France, la Floride et le Mexique. A letter from Madeleine Cavelier, his now elderly niece, written in 1746, commenting on the journal of La Salle in her possession may also shed some light on the issue.

La Salle himself never claimed to have discovered the Ohio River. In a letter to the intendant Talon in 1677, he claimed "discovery" of a river, the Baudrane, flowing southwesterly below the Great Lakes (well north of the Ohio's location) with its head on Lake Erie and emptying into the Saint Louis (i.e. the Mississippi), a hydrography which was non-existent. In those days, maps as well as descriptions were based part on observation and part on hearsay, of necessity. This confounded courses, mouths and confluences among the rivers. At various times, La Salle invented such rivers as the Chucagoa, Baudrane, Louisiane (Anglicized "Saint Louis"), and Ouabanchi-Aramoni.

Confounding fact with fiction started with publication in 1876 of Pierre Margry's Découvertes et Établissements des Français. Margry was a French archivist and partisan who had private access to the French archives. He came to be the agent of American historian Francis Parkman. Margry's work, a massive nine volumes, encompassed an assemblage of documents some previously published, but many not. In it, he sometimes published a reproduction of the whole document, and sometimes only an extract, or summary, not distinguishing the one from the other.

He also used in some cases one or another copies of original documents previously edited, extracted or altered by others, without specifying which transcriptions were original, and which were copies, or whether the copy was dated earlier or later. Reproductions were scattered in fragments across chapters, so that it was impossible to ascertain the integrity of the document from its fragments. Chapter headings were oblique and sensational, so as to obfuscate the content therein. English and American scholars were immediately skeptical of the work, since full and faithful publication of some of the original documents had previously existed. The situation was so fraught with doubt, that the United States Congress appropriated $10,000 in 1873, which Margry wanted as an advance, to have the original documents photostated, witnessed by uninvolved parties as to veracity.

The intermezzo years
La Salle undertook several other smaller unknown expeditions between 1671 and 1673. On July 12, 1673, the Governor of New France, Louis de Buade de Frontenac, arrived at the mouth of the Cataraqui River to meet with leaders of the Five Nations of the Iroquois to encourage them to trade with the French. While the groups met and exchanged gifts, Frontenac's men, led by La Salle, hastily constructed a rough wooden palisade on a point of land by a shallow, sheltered bay. Originally the fort was named Fort Cataraqui but was later renamed Fort Frontenac by La Salle in honor of his patron. The purpose of Fort Frontenac was to control the lucrative fur trade in the Great Lakes Basin to the west. The fort was also meant to be a bulwark against the English and Dutch, who were competing with the French for control of the fur trade. La Salle was left in command of the fort in 1673.

Thanks to his powerful protector, the discoverer managed, during a voyage to France in 1674–75, to secure for himself the grant of Fort Cataraqui and acquired letters of nobility for himself and his descendants. With Frontenac's support, he received not only a fur trade concession, with permission to establish frontier forts, but also a title of nobility. He returned and rebuilt Frontenac in stone. An Ontario Heritage Trust plaque describes La Salle at Cataraqui as "[a] major figure in the expansion of the French fur trade into the Lake Ontario region. Using the fort as a base, he undertook expeditions to the west and southwest in the interest of developing a vast fur-trading empire."

Great Lakes forts
After leaving Lower Canada in September 1678, La Salle and his lieutenant Henri de Tonti travelled to Fort Frontenac (now in Kingston, Ontario) and then to Niagara where, in December 1678, they were the first Europeans to view Niagara Falls; they built Fort Conti at the mouth of the Niagara River.

There they loaded supplies into smaller boats (canoes or bateaux), so they could continue up the shallow and swiftly flowing lower Niagara River to what is now the location of Lewiston, New York.

There the Iroquois had a well-established portage route which bypassed the rapids and the cataract later known as Niagara Falls.

The first ship built by La Salle, called the Frontenac, a 10-ton single-decked brigantine or barque, was lost in Lake Ontario, on January 8, 1679. Afterward, La Salle built Le Griffon, a seven-cannon, 45-ton barque, on the upper Niagara River at or near Cayuga Creek. She was launched on August 7, 1679. La Salle sailed in Le Griffon up Lake Erie to Lake Huron, then up Huron to Michilimackinac and on to present-day Green Bay, Wisconsin. Le Griffon left for Niagara with a load of furs, but was never seen again.

La Salle continued with his men in canoes down the western shore of Lake Michigan, rounding the southern end to the mouth of the Miami River (now St. Joseph River), where they built a stockade in November, 1679. They called it Fort Miami (now known as St. Joseph, Michigan). There they waited for Tonti and his party, who had crossed the Lower Michigan peninsula on foot.

