"What if Newfoundland had Remained a French Colony?"
— Michelle Stamp, Reader
Dr. Ron Rompkey: "For that to have happened, the Treaty of Utrecht [1713] would have to have been changed, because that's where France gave up rights to the island. They retained the right to come in the spring and fish and to leave in the fall, but they had no permanent influence, no claim.
The fundamental difference is that we would not have had British Imperialism. We live in a post-colonial society; we see ourselves with a certain kind of history, which, like the history of the West Indies, is colonial. But France did not have the international presence that Britain had. And France held onto all of its overseas colonies.
Newfoundland's history, like Martinique's, would reflect the changes in French government, for example the Revolution. Our law would be the Napoleonic Code.
Would we have joined Canada? That's another big question. Since 1867, various Prime Ministers, starting with Sir John A. Macdonald, have wanted to bring Newfoundland into Confederation. The resistance against that was partly from the powerful merchants in St. John's, and there's no telling if anyone would have had that power in a French colony.
Would the cuisine be better? The French still salted fish. We would still eat salt fish. But our imports would be different.
And all our place names would be French names, so there would be no Heart's Content, no Heart's Desire. And the names of French origin, Renews, Fermeuse, would be spelled differently. Our capital would probably be Plaisance [Placentia].
There's no end to it. It is all about culture — language, tradition. What role would we have played in WW2? France had fallen to Germany. What architecture would St. John's have? Maybe it would look more like a coastal town in Normandy. For schools we would have lycées, and there would certainly not be a church-run school system. And we'd have good air service to Paris — no struggling through Heathrow.
But the French did not like the weather very much and may not have stayed long!"
Dr. Ron Rompkey is a University Research Professor with Memorial's Department of English, and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Canada. His most recent book, En Mission a Terre Neuve (Pu Rennes, 2007), was reviewed in Vol. 100, no. 3.
