The Québec City St-Patrick's Day Parade is the main event celebrating
Saint Patrick's Day
Saint Patrick's Day, or the Feast of Saint Patrick ( ga, Lá Fhéile Pádraig, lit=the Day of the Festival of Patrick), is a cultural and religious celebration held on 17 March, the traditional death date of Saint Patrick (), the foremost patr ...
in
Quebec City
Quebec City ( or ; french: Ville de Québec), officially Québec (), is the capital city of the Canadian province of Quebec. As of July 2021, the city had a population of 549,459, and the metropolitan area had a population of 839,311. It is t ...
,
Quebec
Quebec ( ; )According to the Canadian government, ''Québec'' (with the acute accent) is the official name in Canadian French and ''Quebec'' (without the accent) is the province's official name in Canadian English is one of the thirtee ...
, Canada. The event returned in 2010 after 84 years' absence.
History
Origins (1837–1926)
Canada's first-known celebration of St. Patrick's Day was held in Québec City in 1765 in the Sun Tavern on St. John Street (today known as rue St-Jean). It was hosted by Protestant landlord Miles Prentice, a former soldier (and believed to be an Irishman), and by the former
Provost-Marshal
Provost marshal is a title given to a person in charge of a group of Military Police (MP). The title originated with an older term for MPs, '' provosts'', from the Old French ''prévost'' (Modern French ''prévôt''). While a provost marshal i ...
in
General Wolfe
James Wolfe (2 January 1727 – 13 September 1759) was a British Army officer known for his training reforms and, as a major general, remembered chiefly for his victory in 1759 over the French at the Battle of the Plains of Abraham in Quebec. ...
's army.
Québec City's first parade was held in 1837, four years after the opening of the Irish community's first church, St. Patrick's, on rue McMahon. The parade attracted a large number of people and quickly became a major annual event in Québec City. In 1916, the parade was suspended due to
World War I
World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...
, resuming in 1921. In 1928, two years after the last parade, the ''Québec Chronicle Telegraph'' acknowledged with regret that the festivity had begun its passage into history. However, the Cadets of St. Patrick's High School held modest parades until the 1940s.
The return of the parade (2010– )
In 2009, a committee was created to bring back the tradition of the parade to the city. With the support of the population, several organisations and the Québec City administration, the St. Patrick's Day parade returned to the streets of Québec on March 13, 2010, for the first time in over 84 years.
For the occasion, a portion of the NYPD Pipes and Drums were present as special guests. The event was considered to be a success across the board, drawing over 40,000 people into the streets of Vieux-Québec. The event has continued in the years since then.
See also
*
Saint Patrick
References
External links
* http://saintpatrickquebec.com/en/
* http://www.nypdpipesanddrums.com/
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Festivals in Quebec City
Tourist attractions in Quebec City
St. Patrick's Day
Irish diaspora in Quebec
Parades in Canada
Saint Patrick's Day
Irish-Canadian culture