On December 3, 1679, with a group of 40, La Salle and Henri de Tonti headed south from Fort Miami. They canoed up the St. Joseph and followed it to a portage at present-day South Bend, Indiana. They crossed to the Kankakee River and followed it to the Illinois River. In January 1680, they reached an area that is near the current city of Peoria, Illinois. In order to help the local Peoria tribe defend themselves against the Iroquois, La Salle and his group built a stockade and named it Fort Crèvecoeur.

In March 1680, La Salle set off on foot for Fort Frontenac for supplies. A month after his departure, the soldiers at Ft. Crevecoeur, led by Martin Chartier, mutinied, destroyed the fort, and exiled Tonti, whom he had left in charge.

Mississippi expedition
The group later travelled along the Illinois River and arrived at the Mississippi River in February 1682; they built canoes there. The exploration reached an area that is now Memphis, Tennessee, where La Salle built a small fort, named Fort Prudhomme.

In April 1682, the expedition reached the Gulf of Mexico. There, La Salle named the Mississippi basin La Louisiane in honor of Louis XIV and claimed it for France.

During 1682–83, La Salle, with Henry de Tonti, established Fort Saint-Louis of Illinois at Starved Rock on the Illinois River to protect and hold the region for France. La Salle then returned to Montreal and later, to France.

Texas expedition and death
On July 24, 1684, he departed France and returned to America with a large expedition designed to establish a French colony on the Gulf of Mexico, at the mouth of the Mississippi River. They had four ships and 300 colonists. The expedition was plagued by pirates, Natives defending their land, and poor navigation. One ship was lost to pirates in the West Indies, a second sank in the inlets of Matagorda Bay. The La Belle made landfall in Feb. 1685.

They founded a settlement, near the bay which they called the Bay of Saint Louis, on Garcitas Creek in the vicinity of present-day Victoria, Texas. La Salle led a group eastward on foot on three occasions to try to locate the mouth of the Mississippi. In the meantime, the flagship La Belle, the only remaining ship, ran aground and sank into the mud, stranding the colony on the Texas coast.

Some of his men mutinied, near the site of present-day Navasota, Texas.

On March 19, 1687, La Salle was slain by Pierre Duhaut during an ambush while talking to Duhaut's decoy, Jean L'Archevêque. They were "six leagues" from the westernmost village of the Hasinai (Tejas) Indians. One source states that Duhaut was a "disenchanted follower". Duhaut was shot and killed by James Hiems to avenge La Salle. Over the following week, others were killed; confusion followed as to who killed whom.

The colony lasted only until 1688, when Karankawa-speaking Natives killed the 20 remaining adults and took five children as captives. Tonti sent a search mission in 1689 when he learned of the colonizers' fate, but the expedition ran out of supplies in northern Texas and failed to reach the site.

It is now known that there were 15 survivors of the original 180 colonists at the fort, most of whom had accompanied La Salle on his final eastward trek to locate the mouth of the Colbert (Mississippi) River and escaped the massacre: 5 children at the settlement kidnapped by Native Americans and later rescued by the Spanish, and 10 other adults, who lived for a while among the Native Americans and were later captured and released by the Spanish; six found their way to Canada and eventually returned to France. Three others were refused passage by the Spanish; an Italian was imprisoned. For as long as 30 years after the demise of the colony, there were specious accounts of survivors still living among the Native Americans in Texas.

Personal life
La Salle never married, but has been linked to Madeleine de Roybon d'Allonne, an early colonizer of New France.

Legacy
In addition to the forts, which also served as authorized agencies for the extensive fur trade, La Salle's visits to Illinois and other Natives cemented the French policy of alliance with Natives in the common causes of containing both Iroquois influence and Anglo-American colonization. He also gave the name Louisiana (La Louisiane) to the interior North American territory he claimed for France, which lives on in the name of a U.S. state.

The Encyclopædia Britannica provides this summary of La Salle's achievements: "His claim of Louisiana for France, though but a vain boast at the time, pointed the way to the French colonial empire that was eventually built by other men".

Pierre Berton wrote, "no other man had crammed so much adventure, so much excitement, so many triumphs, and so many heartbreaks into a single career. Though he died at the hands of some of his quarrelling followers in the mud of reeds of the Gulf of Mexico lowlands, he was essentially a man of the lakes, of Ontario and Erie, Huron and Michigan...."

