On July 22, 1968, the St. Boniface Cathedral caught fire due to a stray cigarette. Crowds gathered to watch the fire rapidly make its way through the church. Shortly before one lucky group of firemen went in, one of the towers collapsed completely.

Cathedral Fire will be overlaid on the St. Boniface Cathedral. Walk on the main walkway of St. Boniface Cemetery. Looking towards the Cathedral, stand between the set of walkway lamps closest to the Cathedral.

At the instigation of Lord Selkirk, supported by petition signed by a number of residents near the junction of Red and Assiniboine rivers, Mgr Plessis, Bishop of Quebec authorized the establishment of a Catholic Mission in what was then the District of Assiniboia within the lands controlled by the Hudson Bay Company. Arriving from Montreal by fur trade canoe the 16th of July, 1818, Fathers Norbert Provencher, Sévère Dumoulin and a seminarian, Guillaume Edge, set about their designated task to serve the needs of the Catholics in the region and to “evangelize the nations” west of Lake Superior to the Pacific Ocean, north to the Arctic seas and south to the northern limits of the Diocese of Dubuque, Iowa. They took possession of a small house located on a parcel of land ceded to the Mission by Selkirk which is now roughly bounded by the Red River between Masson and Despins streets and by Ave Aulneau to the east.

On the first of November 1818, the Mission of Saint-Boniface was inaugurated in honour of the legendary evangelist. Within a year a modest, 9 x 15 metre log church with a single spire was being constructed with lumber harvested near the mouth of la rivière Sale some 18 km south. It was severely damaged in the Red River flood of 1826 When Provencher was consecrated to the rank of “coadjutor” Bishop of the Northwest in May 1822, the Hudson Bay Company provided him with a grant to build a more substantial structure which would serve as his Cathedral. As the stone needed to be quarried and hauled to the site from a riverbank quarry near the St. Andrews rapids 25 kilometres to the north, and stone masons were rare, it took some 25 years to fully complete this substantial twin spired church which would have been the pride of many a long-established parish along the banks of the St. Lawrence in Lower Canada. In the 1859 poem, “the Red River voyageur’ by the American poet, John Greenleaf Whittier, a wide audience read “of the bells of St. Boniface. The bells of the Roman Mission, that call from their turret’s twain, to the boatman on the river, to the hunter on the plain.”

Sadly, on the 14th of December, 1860, the church was largely destroyed by a fire which had started in the attenuating kitchen. Some of the Grey Nuns, and their young helpers, had been making candles in preparation for Christmas services when some of the fat caught fire over a stove.

Using essentially the same foundations and recycling the quarried stone blocks, Provencher’s successor, Bishop Alexandre Antonin Taché built a more modest cathedral which eventually featured only a single bell tower. This was the Cathedral within which Louis Riel’s funeral was held on the 12th of December 1885. His remains, as well as those of his wife and three children are interred just to the right of where the main doors to “Taché’s Cathedral” were located. When the cemetery grounds are dry, as well as in the fall, one can still see the outlines of the foundations of those two early churches.

In the early 1900’s Mgr. Adélard Langevin, eventually as “the builder” (le bâtisseur) for his efforts to bestow St. Boniface with numerous impressive institutional structures believed it was time to build a new Cathedral. He felt the structure should reflect the status of St. Boniface as the “Mother Church” of western Canadian Catholicism and a Diocese which stretched from Saskatchewan to Thunder Bay, Ontario. Construction began in 1904 and when completed in 1908, the structure featured two bell towers extending over 41 metres (135 feet) to the tops of the crosses, an impressive balcony and Rose Window at the front of a building over 99 metres (325 feet) long. Below the arched ceilings ran balconies along either side and an impressive choir loft. The largest Church in Western Canada it had a capacity of 2000 worshippers. It was eventually recognized as a Minor Basilica. Sadly, on the 22nd of July, 1968, the St. Boniface Basilica was gutted by a disastrous fire which had begun in the attic space which had been sparked by a cigarette butt. All that remained were the façade, stone walls and sacristy survived.

Faced with the loss of their iconic Cathedral, many of the parishioners hoped to see the structure rebuilt regardless of cost. According to the architect Étienne Gaboury, it would have cost over $6,000,000 to simply install a roof, new floor and interior walls, “Laisse faire contruire une Cathédrale” (never mind build a Cathedral). In the wake of the Vatican II reforms of the Catholic Church and the costs of replacing the Cathedral which had been insured for half a million dollars, then Bishop Maurice Baudoux had a more modest vision. Gaboury was awarded a contract valued at $635,000 with two conditions; build it on a square plan and provide for a capacity of 1,000 people. It was Gaboury’s decision to build a truly modern Cathedral within the ruins of the old structure, an approach which continues to draw admiration over 50 years after its 1972 opening. Designed to conform to the post Vatican II modernization of Church rites and practices, the present Cathedral presents a warm, welcoming ambience to its visitors who are also often awestruck by Gaboury’s interpretation of the Way of The Cross found in the stained glass windows. A remarkable feature is the skylight over the altar which features a risen Christ but is invisible to the congregation. However, when the sun traverses the western sky, its light passes through the window and projects the image against the wall behind the altar. Images and brief histories of the various churches and Cathedrals can be found on the wall of the Columbarium located on the south west corner of the cemetery.

Written by Phil, edited by Rob.