St. François Xavier is an unincorporated urban centre located in the

Rural Municipality of St. François Xavier The Rural Municipality of St. François Xavier is a rural municipality in Manitoba, Canada, lying west-northwest of Winnipeg. It is part of the Central Plains Region as well as the Winnipeg Metro Region. It had a population of 1,411 in the 2016 ce ...

Manitoba Manitoba ( ) is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada at the Centre of Canada, longitudinal centre of the country. It is Canada's Population of Canada by province and territory, fifth-most populous province, with a population o ...

, Canada. It is located about 15 km west of the city of

Winnipeg Winnipeg () is the capital and largest city of the province of Manitoba in Canada. It is centred on the confluence of the Red and Assiniboine rivers, near the longitudinal centre of North America. , Winnipeg had a city population of 749,6 ...

on the

Assiniboine River The Assiniboine River (''; french: Rivière Assiniboine'') is a river that runs through the prairies of Western Canada in Saskatchewan and Manitoba. It is a tributary of the Red River of the North, Red River. The Assiniboine is a typical meand ...

. Settled around 1824 as Grantown, it is the second oldest settlement in Manitoba.

History

Buffalo Meat Drying, White Horse Plains, Red River

The area of current-day St. François Xavier, commonly known as White Horse Plains (''La Prairie du Cheval Blanc''), was home to several distinct

First Nations First Nations or first peoples may refer to: * Indigenous peoples, for ethnic groups who are the earliest known inhabitants of an area. Indigenous groups *First Nations is commonly used to describe some Indigenous groups including: **First Natio ...

, such as the

Cree The Cree ( cr, néhinaw, script=Latn, , etc.; french: link=no, Cri) are a Indigenous peoples of the Americas, North American Indigenous people. They live primarily in Canada, where they form one of the country's largest First Nations in Canada ...

and the

Dakota Dakota may refer to: * Dakota people, a sub-tribe of the Sioux ** Dakota language, their language Dakota may also refer to: Places United States * Dakota, Georgia, an unincorporated community * Dakota, Illinois, a town * Dakota, Minnesota, a ...

. The lands in the area supported numerous buffalo and other game animals. Around 1824,

Cuthbert Grant Cuthbert James Grant (1793 – July 15, 1854) was a prominent Métis people (Canada), Métis leader of the early 19th century. His father was also called Cuthbert Grant. Life Cuthbert James Grant was born in 1793 at Fort Tremblant, a North We ...

, who had recently led the

Métis The Métis ( ; Canadian ) are Indigenous peoples who inhabit Canada's three Prairie Provinces, as well as parts of British Columbia, the Northwest Territories, and the Northern United States. They have a shared history and culture which derives ...

in the

Battle of Seven Oaks The Battle of Seven Oaks was a violent confrontation in the Pemmican War between the Hudson's Bay Company (HBC) and the North West Company (NWC), rivals in the North American fur trade, fur trade, that took place on 19 June 1816, the climax of ...

, arrived in the area and was soon joined by many Métis families. The settlement was thereby founded, and named ''Grantown'' after Grant. The

have since had a noticeable role in the municipality and throughout the province. In 1851, Father

Louis-François Richer Laflèche Louis-François Laflèche, (September 4, 1818 – July 14, 1898), was a Catholic bishop of the diocese of Trois-Rivières, in the province of Quebec, Canada. Early life and career He was born on September 4, 1818, in the village of Sainte-Ann ...

accompanied the Métis buffalo hunters from the Parish of St. François Xavier on one of their annual hunts on the

prairies Prairies are ecosystems considered part of the temperate grasslands, savannas, and shrublands biome by ecologists, based on similar temperate climates, moderate rainfall, and a composition of grasses, herbs, and shrubs, rather than trees, as the ...

. The hunting group, led by Jean Baptiste Falcon, son of

Pierre Falcon Pierre Falcon (sometimes referred to as Pierriche, meaning 'Pierre the rhymer'; 4 June 1793 – 21 October 1876) was a Métis fur trader and pioneer living in what is today known as Manitoba. He was also a well known composer and singer. F ...

