1744

An early morning today and we managed to get off the ferry on time and then a long drive back to New Glascow and Kizkiz. We drove to Wentworth Perk Café in North Sydney for breakfast first. It was very fancy and established inside an old style green house with a big porch. I had the Perk Bagel, which was veggies, hummus and bacon, and a fruit smoothie. Then we drove the forty minutes out of town to the Louisbourg Fortress. The plan was to take a tour of the fortress and be out by noonish, but we ended up spending about five hours there. After taking a bus a ways to the actual fort, or the recreation of the original town of Louisbourg that had been reconstructed in the ’60’s as a make work project for laid off miners, we walked around for about and hour, checking out some of the exhibits, including one that explained the process of building in the 1700s and another that talked about the conditions of the army. Then the boys and I ran to the bakery to buy some army issue bread before running in the other direction up to the top of the hill for our tour. The tour was basically an hour of learning how different classes lived during 1744, lead by guides dressed in

period costumes. The first twenty minutes or so were spent in the lower class, with a soldier. He told us about the living conditions of the average soldier, in a 19m squared room with 23 other men and 8 beds, their wages of 11/2 livres a week plus rations, and how they had to sign up for at least six years of work in the town. Then he showed us how to load and fire a musket of the period and then actually fired a blank off. Thankfully, nobody lost any limbs. The next stop was the officers house. Now, the officers were middle class and inherited the title through lineage, not through promotion. You had to have a royal name in the family somewhere. The wife of the officer greeted us and sat us down in the kitchen before telling us all about the goings on in an officers life. They got paid

quite a bit more than the soldiers, had a better social stance and didn’t necessarily have to fight. This officer had six children, five girls and one boy. We learned that children didn’t have to wear gender specific clothing until the age of seven. At that point, the boys were given trousers and the girls were given a corset, which they would then wear for the rest of their lives, even to bed. Then she took us to the den and showed us the guest bed, which also served as a sickbed and a maternity bed. We learned that after birth, women had to stay abed for 40 days after having a boy and 80 after having a girl before being aloud up and to church. We discussed bathing and how it was a much less common thing back in 1744. In fact, dirt was supposed to be a layer of protection around your soul, and if you washed it off, you were in danger of corruption. Then, the officer’s wife demonstrated lace making, which was very complicated, very time

consuming and something I could have never done ever. Even if I was born at that point, I would have been deemed useless since my eyesight is worth absolutely zero. Our next stop was the house of the engineer and the upper class. We were seated in the kitchen once again, by the butler this time, and served hot chocolate made with real chocolate, cream and spices, just like it was at the time. In the engineer’s house, there is no front door. You must come around the back to enter and, in doing so, are forced to admire the gardens and the grounds. Engineers were very well off, they entertained often and were well respected. There also wasn’t any one position for an engineer. This particular one was an architect, a geologist, an ornithologist and an astronomer among other things. He also helped design Louisbourg on it’s grid. It was very interesting. Dad was impressed and he was also very proud of himself for being successful in the mid-1700s. It was then time for lunch so we went for the authentic meal at the Louisbourg restaurant. We were seated with a couple from the outskirts of Toronto and we talked while we ate our entire meal with a spoon. I ordered the soup, which turned out to be very good. We walked around a bit more, but it was getting quite late so we had to get on our way to New Glascow. We got there just after suppertime, so Mum and I unpacked while the boys went out to pick up Subway. We also got to see our Kizmet again. Peace out m8s.

#camping #novascotia #newglascow #fortlouisbourg