The grave of David Thompson

The explorer David Thompson was the first European to navigate the entire length of the Columbia River. He also mapped much of the Canadian West by surveying and navigating with skills far better than Lewis and Clark, his contemporaries. He also wrote a better narrative than most explorers, and behaved more ethically. He married a metis-Cree woman, Charlotte Small, and rather than leave her in the field and go back to Montreal, he lived out his entire life with her, and raised I forget how many children, until they both died in Montreal in 1857. So I knew that my trip to Montreal had to include a visit to their grave, in Mount Royal cemetery on the back side of the eponymous mountain.

So I set out to run around the mountain and find the grave. It was in the upper 20s F and I had no gloves. This is not something one can complain about when seeking the grave of David Thompson. I looked at a map and got a general idea of how to follow trails through the park in a counter-clockwise direction, and the hotel desk clerk told me where the entrance to the cemetery is. Following gravel and leafy trails I made it to the other side of the mountain, but it was not obvious where to find the entrance. I asked the right person. A blond woman in a gore-tex raincoat with hightop sneakers and a scarf told me in French to head back up hill along the major auto road through the park, then follow a "path" (the only english word) to the right until I saw a "batisse" a building of some sort. I ran along the shoulder of the road and eventually saw the building, a funeral home. But I had missed the path and had to scramble down an embankment. Most of the cemetery is fenced off, but there was opening here. I knew from findagrave.com that his grave was in section C-5, and I was able to find a map at the entrance identifying the sections. I am lucky I asked that woman who had local knowledge, because I'm sure following streets to the formal entrance would have been much farther.

Thompson is buried alongside his wife, and daughter and grand-daughter named Charlotte Londel, as well as a military officer descendant who spelled it Londell. A plaque indicates that the marble column and inscription was installed only in 1927 by J. B. Tyrrell, an editor of Champlain society exploration narratives. I didn't bring my camera, but there is photo on the website I consulted.

My fondness for David Thompson and his narrative also carries over into an admiration for those who have edited and published his work. After editing and translating Dumont I know how hard this is. William Moreau of Toronto has been working on a new edition of Thompson's writings, first issued in a Champlain Society publication. Moreau has finished one volume and we are still waiting for the second.

The trip home was shorter but just as adventurous. I found another hole in the fence at the top of the cemetery, and followed a trail down around a road-cut, then asked a bicyclist who was coming up to the crest of the hill. He told me how to cross the park back to the city side, behind the General Hospital.