(a Métis songwriter), was made up of 67 men, a number of women who came to prepare the meat, some small children and 200 carts. In

North Dakota North Dakota () is a U.S. state in the Upper Midwest, named after the Native Americans in the United States, indigenous Dakota people, Dakota Sioux. North Dakota is bordered by the Canadian provinces of Saskatchewan and Manitoba to the north a ...

they encountered a band of

Sioux The Sioux or Oceti Sakowin (; Dakota language, Dakota: Help:IPA, /otʃʰeːtʰi ʃakoːwĩ/) are groups of Native Americans in the United States, Native American tribes and First Nations in Canada, First Nations peoples in North America. The ...

. Laflèche dressed only in a black

cassock The cassock or soutane is a Christian clerical clothing coat used by the clergy and male religious of the Oriental Orthodox Churches, Eastern Orthodox Church and the Catholic Church, in addition to some clergy in certain Protestant denomi ...

, white

surplice A surplice (; Late Latin ''superpelliceum'', from ''super'', "over" and ''pellicia'', "fur garment") is a liturgical vestment of Western Christianity. The surplice is in the form of a tunic of white linen or cotton fabric, reaching to the kne ...

, and stole, directed with the camp commander Jean Baptiste Falcon a miraculous defence against 2,000 Sioux combatants, using a

crucifix A crucifix (from Latin ''cruci fixus'' meaning "(one) fixed to a cross") is a cross with an image of Jesus on it, as distinct from a bare cross. The representation of Jesus himself on the cross is referred to in English as the ''corpus'' (Lati ...

at the Battle of Grand Coteau in North Dakota. After a siege of two days (July 13 and 14), the Sioux withdrew, convinced that the

Great Spirit The Great Spirit is the concept of a life force, a Supreme Being or god known more specifically as Wakan Tanka in Lakota,Ostler, Jeffry. ''The Plains Sioux and U.S. Colonialism from Lewis and Clark to Wounded Knee''. Cambridge University Press, ...

protected the Métis. The St. François-Xavier post office was opened in 1871 and closed in 1975.

Demographics

In the

2021 Census of Population The 2021 Canadian census was a detailed enumeration of the Canadian population with a reference date of May 11, 2021. It follows the 2016 Canadian census, which recorded a population of 35,151,728. The overall response rate was 98%, which is sli ...

conducted by

Statistics Canada Statistics Canada (StatCan; french: Statistique Canada), formed in 1971, is the agency of the Government of Canada commissioned with producing statistics to help better understand Canada, its population, resources, economy, society, and cultur ...

, St. Francois Xavier had a population of 845 living in 272 of its 278 total private dwellings, a change of from its 2016 population of 662. With a land area of , it had a population density of in 2021.

Notable people

Notable people buried at the St. Francois Xavier Roman Catholic Church and Cemetery include: *

Patrice Breland Patrice Breland (March 17, 1837 – April 3, 1908) was a fur trader and political figure in Manitoba. He represented St. Francois Xavier from 1879 to 1883 in the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba as a Conservative. He was born in St. Franco ...

Pascal Breland Pascal Breland was a famous 19th-century pre-confederation Canadian Métis farmer and politician. He was a well-known Metis trader and was popularly nicknamed "le Roi des traiteurs" (The King of the traders). He held several appointed political po ...

Bruce Hardy Bruce Alan Hardy (born June 1, 1956 in Murray, Utah), is a former professional American football player who was selected by the Miami Dolphins in the 9th round of the 1978 NFL Draft. A 6'5", 232 lbs. tight end from Arizona State University ...

References

* ''Geographic Names of Manitoba'' (pg. 238) - the Millennium Bureau of Canada

External links

RM of St. François Xavier (Official website)
{{DEFAULTSORT:St. Francois Xavier, Manitoba Saint Francois Xavier Unincorporated urban communities in Manitoba Unincorporated communities in Central Plains Region, Manitoba

History

Demographics

Notable people

See also

References

External links