{"id":8375,"date":"1805-10-29T12:46:00","date_gmt":"1805-10-29T20:38:58","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peipioneercemetery.com\/staging\/?p=8375"},"modified":"2026-10-29T12:49:15","modified_gmt":"2026-10-29T19:49:15","slug":"winter-on-the-north-side","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/peipioneercemetery.com\/staging\/winter-on-the-north-side\/","title":{"rendered":"Winter on the North Side"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Keeping warm, keeping provisions, and keeping in touch before roads were routinely cleared.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\"><strong>On this page<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<ul class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li><a href=\"#snow\">Snow and isolation<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"#warmth\">Warmth<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"#food\">Food for winter<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"#fish\">Salt fish and fresh catches<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"#game\">Rabbits and wildlife<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"#neighbours\">Work and neighbours<\/a><\/li>\n\n\n\n<li><a href=\"#sources\">Sources<\/a><\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Winter narrowed the world around a north-shore household. A drift could block a familiar path; the woodpile and provisions needed to last; animals still needed feeding. Getting through the season depended on preparations made months earlier and work repeated every day.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">When the road disappeared<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">On an exposed coast, falling snow was only part of the problem. Wind moved it into hollows, lanes, and sheltered places around buildings. A field might be scoured while a nearby entrance filled with drifted snow. Reopening a path could be work that had to be done again after the next blow.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Recollections of drifts more than ten feet high give a vivid sense of that experience. A drift is a local accumulation, rather than the depth of snow across an entire district. We have not yet identified a dated parish account measuring a particular ten-foot drift, so that figure should be understood here as a recollection to document.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">It is also useful to distinguish the absence of routine motorized plowing from an absence of any effort to clear or establish routes. People could shovel essential paths and adapt their journeys to the snow. Horses and sleighs belonged to a transport system that did not require a bare road.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Research based on provincial public-works reports shows how late routine winter road access developed. In 1947\u20131948, the province kept about 400 of its 3,200 road miles open. Snow removal expanded rapidly afterward. Even well into the twentieth century, dependable winter motoring was not universal. <sup><a href=\"#s1\">1<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Warmth had to be worked for<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">In a wood-heated household, heat began outside the house. Fuel had to be cut, brought home, split, and kept where it could be reached. A substantial woodpile was a reserve of labour as well as a reserve of warmth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The hearth or stove, depending on the period and house, provided heat for cooking and helped warm the people gathered nearby. Warmth was uneven. A working kitchen could be much more comfortable than a distant room, and families did not necessarily heat every room to the same temperature.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Clothing and bedding mattered alongside the fire: layers, woollen garments, blankets, and quilts helped retain warmth. Drying wet clothes added another task. None of this made a poorly sheltered or poorly supplied household comfortable simply because it had a stove.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">A winter morning therefore involved necessities before other work could begin: tending the fire, bringing in fuel, obtaining water, and preparing food. The household depended on someone doing those things repeatedly. These are general features of wood-heated rural life, rather than a reconstructed morning in a named parish home.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">The winter table began with the harvest<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Provisions could not depend on a shop being reachable every day. Keeping food through the cold months was part of the annual work of a farming household.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Potatoes and other root vegetables could be stored in a suitable cool cellar, protected from freezing. Grain and flour supported meals made at home. Meat and fish could be preserved, while pickling and other methods added variety. Bottling and canning became part of later household practice; they should not be projected unchanged into the earliest settlement years.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">A cellar was not simply a place to leave food and forget it. Stored produce needed attention, and spoilage or freezing reduced what remained. Supplies had to be considered against the number of people eating and the time before new food would be available.