author
Georges Dugas
1833–1928
A French Canadian priest and writer, he spent years in the Red River region and turned that experience into books about western Canada, Métis history, and early settlement. His work offers a clear window into how one 19th-century Catholic observer understood the West he knew firsthand.
1 Audiobook
La première canadienne du Nord-ouest
by Georges Dugas
About the author
Born in Saint-Jacques-de-l'Achigan, Quebec, in 1833, Georges Dugas studied at the Collège de L'Assomption and was ordained a Catholic priest in 1862. After early ministry in Quebec, he went west in 1866 as a missionary to the Red River region, where he became closely involved with Catholic education and pastoral work.
Dugas later became known as an author as much as a clergyman. He wrote extensively on the history of western Canada, including the Red River settlement, the Métis, and notable figures of the Northwest. Because he had lived in the region himself, his books were valued as eyewitness or near-contemporary accounts, especially from a French Canadian perspective.
He died in 1928. Today he is remembered both for his religious work and for the role his writing played in preserving one influential 19th-century view of prairie and Métis history.