Today is a perfect day to go back in time. The headwinds are minimal and the waves small.

We are en route to Grosse Île, one of 21 islands in the Îles-aux-Grues archipelago of the St. Lawrence River, 46 kilometres downstream from Quebec City.

The sky is a radiant blue and, in the distance, the outcrops are shrouded in low-hanging fog.

The island, less than three kilometres long and one kilometre wide, appears quickly, looking every bit the uninhabited aboriginal hunting ground it was until English troops established a hastily built quarantine station in 1832 to handle the masses fleeing a disease-ravaged Europe torn apart by the Napoleonic Wars.

A man leans towards our boat’s window and squints at our destination on the horizon. He’s likely one of the dozen or so visitors here today hoping to find a familiar name carved on an island where 4.3 million people disembarked between 1815 and 1941.

During that time, the hopeful Canadians were sent to a quarantine station on site, where staff checked arrivals for cholera and other infectious diseases that may have travelled in contaminated food, water or the dank corners of a two-month Atlantic Ocean crossing. Countless died on board and on the island.

Immigrant History in the Flesh

“The Americans have Ellis Island; we have Grosse Île,” says Odette Allaire, a member of the Parks Canada field unit here with the group. “Every Canadian should visit at least once in their lifetime.”  

Our group exits the dark-glass confines of our 65-foot-long boat; almost a hundred of us eager, like the thousands who are increasingly visiting from May through September, to walk a little-known chapter of Canada’s immigrant history.
 
I take the new 2.5-km Mirador Trail that winds through forests and wetlands, up grassy slopes and over granite rocks through plentiful flora and fauna on the northern part of the island.

Ten minutes later, I’m amidst the newly opened buildings on the island’s eastern half, where the mostly ill arrivals were held.

I then join a guided walking tour to the west side of the island—a small peninsula where our guide plays the part of immigration officer to our roles of grateful arrivals. We’re told to line up inside the large grey-and-red wooden disinfection building (built in 1893) at the end of the dock, and that the doctors will soon examine us and fumigate our luggage.

Commemorating the Dead

We later reach the highest point on the island, and the site of the lowest point in its tragic history. A 40-foot-high granite Celtic cross commemorates the 20,000 Irish immigrants who died, mostly of typhus, in 1847 before reaching their final destination.

Almost 6,200 are buried in the cemetery at the bottom of this hill, a grassy space dotted with white wooden crosses.

At the glass memorial wall I see dozens of visitors searching for names of their ancestors under the year they perished. A couple run their index fingers down the list of names until the man stops at one and grimaces, tears filling his crow’s feet.

The quarantine station closed in 1937 when the Great Depression reduced immigration numbers and advancement in microbiology meant new arrivals could be treated right in Quebec City. In the 1990s, Grosse Île and the Irish Memorial became a National Historic Site of Canada.

How to Get There

Croisières Coudrier leads day trips from the Port of Quebec to Grosse Île from May to September at 10 a.m.

The 90-minute sailing each way returns at 5:30 p.m. and costs $70 for adults, children under 5 are free.

Visitors have four hours to explore the island. Bring your own lunch (888-600-5554).