Strong Holy-Therese

The Fort Holy-Therese is one of the various defense works set up at the XVIIe century along the Rivière Richelieu, in the province of Quebec, in Montérégie.

Site

Confusion reigned a long time as for the exact site of strong the Holy-Therese. This ambivalence as for the site which the fortification occupied explains owing to the fact that the various cartographic documents which locate it are contradictory and which the strong one was abandoned as of the end of the XVIIIe century. It is thus sunk in the lapse of memory.

A well-known historian in the areas of the Haut-Richelieu and the Valley-of-Richelieu the, Réal Fort, published, in 2003, a very interesting study concerning the exact site of strong the Holy-Therese. By studying and reconstituting the chains of the titles of the batches of the Town of Carignan, Fortin could conclude that strong the Holy-Therese was located well at the end is current batch 343 of the Town of Carignan, on western bank from the Richelieu. It was located in the south of the point of the Bearing (better known under the name of the Fryer island), almost opposite the Sainte-Marie island.

History

Strong first (1665-1667)

The first fortification was built in October 1665 by Henri de Chastelard de Salières, under command of Alexandre de Prouville de Tracy, of the Régiment of Carignan-Salt boxes. One finished to plant the palisades on October 15th, which was worth its name with the fortification, this day marking celebrates it liturgical Sainte Therese. Located at the end of the rapids of Holy-Therese, the site of the fort was strategic. It was consequently at the end of the starting bearing with Chambly. Upstream and downstream from these two points, the Richelieu is naviguable, at least for small boats. Strong the Holy-Therese would have probably given up since 1667. Mr. Fortin underlines, in his work, that the fort would have been used probably thereafter as den to the smugglers.

Strong second (1747-1760)

In 1731, the governor of News-France, by concern of the behavior of Iroquois and the English colonies of the south, asked the population to rebuild the forts of piles along the Richelieu. This operation showed the erection of the forts of the Point-with-the-Hair and Saint-Frederic, both close to the lake Champlain. In the years which followed, a road was established between Chambly and old strong the Holy-Therese, then between Chambly and the Meadow. In short, they were to make sure of the supply the forts of the lake Champlain. In 1741 and 1742, Clément Sabrevois de Bleury made build a hangar with boats with Holy-Therese, which was used to store the boats of the king. Under the English threat which weighs more and more in the south, one extremely assigns the lieutenant of Vassant to the construction again in Holy-Therese in 1747, where some garrisons were posted. The fort was to be abandoned the following year, with the profit of the Fort Midsummer's Day, more in the south. However, which remained of the strong old man Holy-Therese was re-used to store goods during the British invasion (1756-1759), before the hamlet in its entirety is not burned by the major Robert Rogers and its men in 1760.

Strong third (1760)

Following the abandonment of the forts of the lake Champlain, in the context of the English invasion, the French posted at the height soldiers Holy-Therese during the summer of 1760. In September, the fort had already been flaring and given up by the French, following their defeat at the height of the island to the Nuts. The English took possession and arranged trenches of it around. The site was used as camp of rallying with the English troops before the invasion and the rendering of the strong Chambly, on September 4th, 1760.

Holy-Therese, English station

Thereafter, the hamlet which was gradually built near the old French fortifications became an English station. The troops improved the road between Holy-Therese and Chambly, and possibly prolonged it until Midsummer's Day (1776), in the context of the American revolution. The fortifications, however, were in ruins and had early made sink in the lapse of memory.

Today

Nowadays, the vestiges of old extremely were still not updated. The digging of the channel of Chambly, between 1831 and 1843, made the site less accessible. Only a commemorative plaque, installed by the Commission of the Sites and the Historic buildings of Canada, in 1927, is used as witness with a whole side of the regional history.

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