In 1846, almost a hundred years before, somewhere in La Beauce:
” It’s Sunday, we need to go to the church. Go to the end of the field and bring me a horse said Léger Gilbert to his teenage daughter”.
-Yes Dad, I’m going.
When crossing the shallow, sandy Touffe-de-Pins River, Chlotilde noticed a shiny yellow rock the size of a pigeon egg. -Oh, how beautiful this rock is, she said to her horse .
The rock turned out to be a 2.5 ounce gold nugget that could buy 200 horses at that time. In the blink of an eye, miners streamed in from as far away as British Columbia, California, Australia and England. A boom town was hastily slapped together and the river Touffe-de-Pins was renamed Gilbert River.
La Beauce was Canada first Gold Rush ! Charles-Étienne Chaussegros de Léry is it’s most famous figure.