A sculpture of de La Salle is located on the south facade of the Knute Rockne Memorial on the campus of the University of Notre Dame. There is also a statue of him in Chicago's Lincoln Park.

Archaeology
In 1995, La Salle's primary ship La Belle was discovered in the muck of Matagorda Bay. It has been the subject of archeological research. A search of the wreck and surrounding area during 1996 to 1997 yielded numerous artifacts from the 17th century. Through an international treaty, the artifacts excavated from La Belle are owned by France and held in trust by the Texas Historical Commission. The collection is held by the Corpus Christi Museum of Science and History. Artifacts from La Belle are shown at nine museums across Texas.

The wreckage of his ship L'Aimable has yet to be located. In 1998, The National Underwater and Marine Agency claimed that it had found the wreck in Matagorda Bay but the Texas Historical Commission stated that the wreck was much more recent.

The possible remains of Le Griffon were found in 1898 by lighthouse keeper Albert Cullis, on a beach on the western edge of Manitoulin Island in northern Lake Huron. Results of testing some of the artifacts were disputed. Many of the recovered artifacts were lost and the wreck was washed away in 1942. A possible shipwreck of Le Griffon near Poverty Island at the entrance to Green Bay in northern Lake Michigan was located by Steve Libert of the Great Lakes Exploration Group in 2001. The organization prevailed in a lawsuit against the state of Michigan over ownership of artifacts in 2012, and in 2013 was issued a permit to excavate the wreck. Only one artifact, a wood pole, was recovered, and it is indeterminate whether it was from a shipwreck. In 2019, the Discovery Channel featured the story of the ship; divers who were involved in the investigation were convinced that Le Griffon sank in the Mississagi Strait. Historians debated the site of La Salle's "Fort St Louis" colony, which had been said to be near Lavaca Bay at Garcitas Creek, and was a significant part of the history of French colonization of Texas. A June 1996 dig at the site that was believed to be the correct location revealed eight French cannon. This led archeologists to excavate the Keeran Ranch site in the area, during 1996–2002; they concluded that the Spanish Presidio La Bahía fort "was built on the La Salle settlement". Some 10 percent of the artifacts recovered are believed to have originated in France.

Place names
Many places, streets, parks, buildings and other things were named in La Salle's honor:

Counties and towns Parks and streets
 * LaSalle, in Essex County, Ontario, south of Windsor on the Detroit River
 * LaSalle, Quebec is a borough of the city of Montreal, Quebec, Canada.
 * LaSalle County, Illinois, the city of LaSalle and the LaSalle Speedway within it.
 * LaSalle Parish, Louisiana
 * La Salle County, Texas
 * La Salle, Minnesota
 * The LaSalle Expressway, a roadway through Niagara Falls, New York and its outer suburbs.
 * LaSalle Street, a north–south thoroughfare in Chicago, leads directly to the Board of Trade, and is the center of Chicago's financial district.
 * The La Salle Causeway, connecting Kingston, Ontario to neighbouring Barriefield, Ontario.
 * Jardin Cavelier de La Salle in the 6ème arrondissement in Paris
 * La Salle Avenue, a downtown street in Minneapolis, Minnesota.
 * Avenue La Salle, located in Shawinigan, Quebec, Canada.
 * La Salle Street in Navasota, Texas. It also contains a statue given by the local Robert Raines Chapter of the National Society Daughters of the American Revolution and the Texas Society Daughters of the American Revolution.
 * Lasalle Road, an east–west road to the south of Sarnia, Ontario, Canada.
 * LaSalle Avenue, a thoroughfare in South Bend, Indiana, which traverses the downtown area and carries a portion of U.S. Route 20 Business.
 * LaSalle Boulevard and Cavelier Road in Marquette Heights, Illinois, near Fort Crèvecoeur
 * La Salle Avenue in Waco, Texas.
 * La Salles Landing Park on Irondequoit Creek in Penfield, NY
 * La Salle Park in Burlington, Ontario
 * Robert LaSalle County Park, Door County, Wisconsin.

Buildings and other
 * LaSalle automobile brand
 * LaSalle-Peru Township High School in LaSalle, Illinois has the mascot of the Cavaliers (Cavs) and Lady Cavaliers (Lady Cavs).
 * La Salle Hotel, Chicago
 * LaSalle Hotel in downtown Bryan, Texas
 * École secondaire publique De La Salle in Ottawa, Ontario
 * La Salle Secondary School in Kingston, Ontario
 * De La Salle High School in New Orleans, Louisiana

title: René-Robert Cavelier, Sieur de La Salle


text:
Tiberius Hemsterhuis

Tiberius Hemsterhuis (9 January 1685 – 7 April 1766) was a Dutch philologist and critic.

