By Joseph-Noël Fauteux
Essay on Industry in Canada,
Chapter VI, Quebec, 1927

Because, better than any other, he embodies a type frequent in the history of New France that of the priest, manager of industrial companies, and also, because of the importance of his establishments, it is appropriate to grant a few pages specific to Abbot Lepage, parish priest and lord of Terrebonne, who, as we have seen, was among the king's suppliers of wood, both for the shipyards of Quebec and for the ports of France.

Louis Lepage was the second son of a family which included sixteen children, eight boys and eight girls. Born on August 25, 1690, in St-François, one of the five parishes of Île d'Orléans, near Quebec, he was six years old when his father, René Lepage, went to settle in Rimouski where he became the first lord with the title of “sieur de Sainte-Claire”.

A student at the Quebec seminary, the young Lepage was destined for the priesthood. On April 6, 1715, Mgr de Saint-Valier ordained him ordained him and immediately sent him to exercise his ministry, as parish priest, in the parish of Île Jésus, near Montreal. Father Lepage soon found himself grappling with the same difficulties that then confronted most of the priests in the colony. The inhabitants, not very wealthy, barely sufficient for their own needs, could not come to the aid of their pastors. Gifted by nature with an enterprising spirit, the priest of Île Jésus decided to create sources of income that would allow him to live on his own and carry out the program of parish works that he had drawn up for himself. .

On September 2, 1720, he purchased, for the price of 10 pounds from Me François-Marie Bouat, advisor to the king and lieutenant general at the siege of Montreal, the seigneury of Terrebonne, comprising two leagues in length by two leagues in depth, located on the north side of the Rivière des Prairies, opposite Île Jésus, between the lordship of Lachenaye and the lands of Monsieurs Petit and de Langloiserie, with the adjacent islands, islets and flats and a mill. The transaction was advantageous for Mr. Bouat, who had acquired the same seigneury 000 years previously from Lady Marie-Catherine de Saint-Georges, widow of Louis Lecomte Dupré, merchant from Montreal, for the sum of 2 pounds.

We were jumping the gun at that time in the Canadian clergy. Satisfied with the zeal shown by Father Lepage and eager to encourage him, Mgr de Saint-Valier elevated the young priest of Île Jésus to the dignity of canon of the chapter of the cathedral of Notre-Dame de Québec, June 9 1731, and charged him with the functions of vicar general of the diocese. The new canon obtained permission from his bishop to live on his lordship of Terrebonne, which had been canonically established as a parish in 1723, with the right of patronage for the priest in the church he proposed to build.

It was perhaps the memory of a small sawmill that his father had built on a stream near his land, some time after he had become lord of Rimouski, which encouraged the priest of Terrebonne to undertake on his new domain an establishment of the same type but more considerable.

Without personal resources, the canon had to borrow from both sides to carry out his project. As he inspired confidence, he easily found people to lend him money or goods. The Bouat-Lamarque company lent him around five thousand pounds in various supplies. Ignace Gamelin, fils, and Co., Montreal merchants, also lent him 1,656 pounds in money and effects. Equipped with these funds and others, Father Lepage was able to build flour mills and various buildings. In 1729, he found himself a very important owner.

The care that the parish priest of Terrebonne gave to his industrial enterprises caused him to neglect his duties as vicar general and canon. he was hardly seen at the sessions of the Quebec Chapter. Matters came to the point where the bishop was obliged to lodge a complaint with the President of the Naval Council. On April 12, 1729, he wrote to Bishop Dosquet that it was necessary to put an end to the abuses reported to him and that the members of the Chapter who did not fulfill the duties of their office should be ordered to resign or renounce the supplement they would receive from the king.

The choice of Father Lepage was soon made. Seeing that he could very well serve the spiritual interests of his parishioners while continuing the temporal enterprises begun on his lordship, he decided to resign from his office as canon and vicar general. Moreover, he had contracted debts and he was obliged to pay them before thinking of limiting himself exclusively to his ecclesiastical functions.

Far from giving up his various holdings, the abbot increased them. In 1731, he added two new mills to his flour mills, bringing the number to four. in addition, he had made a deal with the king for the supply of oak and pine planking, which would help keep his sawmills in operation. In short, the establishment took on growing importance and Hocquart could say that it was the most beautiful of its kind in the colony. In the meantime, the priest of Terrebonne found a way to build a church, to attempt the manufacture of tar and pitch, and to take an interest in cod fishing and the exploitation of a slate quarry in the lower of the St. Lawrence River.

Wood had become rare in the seigneury of Terrebonne. The abbot represented to Hocquart that it would soon be impossible for him to fulfill his supply contracts to the king as exactly as he had done until then, unless new forest limits were granted to him. On July 22, 1730, the intendant issued an order allowing the lord of Terrebonne to exploit the woods behind his land to a depth of two leagues and to open the paths necessary for transport. The concession was ratified by a royal patent on April 10, 1731.

It was a whole village that Father Lepage had created. Where there was practically only forest ten years previously, many families were now established around the parish church. Their leaders could count on a stable livelihood by working on land clearings or at the saw and flour mills. We can believe that the priest of Terrebonne had the full sympathy of his flock.

The worthy priest himself could not fail to feel content at the sight of the success of his establishments, especially since he knew that, at the court of France, his zeal and the services he provided were highly appreciated. returned to the colony. His own family felt his prosperity. One of his sisters, Reine Lepage, having entered the Ursuline community of Quebec, he joined his brother, Germain Lepage of Saint-François, in 1730, to pay her a dowry of 2,000 livres in the form of an annual annuity of 100 books.