Lacolle () is a

municipality A municipality is usually a single administrative division having municipal corporation, corporate status and powers of self-government or jurisdiction as granted by national and regional laws to which it is subordinate. The term ''municipality' ...

in southern

Quebec Quebec is Canada's List of Canadian provinces and territories by area, largest province by area. Located in Central Canada, the province shares borders with the provinces of Ontario to the west, Newfoundland and Labrador to the northeast, ...

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its Provinces and territories of Canada, ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, making it the world's List of coun ...

, located in the administrative area of the Montérégie, on the Canada–United States border. The population as of the Canada 2021 Census was 2,708. The Lacolle River runs eastward through the middle of the town and empties in Richelieu River. More people cross the border illegally from the United States there than at any other point. Almost nineteen thousand people were detained in 2017. The nearest town across the border is Champlain, New York.

History

The written history of Lacolle can be traced back to July 4, 1609, when

Samuel de Champlain Samuel de Champlain (; 13 August 1574#Fichier]For a detailed analysis of his baptismal record, see #Ritch, RitchThe baptism act does not contain information about the age of Samuel, neither his birth date nor his place of birth. – 25 December ...

and his entourage stopped briefly at the mouth of a small stream for a meal before continuing southward up the Richelieu River into the Lake Champlain, lake which now bears his name. In his journal, Champlain referred to the location of the delta as "Lacole". When translated literally, the term means the neck of a bottle or that which is above the shoulders. Lacolle was the site of three battles in the early 19th Century. Two of the battles took place during the War of 1812. The Battle of Lacolle Mills (1812) was a short engagement in which a small garrison of Canadien Militia, with the assistance of Kahnawake Mohawk warriors, defended a makeshift log blockhouse from an American invasion force led by Major General Henry Dearborn. In the Battle of Lacolle Mills (1814) a garrison of 80 men of the 13th Regiment of Foot and a

Congreve rocket The Congreve rocket was a type of rocket artillery designed by British inventor Sir William Congreve, 2nd Baronet, Sir William Congreve in 1808. The design was based upon Mysorean rockets, the rockets deployed by the Kingdom of Mysore against ...

detachment of the Royal Marine Artillery, later reinforced by a company of the Canadian Voltigeurs and the Grenadier company of the Canadian Fencibles successfully defended a blockhouse and stone mill building from an attacking American force of 4,000 men led by Major General James Wilkinson.John R. Elting, ''Amateurs to Arms'', p.176 The Battle of Lacolle was fought on November 7, 1838, between Loyal Lower Canada volunteer forces under Major John Scriver and

Lower Canada The Province of Lower Canada () was a British colonization of the Americas, British colony on the lower Saint Lawrence River and the shores of the Gulf of Saint Lawrence established in 1791 and abolished in 1841. It covered the southern portion o ...

rebels under Colonel Ferdinand-Alphonse Oklowski. The half hour battle ended in a rebel defeat.

Demographics

Population

Language

Economy

Lacolle as a small industrial park featuring Arneg Inc, Soudure HMC inc, and a Recycling complex operated by Compo Haut-Richelieu inc. (headquartered in St-Jean-sur-Richelieu).

Education

The South Shore Protestant Regional School Board previously served the municipality.King, M.J. (Chairperson of the board).
South Shore Protestant Regional School Board
(St. Johns, PQ). '' The News and Eastern Townships Advocate''. Volume 119, No. 5. Thursday December 16, 1965. p. 2. Retrieved from

Google News Google News is a news aggregator service developed by Google. It presents a continuous flow of links to articles organized from thousands of publishers and magazines. Google News is available as an app on Android, iOS, and the Web. Google ...

on November 23, 2014.

References

External links

Lacolle official website

{{Authority control Municipalities in Quebec Incorporated places in Le Haut-Richelieu Regional County Municipality