Manitoba History
The Francophone fact of Manitoba
Photo by Dorothy Dobbie.
By Dorothy Dobbie
The present Saint Boniface Cathedral was partially destroyed by fire in 1968.
A
nglophone Canadians often forget that our history is a tale of two cities: Winnipeg and St. Boniface, the British and the French communities, upon which our provincehood rests. Today, many of us seem to overlook our rich French ancestry that has helped weave our unique Manitoba character. Voyageurs, working for commercial enterprises in Montreal, were the first Europeans to venture into the prairies. Pierre La Verendrye reached 20 • Spring 2020
the forks of the Red and Assiniboine on September 24, 1738, following up on a journey made by two of his men four years earlier. Some of the party remained to build a fort somewhere near what is now Fort Rouge, while La Verendrye pressed on, establishing four trading posts or forts further north as far as The Pas. The French were predominant in the area until the Selkirk Settlers arrived 80 years later. At the time of our entry into confederation, more that 50 percent of the
population in Manitoba was French. Long before that, in 1809, the French Fort Gibraltar was built at what would become St. Boniface, east of the Red River. Bishop Provencher built the first little log church in 1818. The log church was replaced in 1825 and again in 1832, where it served a growing community for the next three decades until it burned in 1860. By the time of Manitoba’s entry into confederation, it had been rebuilt in imposing stone as a significant landmark The Hub
