Books by or about Lowertowners

By Nancy Miller Chenier

Joan Finnegan, Giants of Canada’s Ottawa Valley, General Store Publishing House, 1981. 

Joseph Montferrand, also known as Joe Mufferaw and Jo Mofero, generated many local legends and some are lodged in Lowertown lore. He was famous for throwing Irish Shiners off bridges and for kicking tavern ceilings but this legend about Montferrand and the Rideau Falls is not so well known. 

Because Joan Finnigan recounts the tale so well in her chapter on Joseph Montferrand, her dramatic account is reproduced here:

“After the fight on the Chaudière Bridge, the Shiners, with a killer thirst for revenge, waited for Montferrand in gangs. His superiors, fearing for his life, warned him that he was never to go about in either Hill or Bytown alone. But Montferrand grew careless and one day found himself encircled by Shiners on the banks of the Rideau. An accomplished swimmer, he quickly took to the river, prepared to swim across. But there on the bank opposite waited another band of enemies, some say – armed with pistols.”

“‘Holy Mary, Mother of God!’ said Joe fervently looking upwards. ‘There is only one way to go!’”

“And he headed downriver toward the Rideau Falls. Two hours later, all of Bytown and Hull had heard that the great Joe Montferrand had been swallowed up by the Ottawa River. But Montferrand had not spent years on the river for nothing. In 1613, Samuel de Champlain had written of the Rideau Falls, ‘This fall rushes with such impetuosity that it leaves an arcade with a depth of almost four hundred feet. The Indians pass underneath, as a game, without getting wet.’”

“Joe had simply slipped in under the curtain of the falls, hidden until his enemies tired of watching and within an hour, was quietly changing his clothes and recounting the adventure at the Ottawa Inn owned by a friend, d’Agapit Lesperance!” 

The inn referred to as being owned by A.P. Lesperance was on Clarence Street in Ottawa.