Father's Day Weekend

Today was taken up by a visit to Ormstown Fair (the centennial edition), which was fun, involving pony rides, demolition derbies (or cars fighting, as the lil'un called it), and 100 pipers.

The reason I mention it here, is that the fair takes place next to the battlefield for the Battle of Chateauguay. Thereby leading to the continuation of my unintended treks around the battlefields of the War of 1812.  Indeed, the two battles themselves were fought in close succession (in the reverso order of my visits though!). Not really a surprise that the two were linked, and so close geographically, as the intended outcome of the St Lawrence Campaign by the Americans was to capture Montreal. This was indeed the closest battle to Montreal that was fought during the war, so indeed it is more surprising that we had not been there before.

The battlefield itself is just a large flat field now, but there is a visitor centre (we didn't go in). I did however, purchase for myself a little father's day pressie, in the form of a booklet by the Chateauguay Historical Society, which seems to cover the whole campaign in some detail. It is titled 'A Young Person's Introduction to the Chateauguay Valley" but that seems to be mainly because it was originally produced as an educationally booklet for schools. In my opinion, the secondary title is enough. it is a 32 page bookelt, with no space wasted, including a rather full intro to the whole St Lawrence campaign, including the background, geography, and all the major players. The maps and artwork seems to be rather out of focus, and hasn't been well reproduced, but since there is a web site reference for all the art, there should be no trouble finding the originals. I look forward to delving in in more detail.

There were two other points to note, that I think are relevant. First off, the pipes and drums of the Canadian Black Watch were amongst the 100 pipers who played today, and they were supposedly at the battle, as the 5th Battalion of the Select Embodied Militia (50 of whom were at the battle). Secondly, to drive to the fair, we passed through the Kahnawà:ke Mohawk reserve (the first time we had done so since coming to Canada. This in itself would make an interesting post, but we'll leave the politics of the First Nations aside for now), again, there were 150 Mohawks and others present on the field at Chatueauguay.

I really should get round to doing some proper 1812 gaming. It really should be easier to find people to play with for such a local historical period. Who says the New World doesn't have any history?

P.S.
In addition to the wikipedia site above, there's a rather neat little breakdown of the battle here.

Upper Canada Village

As newly minted Canadian Citizens, we get a Canadian cultural pass. This allows free access to a whole host of attractions and parks across the country, as a way of helping new Canadians to see and access the country. One of the places we can get into for free is the Upper Canada Village. This is only about an hour and a half from Montreal.

I can remember going to somethign similar as a kid, with the Canadian branch of the family on one of our many visits to Toronto as a young 'un (I think it may have been this one), but I can't remember a thing about it, other than some pigs, people in costume, and it being really muddy. Fortunately, that was not the experience we had today (the blistering sun for one kept the mud at bay). Furthermore, there were two added bonuses to the visit. First off, they were holding a Medieval Festival today, replete with vikings and jousting (not at the same time) amongst a host of other events. This we knew of before going, and was one of the reasons we went today. The second bonus was that the village is sited right beside Crysler Farm, that of 1813 fame.

Firrstly, some pics from the Medieval part of the day.

...and got to try out some others

We got to see all these warmachines in action...

Big'un gets to go for a ride on the knight's horse.

Full contact jousting.

A dragon and minstrel show.

Vikings marching to battle. I was surprised how easily the lil'un followed the chevaliers!

I was sorely tempted by the one with the wings!

Then it was back to the 1860's era village. A great mix of buildings with many roles within the village. Unlike a lot of this type of place, where you just look in and see old stuff, each one of the buildings had a volunteer playing the role of the owner of the building, and each one had very interesting stuff to pass on, as well as was able to answer any questions we had. The last little surprise, was, when looking at the map of the village, I noted one of the homes was named the Robertson House. Made me feel right at home! If you're in the area, I cannot recommend this place more highly.

In the end, the three things in one place was too much for one visit, and we didn't make it round the farm memorial site, so no pics of that. That plus the gorgeous weather all day left those of us with a soft northern complexion in need of retiring back to the air conditioned car before sun-stroke set in. The good news is that there was enough of the village still to see (and a train we didn't manage to go on), that we plan to come back another time (as it's still free for us for the rest of the year), at which point I intend to get a look at the site.