Date Published:
March 2005

L’Encyclopédie de l’histoire du Québec / The Quebec History Encyclopedia

Jean-Charles Chapais

(1811-1885)

Chapais, Jean Charles (1811-1885), one of the Fathers of Confederation, was born at Rivière Ouelle, Lower Canada , on December 2, 1811, the son of J. C. Chapais, a merchant. He was educated at Nicolet College and at the Quebec Seminary, and became, like his father, a merchant. From 1851 to 1867 he represented Kamouraska in the Legislative Assembly of Canada; and in 1864 he became commissioner of public works in the. short-lived Taché-Macdonald administration. He continued to hold this portfolio in the coalition government of 1864-7; and he was one of the delegates to the Quebec Conference. From 1867 to 1871 he represented Champlain in the Legislative Assembly of Quebec; and in 1867 he contested Kamouraska as a candidate for the Canadian House of Commons, but no election was declared, and in 1868 he was appointed a member of the Senate of Canada. From 1867 to 1869 he was minister of agriculture in the first Dominion government under Sir John Macdonald, and from 1869 to 1873 he was receiver-general. He died at Ottawa, Ontario, on July 17, 1885. He married Henriette Georgina, daughter of the Hon. Amable Dionne, a member of the Legislative Council of Canada; and by her he had several children. See C. E. Rouleau, L'honorable Jean-Charles Chapais (Bull. rech. hist., 1899).

Source  : W. Stewart WALLACE, ed., The Encyclopedia of Canada, Vol. II, Toronto, University Associates of Canada, 1948, 411p., p. 34.