Life
He was born in Groningen. His father, a learned physician, gave him a good early education and he entered the university of his native city in his fifteenth year, where he proved himself the best student of mathematics. After a year or two at Groningen, he was attracted to the University of Leiden by the fame of Perizonius. While there, he was entrusted with the duty of arranging the manuscripts in the library. Though he accepted an appointment as professor of mathematics and philosophy at Amsterdam in his twentieth year, he had already directed his attention to the study of the ancient languages.

In 1717 Hemsterhuis was appointed a professor of Greek at the University of Franeker to replace Lambert Bos, but he did not enter on his duties there till 1720. In 1738 he became a professor of national history as well. Two years afterward, he was called to teach the same subjects at Leiden, where he died on 7 April 1766.

He was the father of Frans Hemsterhuis.

Works
In 1706, he completed the edition of Julius Pollux's Onomasticon begun by Jean-Henri Lederlin (1672–1737), but the praise he received from his countrymen was more than counterbalanced by two letters of criticism from Bentley, which mortified him so keenly that for two months he refused to open a Greek book. Hemsterhuis was the founder of a Dutch school of criticism which had disciples in Lodewijk Caspar Valckenaer, Jacob van Lennep and David Ruhnken.

His major writings were:
 * Luciani colloquia et Timon (1708)
 * Aristophanis Plutus (1744)
 * Notae, etc., ad Xenophontem Ephesium in the Miscellanea critica of Amsterdam, vols. iii. and iv.
 * Observationes ad Chrysostomi homilias (1784)
 * Orationes (1784)
 * a Latin translation of the Birds of Aristophanes, in Kuster's edition
 * notes to Bernard's Thomas Magister, to Alberti's Hesychius of Alexandria, to Johann August Ernesti's Callimachus and to Pieter Burmann the Younger's Propertius.

title: Tiberius Hemsterhuis


text:
Pierre Gaultier de Varennes, sieur de La Vérendrye

Pierre Gaultier de Varennes, sieur de La Vérendrye (17 November 1685 – 5 December 1749) was a French Canadian military officer, fur trader, and explorer. In the 1730s, he and his four sons explored the area west of Lake Superior and established trading posts there. They were part of a process that added Western Canada to the original New France territory that was centred along the Saint Lawrence basin.

He was the first known European to reach present-day North Dakota and the upper Missouri River in the United States. In the 1740s, two of his sons crossed the prairie as far as present-day Wyoming, United States and were the first Europeans to see the Rocky Mountains north of New Mexico.

Early life
Born in Trois-Rivières, New France, Pierre was the eldest son of René Gaultier de Varennes, who came to Canada as a soldier in 1665, and Marie, the daughter of Pierre Boucher, the first Governor of Trois-Rivières. The Gaultier family were minor nobility or landowners who came from the Anjou area of France. Varennes and La Vérendrye were 2 of their estates.

Pierre's father died when he was 3, and he was educated at the Jesuit seminary in Quebec. At the age of twelve he received a cadet's commission in the French Marines in Canada. In 1704 and 1705 La Vérendrye took part in the raids of Queen Anne's War, which was waged by colonists in the English and French areas of North America. He was present at the Raid on Deerfield in present-day Massachusetts. The French and their Abenaki allies took more than a hundred captives from the village, forcing them on the 300-mile journey through the wilderness to return to Montreal. During those years, both sides often took captives for ransom. The next year La Vérendrye participated in an unsuccessful attack on the English settlement of St. John's, Newfoundland.

At age 22, he enlisted in the French Army, and fought in Flanders during the War of the Spanish Succession; he was seriously wounded at the Battle of Malplaquet. After recovering from his injuries and being given paroled as a prisoner of war, Gaultier returned to Canada and married Marie-Anne, daughter of Louis Dandonneau, Sieur Du Sablé, in 1712. For the next 15 years, he supported his family by farming and fur trading along the Saint Lawrence.

Explorations

In 1726 his fortunes changed when his brother Jacques-René was appointed the commander of the poste du Nord. This was the north shore of Lake Superior with three main posts: Fort Kaministiquia, which was a terminus for the main route west; a post at the mouth of the Nipigon River; and one near the future site of Wawa, Ontario, which had river connections to James Bay. La Vérendrye began trading in the area and in 1728 was appointed as commandant when his brother left to fight the Fox Indians.

