For centuries the clifftop site of
what is now Quebec City was
occupied by the
Iroquois
village of
Stadacona , and
although Cartier visited in the
sixteenth century, permanent
European settlement did not begin
until 1608, when Samuel de
Champlain established a
fur-trading post here. To protect
what was rapidly developing into a
major inland trade gateway, the
settlement shifted to the clifftop
in 1620 when Fort St-Louis was
built on the present-day site of
the
Château Frontenac . Quebec's
steady expansion was noted in
London, and in 1629 Champlain was
starved out of the fort by the
British, an occupation that lasted
just three years.
Missionaries began arriving in
1615, and by the time Bishop Laval
arrived in 1659 Quebec City and
the surrounding province were in
the grip of Catholicism. In the
city's earliest days, however, the
merchants of the fur trade wielded
the most power and frequently came
into conflict with the priests,
who wanted a share in the profits
in order to spread their message
amongst the aboriginal peoples.
The wrangles were resolved by Louis
XIV , who assumed power in
France in 1661 and was advised to
take more interest in his
kingdom's mercantile projects. By
1663, New France had become a
royal province, administered by a
council appointed directly by the
crown and answerable to the king's
council in France. Three figures
dominated the proceedings: the
governor, responsible for defence
and external relations; the
intendant, administering justice
and overseeing the economy; and,
inevitably, the bishop.
Before the century was out, the
long-brewing European struggles
between England and France spilled
over into the colony with French
attacks on the English in New York
and New England in 1689 and a
foiled naval attack on the city by
Sir William Phipps, governor of
Massachusetts, in the following
year. It was at this time that the
Comte de Frontenac , known
as the "fighting
governor", replaced
Champlain's Fort St-Louis with the
sturdier Château St-Louis, and
began work on the now-famous
fortifications that ring Vieux-Quebec.
In September 1759, during the
Seven Years War, the most
significant battle in Canada's
history took place here, between
the British under general James
Wolfe and Louis Joseph, Marquis
de Montcalm . The city had
already been under siege from the
opposite shore for three months
and Montcalm had carefully
protected the city from any
approach by water. Finally, Wolfe
and his four thousand troops heard
of an unguarded track, scaled the
cliff of Cap Diamant and crept up
on the sleeping French regiment
from behind. The twenty-minute
battle on the Plains of Abraham
left both leaders mortally wounded
and the city of Quebec in the
hands of the English, a state of
affairs confirmed by the Treaty of
Paris in 1763. Madame de Pompadour
commented: "It makes little
difference; Canada is useful only
to provide me with furs".
In 1775 - the year after the Quebec
Act of 1774 allowed
French-Canadians to retain their
Catholic religion, language and
culture - the town was attacked
again, this time by the Americans,
who had already captured Montréal.
The battle was won by the British
and for the next century the city
quietly earned its livelihood as
the centre of a timber-trade
and shipbuilding industry.
By the time it was declared the
provincial capital of Lower Canada
in 1840, though, the accessible
supplies of timber had run out.
The final blow came with the
appearance of steamships that
could travel as far as Montréal,
while sailing ships had found it
difficult to proceed beyond Quebec
City. Ceasing to be a busy
seaport, the city declined into a
centre of small industry and local
government, its way of life still
largely determined by the Catholic
Church.
With the Quiet Revolution in
the 1960s and the rise of Quebec nationalism,
Quebec City became a
symbol of the glory of the French
heritage - for example, the motto Je
me souviens ("I
remember") above the doors of
its parliament buildings was
transferred to the licence plates
of Quebec cars, to sweep the
message across Canada. Though the
city played little active part in
the changes, it has grown with the
upsurge in the francophone
economy, developing a suburbia of
shopping malls and convention
centres as slick as any in the
country.
