2-798-581 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

St. Rocks, Quebec, after the late fire - sketched by a correspondent, 1845. Devastation in Canada: 'The scene of desolation and despair it is beyond human power to describe...the unfortunate refugees yielded themselves up to apathetic despair. From street to street they wended their way, laden with their children and the most precious of their household goods, but still the insatiate cause of their misfortune traced their path with unrelenting fury. In the greater number of instances, the inmates of dwellings barely escaped with their lives, and many of these were severely burnt...Women, children, nay even men, sat weeping by the road-side, bereft of their little property, and beggared by the destruction...Upwards of twelve hundred houses are supposed to have been burnt, and the inmates of these are not only houseless but pennyless too...'. From "Illustrated London News", 1845, Vol VII.