He became involved with the quest to find a route to the Pacific, what was known as the Northwest Passage. Under the 1713 Treaty of Utrecht, Great Britain had taken control of Hudson Bay and thereby blocked the French from using that area. At this time people thought that not far to the west was an inlet from the Pacific called the mer du couchant, similar to the equally mythical Strait of Annian. They thought also that travelers could cross the height of land and find a River of the West that flowed all the way to the Pacific. (For the area to be explored see Early Canadian canoe routes, Nelson River Basin.)

In 1688 Jacques de Noyon had reached Rainy Lake. In 1717 Zacharie Robutel de La Noue tried to reach Rainy Lake but succeeded only in establishing Fort Kaministiquia. The British on Hudson Bay heard reports of coureurs des bois west of Lake Superior, but they left no records in the French archives. Morton thinks they may have gotten as far as Lake Winnipeg. In 1716 a memoir drawn up by Governor Vaudreuil showed lakes and portages as far as Lake of the Woods, from which flowed a river to the "Sea of the West". This implies that Frenchmen had explored west of Lake Superior before Vérendrye did so.

La Vérendrye questioned the Natives who came to trade. He learned of the Mandan country on the upper Missouri River. These people were described as white men who lived in big houses. Auchagah, a Cree guide, made a map of the canoe routes between Lake Superior and Lake Winnipeg based on his and other Cree experience. La Vérendrye judged correctly that Lake Winnipeg was the geographic key which had to be reached to allow further exploration.

In 1730 he met Governor Beauharnois at Quebec and worked out a plan. La Vérendrye would build a post on Lake Winnipeg. The expedition would be paid for by Quebec merchants who hoped to profit from the resulting fur trade. This financing was fragile because the merchants lacked the capital and organization to efficiently move supplies so far to the west. An additional goal was to divert furs from being traded to the British on Hudson Bay. In the absence of government funds, exploration was dependent on financing from the fur trade. It is not clear whether La Vérendrye was genuinely interested in exploration or whether exploration was a pretext for expansion of the fur trade. Maurepas, the French Minister of Marine, was very interested in exploration, but would not provide funds. According to Pehr Kalm, La Vérendrye was acting upon orders given by de Beauharnois to explore until he could reach the ocean.

In 1731 La Vérendrye, three of his sons and 50 engagés left Montreal. That autumn his son Jean-Baptiste built Fort St. Pierre on Rainy Lake. Next year they built Fort St. Charles on Lake of the Woods, which became his headquarters for the next several years. In 1733 Jean-Baptiste got within 20 miles of Lake Winnipeg but was blocked by ice and lack of supplies. In 1734 their party reached Lake Winnipeg. Jean-Baptiste built Fort Maurepas near the mouth of the Red River at the southern end of the lake. In 1734 La Vérendrye went to Quebec to reorganize the finances and returned to the western post the following spring. In 1734 more than half the beaver pelts reaching Quebec came from La Vérendrye's posts. But by 1736 it was clear that the supply system was not working, and Jean-Baptiste was forced to go to Lake Superior for supplies. He along with 20 other Frenchmen, 19 voyageurs including the Jesuit missionary priest Jean-Pierre Aulneau who accompanied them, were killed by the Sioux on Massacre Island in Lake of the Woods. La Vérendrye restrained the local Cree from a war of revenge in order to protect the fur trade. In 1737 La Vérendrye returned to Quebec on business.

In Paris, Maurepas was pushing for more exploration. By this time explorers had identified two candidates as the 'River of the West'. The correct one was the Saskatchewan River, which flows east into Lake Winnipeg. The other was the Missouri River in the Mandan country in what is now North Dakota, United States. The Mandan were said to live in big houses and resemble Frenchmen. La Vérendrye picked the Missouri. In September 1738 he reached Fort Maurepas on Lake Winnipeg and ascended the Assiniboine River to Portage la Prairie, where he built Fort La Reine just south of Lake Manitoba (October 1738).

Joining a large band of Assiniboines, he pushed southwest across the prairie and reached a Mandan village probably somewhere near the modern New Town, North Dakota, about 70 miles east of the Montana border. He did not push on to the Missouri River but sent his son Louis-Joseph to do it for him. In order to get rid of their numerous Assiniboine guests, the Mandan claimed that there was a Sioux war party in the area. The Assiniboines fled, taking with them the Cree interpreter. Unable to talk to the Mandan, La Vérendrye left two Frenchmen to learn the language and returned to Fort La Reine (January 1739).

