As I promised in my last Blog, this week I am covering some of the ships the Beaupre men designed, built and sailed, or any combination of these three.

A few of the better known ships are Eliza Fisher, Annie Minnes, Oliver Mowat, Nellie Hunter, Anna Falconer, and Queen of the Lakes. To date, I have located the names of 25 ships the Beaupre men designed or built or sailed, in and around Portsmouth, Kingston, Bath, Barriefield, Millhaven, Oswego NY, and Sheboygan Wisconsin.

Edouard “Scud” Beaupre 1820-1908 is attributed to designing and or building the schooners  John Stevenson 1863,  Eliza Fisher 1867 and  Anna Falconer 1867 at Portsmouth,  Annie Minnes 1867,  Oliver Mowat 1873 and  Nellie Hunter 1874. In Edouard’s obituary in the British Whig dated 11 August 1908, the Queen of the Lakes was also listed as one of the ships he built. I am sure there were other ships but these are the ones for which I have found the actual records.

Pierre Beaupre 1825-1887, one of Edouard’s brothers, is attributed to building the schooners Cataraqui in1847 at Hatter’s Bay (Portsmouth),  Pearl, and Bristol both in 1847 at Kingston, and Triton 1849 also at Kingston.  J.S.Harvey 1855, Kossuth in 1857, and Lucy Raab in 1858 all in Sheboygan Wisconsin. He also built the steamboat City of Hamilton at Bath ON in 1850

Joseph Beaupre built Gladstone in 1869 at Dog Lake,  Forwarder 1870 in Storrington, and  Hannah Knapp in 1871 at Brewers Mills.

Sometimes in the Ship’s Lists of Registration only the last name Beaupre was listed making it very difficult to know which Beaupre the ship should be attributed to. Examples of these are Bay of Quinte built in 1850, and Magnet built in 1873 both at Bath ON, and Prescott built in 1928 in Prescott. Although no first name was listed for Charlotte built in 1853 at Sheboygan, it was probably Pierre Beaupre as he built other ships there and the time frame is correct.

During my researching days, I was thrilled to find actual artifacts from the Anna (sic Annie) Falconer in a small museum in Prince Edward County.  Annie Falconer was built by Edouard Beaupre at Portsmouth in 1867. She was a 201 tonne, 2 masted, wooden schooner measuring 107 ft. long, 24 ft. wide and 9 ft. deep.

 If memory serves me this is a carpenter’s planer

 Spittoon. teacup, handle etc.

I felt such a connection to these artifacts knowing my ancestors used these tools and everyday objects 150 years ago.  How’s that for celebrating Canada’s 150th birthday!