“The minister at Montreal (who is also chaplain for the garrison) when he does officiate it is in the chapel of the Recollects Convent on Sunday mornings only and on Christmas day and Good Friday.” Again, “there is not a single Protestant church in the whole province. The greater part of the inhabitants of Montreal are Presbyterians of the church of Scotland. These being weary of attending a minister (M. de Lisle) whom they did not understand and for other reasons, have established a Presbyterian minister and subscribed liberally to his support. His name is Bethune and he was late chaplain of the Eighty-fourth Regiment, and while Mr. Stuart assisted Mr. de Lisle (which he did for a short time) he used constantly to attend the service of our church.”
Even on the arrival of the first Protestant bishop for the country, Doctor Mountain, who was made Bishop of Quebec about 1793, there were but nine Protestant clergymen in Canada. In the first years the duty was performed by the military and naval chaplains. In 1766 the Rev. D.C. De Lisle, a Swiss Protestant, was appointed rector of Montreal; hitherto, as said, he had acted as chaplain for the regiment. A minister was appointed for Three Rivers in 1768 and one for Sorel in 1783. In 1784 the Loyalists, establishing themselves in the north of the St. Lawrence and founding the Modern Ontario, chaplains were appointed for New Oswegatchie (Prescott), New Johnstone (Cornwall), and Kingston (Cataraqui).
The first Episcopal visitation of an Anglican prelate took place in Canada in 1787, Dr. Inglis, the first bishop of Nova Scotia, and then the only bishop in Canada, being appointed on August 12, 1787. He arrived at Quebec on June 11th. After a fortnight’s visitation he ascended the river, visiting Three Rivers, Sorel and Montreal. At Montreal he found that a part of the Récollect Church was kindly loaned at certain hours for the Protestant services. The city Protestants urged the Bishop to obtain permission from the government for the Jesuits church, now in its hands, the order being suppressed and the church falling into disrepair. The Governor, Lord Dorchester, agreed to place the building in good repair, but the interior of the pews were to be fitted up by the congregation. He proposed that the church be called Christ Church. We may call this the establishment of the Church of England in Montreal.
Christ Church was opened for service on December 20, 1789, when the sermon was preached by Mr. De Lisle. Mr. De Lisle died in 1794, being succeeded by the Rev. James Tunstall, who was followed in 1801 by the Reverend Dr. Mountain, brother of the Rev. Jacob Mountain, who had been appointed in 1793 to the new Anglican see of Quebec. In June, 1803, the church was destroyed by fire. A building committee was appointed, consisting of Doctor Mountain, the Hon. James McGill, George Ogden and the Messrs. Ross, Gray, Frobisher and Sewell. The site of the old French prison (about where No. 23 Notre Dame Street, West, now stands) was granted by the government. The cornerstone was laid in 1805. Meanwhile the Scotch Presbyterian Church of St. Gabriel’s, which had been erected since 1792, was loaned for services. On the 9th of October, 1814, after much delay, the new Christ Church was opened and dedicated. Doctor Mountain died in 1816 and the Rev. John Leeds succeeded. On his resignation in 1818 the Rev. John Bethune was presented by the king as rector under letters patent, which created a rectory and defined the limits of the parish. Thus Christ Church became the Anglican Mother Church of the city.
In 1850 Montreal was made a diocesan see and the Rev. Francis Fulford was appointed by letters patent the first bishop, and Christ Church was named his cathedral. These two seats of letters patent were the beginning of a long dispute as to the limitations of authority within the cathedral. Bishop Fulford was enthroned in Christ Church on September 15th of that year. In 1853 Doctor Bethune became the first dean of Montreal. In 1856, on the night of December 10th, the first cathedral was totally destroyed by fire; the tablets to the memory of the Hon. John Richardson, now in the east transept of the present edifice, and the copy of Leonardo da Vinci’s Last Supper, now hung on the south wall, being among the few objects saved. A new building committee, of which the Hon. George Moffatt and Chief Justice McCord were leading members, then set to work. The present site of the cathedral was chosen, in spite of those who thought it was too far from the city, and in 1859, on November 27th, the beautiful Gothic cathedral, one of the most handsome of its kind on the continent, was opened for worship. In the interval, Gosford Street church was appropriated for worship under the name of St. John’s Chapel. In 1867 the Cathedral was consecrated by the Metropolitan Bishop Fulford. The rectory house was completed in 1877. In 1901 the cathedral act was promoted defining the rights of the rector, the bishop, the archbishop and the primate within the cathedral, and the duties of the cathedral chapter. The following is a list of the rectors of Christ Church and Christ Church Cathedral: 1789, Rev. D.C. De Lisle; 1791, Rev. James Tunstall; 1801, Rev. Dr. Mountain; 1815, Rev. John Leeds; 1818, Rev. John Bethune, afterwards dean; 1872, Rev. Maurice Baldwin, afterwards dean of Montreal and subsequently bishop of Huron; 1884, Rev. J.G. Norton, subsequently archdeacon of Montreal; vicars in charge of the parish, 1902, Rev. F.J. Steen; 1903, Rev. Herbert Symonds.