In 1740 he returned to Quebec on business, and in 1741 started on his fourth and last journey west. From Fort La Reine he sent his son Louis-Joseph exploring westward as far as, probably, the Big Horn Mountains of Wyoming (1742–43). (See: Verendrye brothers' journey to the Rocky Mountains) He worked to consolidate his hold on the chain of lakes that look like a single lake west of Lake Winnipeg, establishing Fort Dauphin (Manitoba), Fort Bourbon and Fort Paskoya. Back in France, Maurepas was growing increasingly irritated with La Vérendrye, who he thought was trading in furs when he should be exploring. In 1742 Maurepas suggested that he be replaced.

In 1743 La Vérendrye resigned. He returned to New France and led the life of a gentleman while doing a considerable business since his sons remained as traders in the west. In 1746 he was reappointed to his old post. He was planning the fifth expedition, this time up the Saskatchewan River, when he died on December 5, 1749. Shortly before his death, he was awarded the Order of Saint Louis.

Afterwards

From 1744 to 1746 Nicolas-Joseph de Noyelles de Fleurimont held the command of poste du Nord, but accomplished little. After the elder La Vérendrye's death, the new governor Jonquière forced his sons out of their father's patrimony.

Control of the west was given to Jacques Legardeur de Saint-Pierre (1750–53). He built Fort La Jonquière somewhere on the Saskatchewan, but failed in an attempt to ascend that river. He was followed by Louis de la Corne, Chevalier de la Corne (1753-1756). He built Fort de la Corne on the Saskatchewan. In 1756 the western command was given to Pierre's son Louis-Joseph Gaultier de La Vérendrye, but he was unable to travel to the west. During the French and Indian War (1754-1763), the North American front of the Seven Years' War, the French gradually abandoned the western posts. With France's defeat, the British took control of New France territory east of the Mississippi River.

Legacy and honours

 * Joseph-Émile Brunette's statue of Pierre Gaultier de Varennes, sieur de La Vérendrye, is located in Saint Boniface, Manitoba.

Numerous places were named in his honour:
 * La Verendrye Provincial Park in Ontario
 * La Vérendrye Wildlife Reserve in Quebec
 * Boulevard de La Vérendrye in Montreal
 * Boulevard La Vérendrye in Gatineau, Quebec
 * The neighbourhood of Varennes in the St. Vital district of Winnipeg, rue La Vérendrye and Parc La Vérendrye in the Saint Boniface district in Winnipeg, and École LaVérendrye in the Earl Grey neighbourhood of Winnipeg
 * La Vérendrye Hospital in Fort Frances, Ontario
 * École Secondaire Catholique de LaVérendrye, Thunder Bay, Ontario
 * Fort la Reine Museum, Portage la Prairie, Manitoba
 * La Verendrye School, Portage la Prairie, Manitoba
 * Verendrye, North Dakota - unofficial ghost town
 * La Vérendrye Trail, Manitoba
 * Mount Verendrye in British Columbia


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Pieter Burman the Younger

Pieter Burman (23 October 1713 – 24 June 1778), also known as Peter or Pieter Burmann (Petrus Burmannus) and distinguished from his uncle as "the Younger" (Secundus or Junior), was a Dutch philologist.

Life
Born in Amsterdam, he was brought up by his uncle in Leiden, and afterwards studied law and philology under CA Duker and Arnold von Drakenborch at Utrecht. In 1735, he was appointed professor of eloquence and history at Franeker, with which the chair of poetry was combined in 1741. In the following year he left Franeker for Amsterdam to become professor of history and philology at the Athenaeum Illustre of Amsterdam. He was subsequently professor of poetry (1744), general librarian (1752), and inspector of the gymnasium (1753). In 1777 he retired, and died on 24 June 1778 at Santhorst, near Wassenaar.

He resembled his more famous uncle in the manner and direction of his studies, and in his violent disposition, which involved him in quarrels with contemporaries, notably Saxe and Christian Adolph Klotz. He was a man of extensive learning, and had a great talent for Latin poetry. His most valuable works are:
 * Anthologia Veterum Latinorum Epigrammatum et Poematum (1759–1763)
 * Aristophanis comoediae Novem (1760)
 * Rhetorica.

He completed the editions of Vergil (1767) and Claudian (1760), which had been left unfinished by his uncle, and commenced an edition of Propertius, one of his best works, which was only half printed at the time of his death. It was completed by L. van Santen and published in 1780.

title: Pieter Burman the Younger


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Marquess of Normanby

Marquess of Normanby is a title that has been created twice, once in the Peerage of England and once in the Peerage of the United Kingdom. The first creation came in 1694 in the Peerage of England in favour of John Sheffield, 3rd Earl of Mulgrave. He was a notable Tory politician of the late Stuart period, who served under Queen Anne as Lord Privy Seal and Lord President of the Council. In 1703 this first Marquess of Normanby was further honoured when he was made Duke of Buckingham and Normanby. These titles became extinct on the death of the 2nd Duke in 1735.

