The Château de Vaudreuil was commenced in 1723, as it appears from the following inscription, found May 15, 1806, under the foundation stone at the southwest angle.
Cetter pierre. a. esté posée par Dame Louise Elizabeth. Jouabere. femme.
du haut. et. puissent, seigneur, Philippe. de Rigaud Chevalier.
Marquis. de Vaudreuil. grand Croix. de l'ordre militaire, de
St. Louis Gouverneur et lieutenant, general pour le roy.
>de toute. la nouvelle France Septentrionale
En 1723 le 15 May.
Sept Maison appartien à Monsieur le Marquis de Vaudreuil.
The Château Vaudreuil or Hôtel de Vaudreuil occupied with its ground, acquired in 1721, a large tract of land between St. Paul Street and Notre-Dame and included what is now known as Jacques Cartier Square. After the cession in 1763, on April 12th, the son of the builder, the Marquis Pierre de Rigaud, and his lady, then living at Paris in their hotel, Rue de Deux Boulles, sold the estate to Messire Michel Chartier, Chevalier et Seigneur de Lothbinière, ordinarily dwelling in the town of Quebec, Canada, but being at present in Paris. In 1771 M. de Lothbinière sold the Château Vaudreuil to M. Joseph Fleury Deschambault de la Gorgendière. In 1773 the latter sold it on July 26th to the church wardens of the parish of Notre-Dame, for the establishment of a colony. The building was opened as a school on the following October 1st under the name of Collège de St. Raphael. This was the continuation of a college founded about 1767 in the priests' house at Longue Pointe by a priest of St. Sulpice, J. B. Curatteau de la Blaiserie. St. Raphael's College remained here till June 6, 1803, when it was reduced to ashes. It was then transferred to College Street in 1804, being rebuilt at the expense of the Seminary of St. Sulpice. In 1806, on October 20th, it was opened under the name of the Collège ou Petit Séminaire de Montréal.
On December 14, 1803, the Vaudreuil estate with the ruined college and its dependencies was sold by the church wardens to two merchants, MM. Jean Baptiste Durocher and Joseph Périnault, for a sum of 3,000 guineas. During the month of December, 1803, these divided their land as well as that which they had bought from the seminary, as follows:
1. They have left for the public use a place named the New Market, 172 French feet in breadth on Notre-Dame Street and 175 on St. Paul Street, without comprising St. Charles Street, which terminated this market on the northeast and that of "La Fabrique," which terminated it at the southwest. The said place extending in length from Notre Dame Street to St. Paul Street, a distance of about 388 feet.
2. The rest of the land on the southwest of the market and Fabrique Street was divided into eight holdings and sold to eight persons on December 26th and 27th.
FOOTNOTES:
[174] The work of demolition of the useless fortifications began in 1804 to make room for local expansion.
[175] The Marquis de Beauharnois became governor-general in 1726, holding the post till 1747. In dealing with his government and that of his successors, till the Seven Years' War, we shall pursue the chronological method as before.