The Anglican Bishopric of Montreal has its origin as follows:
In 1787 His Majesty, George III, had created Nova Scotia into an Episcopal see, the bishop of the diocese being also granted jurisdiction, spiritual and ecclesiastical, over the province of Quebec as it then existed. In 1793 the bishopric of Quebec was created and curtailed the jurisdiction of Nova Scotia. The first bishop was the Rev. Dr. Jacob Mountain who was succeeded on his death, in 1826, by Bishop Stewart, a younger son of the Earl of Galloway, and when he died, in 1837, Dr. George Jehoshaphat Mountain took charge of the extensive diocese. Dr. G.J. Mountain had been appointed to assist the bishop of Quebec under the title of Bishop of Montreal, but he had no separate jurisdiction nor was any see erected at Montreal. This was divided in 1839 by the creation of a diocese of Toronto, in 1845 by that of Fredericton and by that of Montreal in 1850. The bishops of the diocese of Montreal from this date are: Francis Fulford, September 15, 1850, to September 9, 1868; Ashton Oxenden, August 31, 1869, to May 7, 1878; William Bennett Bond, January 25, 1879, to October 9, 1906; James Carmichael, November 4, 1906, to September 21, 1908; John Farthing, consecrated January 6, 1909.
Of the earliest Anglican churches of the city, the Gosford Street Church, now no longer existent, served as a temporary place of worship for the Christ Church Cathedral congregation between 1856 and 1859 after the fire on Notre Dame Street and saw many vicissitudes. It was purchased by Trinity Church Congregation in 1860 and used for worship till 1865. It then afterwards became the Dominion Theatre. Here Miss Emma Lajeunes of Chambly, afterwards famous as Madame Albani, made a debut as a plain piano player, for as yet she had not discovered the powers of her beautiful voice. In 1871 it was changed to “Debars Opera.” The Cercle Jacques Cartier, a dramatic organization of French-Canadian amateurs, who were the pioneers of the French theatre in America, presented a number of plays there. In 1889, the building passed into the hands of Mgr. Bourget, who placed the property at the disposition of the Union Allet, an organization of Canadian Zouaves, who had fought for the temporal power of Pius IX. It then became a vinegar factory, and when demolished was a carriage depot, and the site has now become, in 1914, that of the City Hall Annex.
The original Trinity Church was built in 1840 on St. Paul Street, immediately opposite the center of Bonsecours Market, at the personal expense of Major William Plenderleath Christie, a son of General Christie of the “Royal Americans,” subsequently designated the Sixtieth Rifles. It was built on a lot 75 feet 6 inches, more or less, in front, by 174 feet, more or less, in depth. This church and its successor are proud of the military associations surrounding it. The edifice is described as an elegant structure, built in the Gothic style, 75 feet long by 44 wide. The first incumbent of the church was the Rev. Mark Willoughby. In 1860 the congregation of Trinity purchased the Gosford Street Church, lately used by the Congregation of Christ Church, under the title of St. John’s Chapel, and worshipped there for five years. The old building on St. Paul Street was torn down and the lot sold. In 1864 the Trinity Church congregation secured the present site of the church at the northwest corner of Viger Square and St. Denis Street. The corner stone was laid on Thursday, June 23, 1864, by the Lord Bishop Metropolitan, Bishop Fulford. It was opened for public worship September 17, 1865. It was consecrated on January 13, 1908, by Bishop Farthing, being his first official act.
The predecessor of St. George’s Church was opened as a proprietary chapel on St. Joseph Street on June 30, 1843, with St. George’s Society present in force. The present St. George’s Church was built in 1870 at the corner of the streets then named St. François de Sales and St. Janvier (now facing Dominion Square). It was opened on October 9th of the same year.