The second creation came in the Peerage of the United Kingdom on 25 June 1838, in favour of Constantine Phipps, 2nd Earl of Mulgrave. He was a noted politician and served as Lord Lieutenant of Ireland and as Home Secretary. His great-grandfather William Phipps had married Lady Catherine Annesley, who was the daughter and heiress of James Annesley, 3rd Earl of Anglesey and his wife Lady Catherine Darnley (an illegitimate daughter of King James II by his mistress Catherine Sedley, Countess of Dorchester). Lady Catherine Darnley had later married John Sheffield, 1st Duke of Buckingham and Normanby, and hence Constantine Phipps, 2nd Earl of Mulgrave was the step-great-great-grandson of the 1st Duke of Buckingham and Normanby. Upon his death, Constantine Phipps, 1st Marquess of Normanby was succeeded by his son, the 2nd Marquess. He was a Liberal politician and also served as Governor of New Zealand. His grandson, the fourth Marquess, served briefly as a Labour Lord-in-waiting (government whip in the House of Lords) in 1945 and was also Lord Lieutenant of the North Riding of Yorkshire and of North Yorkshire. As of 2013 the titles are held by the latter's eldest son, the fifth Marquess, who succeeded in 1994. The fifth Marquess also served in the House of Lords until he lost his seat in the House of Lords Act 1999.

The family seat is Mulgrave Castle near Whitby, North Yorkshire.

Marquess of Normanby, First creation (1694)

 * see the Duke of Buckingham and Normanby

Barons Mulgrave, First Creation (1767)

 * Constantine Phipps, 1st Baron Mulgrave (1722–1775)
 * Constantine John Phipps, 2nd Baron Mulgrave, 1st Baron Mulgrave (1744–1792) (created Baron Mulgrave in 1790; title extinct on his death)
 * Henry Phipps, 3rd Baron Mulgrave, 1st Baron Mulgrave (1755–1831) (created Baron Mulgrave in 1794 and Viscount Normanby and Earl of Mulgrave in 1812)

Earls of Mulgrave, Second Creation (1812)

 * Henry Phipps, 1st Earl of Mulgrave, 1st Viscount Normanby, 3rd Baron Mulgrave, 1st Baron Mulgrave (1755–1831)
 * Constantine Henry Phipps, 2nd Earl of Mulgrave, 2nd Viscount Normanby, 4th Baron Mulgrave, 2nd Baron Mulgrave (1797–1863) (created Marquess of Normanby in 1838)

Marquesses of Normanby, Second Creation (1838)

 * Constantine Henry Phipps, 1st Marquess of Normanby, 2nd Earl of Mulgrave, 2nd Viscount Normanby, 4th Baron Mulgrave, 2nd Baron Mulgrave (1797–1863)
 * George Augustus Constantine Phipps, 2nd Marquess of Normanby, 3rd Earl of Mulgrave, 3rd Viscount Normanby, 5th Baron Mulgrave, 3rd Baron Mulgrave (1819–1890)
 * Constantine Charles Henry Phipps, 3rd Marquess of Normanby, 4th Earl of Mulgrave, 4th Viscount Normanby, 6th Baron Mulgrave, 4th Baron Mulgrave (1846–1932)
 * Oswald Constantine John Phipps, 4th Marquess of Normanby, 5th Earl of Mulgrave, 5th Viscount Normanby, 7th Baron Mulgrave, 5th Baron Mulgrave (1912–1994)
 * Constantine Edmund Walter Phipps, 5th Marquess of Normanby, 6th Earl of Mulgrave, 6th Viscount Normanby, 8th Baron Mulgrave, 6th Baron Mulgrave (b. 1954)

The heir apparent is the present holder's son John Samuel Constantine Phipps, Earl of Mulgrave (b. 1994).

