Person

Cruchet, Alfred Benjamin, 1855-1915

1855-1915

Rev. Alfred Benjamin Cruchet was born on July 19, 1854, in Ramsay, Québec.

He was a Presbyterian minister, author, journalist, and innkeeper. He studied at the Institut évangélique de Pointe-aux-Trembles in 1867 and, in 1871, he pursued theological studies at The Presbyterian College in Montreal. In 1877, he began his ministry in New Glasgow in the Laurentians. In 1879, he started at Saint-Sauveur parish where he stayed for over 10 years. In 1883, he took charge of the Franco-protestant short-lived weekly L'Aurore and he published his well-received sermons in 1884. In 1885, he agreed to join the Literary and Musical Circle of Montreal at the request of McGill University Professor Daniel Coussirat. In 1889, he made the first presentation to the French section of the Royal Society of Canada. He was interested in Quebec and French poetry and he contributed articles for the Montreal Weekly Witness on French-Canadian literature. He also became a francophone columnist for the weekly newspaper Semeur franco-américain. In 1890, he was forced to resign as a pastor due to an affair with a younger woman from Montreal and the birth of a child outside of marriage. To survive and to support his new family, he worked as a private tutor and an innkeeper on the Lake L'Achigan in Saint-Hippolyte. He also wrote book reviews for the newspaper L'Avenir du Nord. In appreciation of his past contributions, he was elected president of the Amicale des anciens et nouveaux élèves de Pointe-aux-Trembles in 1912.

In 1878, he married Iphigénie "Eugénie" Bourgoin (1852–1880). In 1884, he remarried Alice Blanche Lafleur (1855–1887) and in 1890, Elise Marion (1868–1943). He died on January 2, 1915, in Montreal, Quebec.