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">MacDonald\u2019s parish history describes mixed farming, potatoes, grain, and garden crops, as well as trips to sell products and buy necessities. It supplies the local setting for this pattern of producing, storing, purchasing, and using food. <sup><a href=\"#s2\">2<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Having provisions did not mean every family had enough. Poor harvests, illness, limited cash, or the loss of a working adult could leave a household short. The aim was to prepare for winter; success depended on circumstances.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Salt fish: food kept beyond the fishing season<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The sea\u2019s contribution to winter food was not limited to fish caught during winter. Fish preserved when catches were available could be kept for later use.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">MacDonald remembers cod, herring, hake, mackerel, and haddock being caught, processed, and cured along the parish coast. This gives preserved fish a firm place in the local working economy, although the passage does not provide the winter menu or stores of an individual family. <sup><a href=\"#s2\">2<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Salted fish could help bridge the interval between catches. It still required preparation for the table, and the particular method depended on the product. Fresh and preserved fish offered different possibilities: one was a catch to use while available, the other a provision deliberately kept.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Fresh fish and ice fishing<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Winter did not end all fishing. A Fisheries and Oceans Canada report on PEI describes smelt fishing in fall and winter in bays and estuaries. It also records winter recreational eel spearing. A separate PEI recreational-fishing survey explicitly includes smelt taken through the ice. <sup><a href=\"#s3\">3<\/a><\/sup> <sup><a href=\"#s4\">4<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">These records establish that winter fishing belongs to Island life. They do not prove that every north-side family fished through the ice, or that a later recorded method was used unchanged in the early 1800s.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Location mattered. Sheltered tidal water, a coastal pond, and the open Gulf were different fishing environments. Fresh winter fish could supplement stored provisions where a catch was available; it was not an assured replacement for a winter reserve.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Did people catch \u201crabbits\u201d?<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The animal commonly called a rabbit on PEI is the snowshoe hare. Hunting or snaring hares could provide meat, and the Island has a documented hare-harvest tradition. That makes it a reasonable part of the wider winter-food story. <sup><a href=\"#s5\">5<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">What we cannot yet do is assign rabbit snaring to a particular parish household without a recollection or record. A family might depend on someone\u2019s skill and opportunity, and catches could vary. Game was not a pantry that could always be drawn upon in a storm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Other wildlife needs the same care. Species present on the Island changed over time, and taking animals for food was not the same as trapping for pelts or income. We should not fill the picture with deer, moose, or other game merely because they feature in mainland pioneer stories.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">The useful family questions are concrete: who went out, what did they bring home, at what time of year, and how was it used? Those details would give a local account more value than an invented list of wild foods.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Work continued beyond the kitchen<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Farm animals still needed feed and water. A blocked way to the barn or well could not be ignored until spring. Making those short journeys possible was part of the work of keeping the household and farm going.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Nor did snow necessarily end contact with neighbours. The parish history preserves winter journeys by horse and sleigh, including trips toward Charlottetown over routes marked across frozen waterways. That is a remembered historical practice, not evidence that every winter journey was possible or safe. <sup><a href=\"#s2\">2<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<h3 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Sarah Stewart\u2019s winter journeys<\/h3>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">McQuaid remembers midwife Sarah Stewart sometimes travelling by hand sleigh to help neighbours in winter. The account does not identify who pulled it. Its value is the glimpse of help reaching another household when ordinary travel was difficult. <sup><a href=\"#s6\">6<\/a><\/sup><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">That story brings the winter picture back to people. Fuel and food were essential, but so were the relationships through which care, news, and assistance could move. A storm could isolate a house without ending its place in a community.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">Winter was neither unbroken hardship nor a picturesque holiday. It was a season of preparation, repetitive labour, changing weather, and opportunities to gather when conditions allowed. How well a family managed depended on its resources, health, and help from others.