Line of succession

 * [[Image:Coronet of a British Earl.svg|35px]] Henry Phipps, 1st Earl of Mulgrave (1755–1831)
 * [[Image:Coronet of a British Marquess.svg|35px]] Constantine Phipps, 1st Marquess of Normanby (1797-1863)
 * [[Image:Coronet of a British Marquess.svg|35px]] George Phipps, 2nd Marquess of Normanby (1819–1890)
 * [[Image:Coronet of a British Marquess.svg|35px]] Constantine Phipps, 3rd Marquess of Normanby (1846-1932)
 * [[Image:Coronet of a British Marquess.svg|35px]] Oswald Phipps, 4th Marquess of Normanby (1912–1994)
 * [[Image:Coronet of a British Marquess.svg|35px]] Constantine Phipps, 5th Marquess of Normanby (born 1954)
 * (1). John Samuel Constantine Phipps, Earl of Mulgrave (b. 1994)
 * (2). Lord Thomas Henry Winston Phipps (b. 1997)
 * (3). Lord Justin Charles Phipps (b. 1958)
 * (4). William David Phipps (b. 1990)
 * Lord Henry George Russell Phipps (1851-1905)
 * Vivian Louis Augustus Phipps (1884-1971)
 * Vivian Henry Blakeney Phipps (1923-1991)
 * male issue and descendants in remainder
 * Hervey Owen Phipps (1925-1982)
 * male issue and descendants in remainder
 * Hon. Sir Charles Beaumont Phipps (1801–1866)
 * Charles Edmund Phipps (1844–1906)
 * Albert Edmund Phipps (1873–1945)
 * Norman Ernest Phipps (1907–1984)
 * male issue in remainder to earldom
 *  Augustus Henry Constantine Phipps (1882–1946)
 * male issue in remainder to earldom
 * Hon. Edmund Phipps (1808–1857)
 * Sir Constantine Phipps (1840–1911)
 * Sir Eric Phipps (1875–1945)
 * Alan Phipps (1915–1942)
 * Jeremy Julian Joseph Phipps (1942–2021)
 * male issue in remainder to earldom
 * John Francis Phipps (b. 1933)
 * male issue in remainder to earldom
 * William Phipps (1936–2009)
 * male issue in remainder to earldom

title: Marquess of Normanby


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Pieter Burman the Elder

Pieter Burman (6 July 1668 – 31 March 1741), also known as Peter or Pieter Burmann (Petrus Burmannus) and posthumously distinguished from his nephew as "the Elder" (Senior), was a Dutch classical scholar.

Life
Burman was born at Utrecht on 6 July 1668, the son of Franz Burmann (Franciscus Burmannus; 1628–1679) and Maria, daughter of Abraham Heidanus. His father was the son of a Protestant minister who had been driven from France; he officiated as professor of theology at Utrecht, and became known by his writings, especially by his commentaries on the Old Testament. At the age of thirteen Pieter entered the university where he studied under Graevius and Gronovius. He devoted himself particularly to the study of the classical languages, and became unusually proficient in Latin composition. As he was intended for the legal profession, he spent some years in attendance on the law classes. For about a year he studied at Leiden, paying special attention to philosophy and Greek.

On Burman's return to Utrecht he took the degree of doctor of laws (March 1688), and after travelling through Switzerland and part of Germany, settled down to the practice of law, without, however, abandoning his classical studies. In December 1691 he was appointed receiver of the tithes which were originally paid to the bishop of Utrecht, and five years later was nominated to the professorship of eloquence and history. To this chair was soon added that of Greek and politics. In 1714 he paid a short visit to Paris and ransacked the libraries. In the following year he was appointed successor to the celebrated Perizonius, who had held the chair of history, Greek language and eloquence at Leiden.

Burman was subsequently appointed professor of history for the United Provinces and in 1724 he became the 9th Librarian of Leiden University. His numerous editorial and critical works spread his fame as a scholar throughout Europe, and engaged him in many of the stormy disputes which were then so common among men of letters.

Works
Burman published Latin editions of Phaedrus (1698), Horace (1699), Valerius Flaccus (1702), Petronius (1709), Menander and Philemon (1710), Ovid (1713 & 1727), Velleius Paterculus (1719), Quintilian (1720), Justin the Historian (1722), various minor Latin poets (1731), Suetonius (1736), and Lucan (1740) He died while editing the work of Vergil, an edition that was completed by his nephew.

Burman also emended Thomas Ruddiman's edition of George Buchanan's Latin works, continued Graevius's Thesauruses of Italian and Sicilian history, and wrote the treatise De Vectigalibus Populi Romani (1694) and A Brief Description of Roman Antiquities (1711). His Sylloge of Letters Written by Illustrious Men (1725–27) contains biographical material on scholars. He edited several other volumes of letters as well.

The list of Burman's works occupies five pages in Saxe's Onomasticon. His Latin poems and orations were republished after his death. There is an account of his life in the Gentleman's Magazine for April 1742 by Samuel Johnson.

Legacy
In his edition of Petronius's Satyricon, Burman demonstrated that the supplementary material recently added to the text by François Nodot was in fact a forgery.

title: Pieter Burman the Elder