Quaint Quebec Countryside Inn
Recalls Earlier Times

By George Medovoy, Editor

Auberge Handfield, an aging boarding house-turned-country inn in the bucolic garden region of Monteregie, may be just a bridge away from Montreal.

But for me the drive represented more than a mere hour or so excursion from cosmopolitan Montreal to the quaint Quebec countryside village of St.-Marc-sur-Richelieu.

The trip to the comfortable auberge on the Richelieu River became a kind of mirror on one Jewish immigrant’s excursion into French-Canada over 80 years ago. That immigrant was my late father, Asher Medovoy, of blessed memory.

The Changed Face of the Boardinghouse

Over the years, the boarding house has undergone considerable change: an enclosed dining room terrace; the Laflamme Pavilion, with new rooms by the water’s edge; the addition of the Batteau-theatre "L’Escale," a riverboat for French-language theatre; and a state-of-the-art, elegant health spa.

Several of the area’s modest, early 20th-century cabins once used by farmers have been moved onto the property and may be rented for a more "roughing it" experience.

(The charming countryside of St.-Marc-sur-Richelieu)

But with these exceptions, the rustic old dwelling remains essentially as it was when my father traveled on foot in Quebec with his peddler’s pack slung over his shoulder. Big wooden beams hug the ceilings, the floors creak in places, and the heavy, embroidered parlor chairs, now stooped with age, recall an earlier period when Quebec farmers would sit in front of the roaring fire on cold winter nights.

At such times, my father, who eventually move up to a horse and wagon and, later on, to owning a store of his own where we lived upstairs, would be welcomed inside for something warm to eat and drink. Then the "show" would start with displays of his new goods.

Everyone would turn out for these events.

Exactly how many Yiddish-speaking immigrant peddlers like my father traversed the Quebec countryside in the early part of the last century, I don’t know. But they worked in many parts of the province, often settling in remote towns for brief periods of time.

Venturing Out to Small Communities

More established Jews also ventured out of Montreal to open stores in these small French communities. My maternal grandfather, for example, took his rather large family to a place called Riviere du Loup (River of the Wolf), a tiny community on the St. Lawrence River whale-watching route where my mother was born — and for want of an incubator, was placed in a shoe box in a wood-burning stove.

When it came time for my uncle to study for his bar mitzvah, my grandfather decided to return the family to Montreal.

But back to my father’s story...
On many of those frigid winter nights, his horse, an asthmatic creature named Jim, would escape to the relative warmth of his nearby barn. And several farmers to give chase through the snow would join my father. But Jim invariably proved swifter than any of these two-footed humans, reaching the warmth of his barn.

Auberge Handfield opened over 50 years ago, when an aristocratic, silver-haired gentleman named Conrad Handfield turned his boyhood home into an inn and fine restaurant. The late Handfield was a descendant of an officer in the army of Britain’s General Wolfe, whose defeat of French forces on the Plains of Abraham brought England to political ascendancy in this part of the world.

But as Quebec’s politics of separatism have illustrated, the French have never forgotten that defeat, ever dreaming of independence from the rest of Canada.

When my wife and I walked into the old parlor and met Handfield for the first time — he stood there looking so distinguished in his double-breasted blue suit — I imagined my father here many years ago.

This time it was his son in the parlor — a carefree, romantic tourist seeking new avenues to do mostly loafing in style. And here at Auberge Handfield, as in the neighboring countryside, there is plenty to help you indulge in this regal pleasure.

After a hearty breakfast of fluffy pancakes with real maple syrup derived from the trees on Handfield’s adjoining farm, you can take forever to read the newspaper on white garden chairs. And perhaps a picnic will be in your plans across the road by the edge of the Richelieu River, where Louis XIV’s soldiers built forts to protect the small colony of Montreal from attack by the Iroquois Indians.
St-Marc-sur-Richelieu (population 851) is a whisper of a name along Quebec Provincial Route 323.

(Auberge Handfield in winter)

Nearby, I have relieved delicious moments of my Quebec childhood, tasting crisp, fresh apples on Monteregie apple farms. I have also visited family-run wineries to sample Quebec vintages along the Vintners’ Trail, a route near the Richelieu River.

When my father arrived in Canada in 1921, it was, as they say in Quebec, "autre chose" — quite another story. There were neither wineries nor modern bed-and-breakfast inns here, just a landscape covered with mostly small farms carved into narrow strips perpendicular to the river — a practice, still common today, first used by 17th-century French settlers to allow equal access to the current.

When he stepped off the Halifax-Montreal train, newly arrived from Russia, my father had two choices: he could work in a Montreal clothing factory or choose to set out on his own in the Quebec countryside.

For such a man already accustomed to a life of adventure — like paying off smugglers to get him out of Russia — the idea of closing himself up in a factory, he once told me, would be tantamount to locking himself up in a prison.

Choosing the Open Road

So he chose the open road, returning to Montreal on weekends to replenish his supply of clothing articles. During those visits, he would stay with his relatives, who distributed the Yiddish Daily Forward in Quebec and imported New York Yiddish theatre shows to the Montreal stage.

By living in the country, my farther could appreciate the sharp contrast between Montreal -- a city literally and figuratively an island of varied cultures and languages -- and the French countryside.

Boarding houses like Handfield became not only his home, a place where he found shelter, but also a school of sorts, where slowly he learned the patois of the French farmers -- that odd-sounding, sing-song Quebec French -- and adjusted to his newly-adopted country.

If you were honest and worked hard, the farmers respected you and helped you. From everything I know, they were very kind to my father, who first showed up on their doorstep not knowing a word of French or English.

They took him in, and in some cases, I think, bought his goods more out of pity than out of need. Of course, there were conflicts, rather harmless, as one looks back on them now, which centered on religion. And why not among such devoutly Catholic people?

One such conflict took place in a boarding house where my father lived. The woman of the house made it a habit to question why my father stayed home on Sundays instead of joining her family at the local Catholic church.

Calling Her Bluff

Well, one Sunday, my father decided to call her bluff, but first, some background: In Quebec, there is a tradition associated with a particularly large and impressive Montreal church that if the handicapped climb the many steps to the very top, they will be able to descend without their crutches.

Now this woman also had a son, who, unfortunately, was handicapped and used crutches. My father issued this challenge: if the lady’s son could climb to the top of the church and then walk down the steps unaided, he himself, this Jewish peddler, would convert.

"Ah," the woman sighed, "the good Lord does not will it."

And so the issue was finally put to rest. Though it never came up again, I am sure that the good woman never forgot it. Nor, of course, did my father.

The religious question was simply a bridge never to be crossed. But over the 30 or so years that my father lived in Quebec, there were others that he and the farmers could cross, together in simple friendship — a friendship recalled at Auberge Handfield.

IF YOU GO
Auberge Handfield is located at 555 rue Richelieu, Saint-Marc-sur-Richelieu, Québec J0L 2E0. The phone number for information is (450) 584-2843.

From Montreal, take Hwy. 20 East, direction Quebec City, Exit 112, Beloeil/St-Marc-sur-Richelieu, Route 223, direction North to St-Marc-sur-Richelieu.

For information about Auberge Handfield, visit www.aubergehandfield.com.