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<h2 class=\"wp-block-heading\">Sources and historical context<\/h2>\n\n\n\n<ol class=\"wp-block-list\">\n<li>D. Bailey Clark, <a href=\"https:\/\/niche-canada.org\/2024\/01\/24\/snowplows-and-the-modernization-of-prince-edward-island-commercialized-farms-and-urban-growth-in-the-countryside\/\">Snowplows and the Modernization of Prince Edward Island<\/a>, NiCHE (2024), drawing on provincial public-works reports. Used for the development of winter road clearance.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Roddie J. MacDonald, <em>History of St Margaret\u2019s Parish \u2013 Bear River \u2013 P. E. Island Up to 1982<\/em>, owner-supplied text; <a href=\"https:\/\/www.islandregister.com\/1982stmargarets.html\">online transcription at Island Register<\/a>. Local farming, fish curing, and winter transport.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Fisheries and Oceans Canada, <a href=\"https:\/\/waves-vagues.dfo-mpo.gc.ca\/Library\/215653.pdf\"><em>Prince Edward Island Eels, Gaspereau, Silversides, and Smelts<\/em><\/a>, Stock Status Report D3-18 (September 1997). Seasonal fisheries are historical descriptions, not current regulations.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Fisheries and Oceans Canada, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.dfo-mpo.gc.ca\/stats\/rec\/can\/2005\/qpei-eng.htm\">2005 PEI recreational-fishing survey material<\/a>, including smelt fishing through the ice. Evidence of the Island practice, not proof of a named household\u2019s nineteenth-century activity.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Parks Canada, <a href=\"https:\/\/parks.canada.ca\/pn-np\/pe\/pei-ipe\/nature\/faune-wildlife\/mammiferes-mammals\">Mammals of PEI National Park<\/a>, snowshoe hare; Government of PEI, <a href=\"https:\/\/www.princeedwardisland.ca\/sites\/default\/files\/1c3d\/State%20of%20Wildlife%20Report%20-%20ONLINE%20VERSION.pdf\"><em>State of Wildlife Report<\/em><\/a>, hare harvest. Sources establish species and harvest, not a specific parish family practice.<\/li>\n\n\n\n<li>Jenny O\u2019Hanley McQuaid, <em>Genealogy of St Margaret\u2019s Parish<\/em>, Chapter 5, printed page 74, Sarah Stewart\u2019s remembered service as a midwife and winter travel.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n\n\n\n<p class=\"wp-block-paragraph\">This article combines documented local accounts with general historical context about rural households. It is not a reconstruction of one family or one winter. The recollection of ten-foot drifts and individual hunting, food-storage, and heating practices remain subjects for local testimony.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Keeping warm, keeping provisions, and keeping in touch before roads were routinely cleared. On this page Winter narrowed the world [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"site-sidebar-layout":"default","site-content-layout":"","ast-site-content-layout":"default","site-content-style":"default","site-sidebar-style":"default","ast-global-header-display":"","ast-banner-title-visibility":"","ast-main-header-display":"","ast-hfb-above-header-display":"","ast-hfb-below-header-display":"","ast-hfb-mobile-header-display":"","site-post-title":"","ast-breadcrumbs-content":"","ast-featured-img":"","footer-sml-layout":"","ast-disable-related-posts":"","theme-transparent-header-meta":"","adv-header-id-meta":"","stick-header-meta":"","header-above-stick-meta":"","header-main-stick-meta":"","header-below-stick-meta":"","astra-migrate-meta-layouts":"default","ast-page-background-enabled":"default","ast-page-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-5)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"ast-content-background-meta":{"desktop":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"tablet":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""},"mobile":{"background-color":"var(--ast-global-color-4)","background-image":"","background-repeat":"repeat","background-position":"center center","background-size":"auto","background-attachment":"scroll","background-type":"","background-media":"","overlay-type":"","overlay-color":"","overlay-opacity":"","overlay-gradient":""}},"footnotes":""},"categories":[1450],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8375","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-work-everyday-life"],"gutslider_comments":0,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/peipioneercemetery.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8375","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/peipioneercemetery.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/peipioneercemetery.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peipioneercemetery.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peipioneercemetery.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8375"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/peipioneercemetery.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8375\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":8376,"href":"https:\/\/peipioneercemetery.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8375\/revisions\/8376"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/peipioneercemetery.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8375"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peipioneercemetery.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8375"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peipioneercemetery.com\/staging\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8375"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}