Up the Gatineau! Article
This article was first published in Up the Gatineau! Volume 4.
Brigham-Chamberlain House — Old Chelsea, Que.
Heather Quipp
This house is over one hundred years old, and may date back to 1850 or earlier. Prior to 1962 it stood on the west bank of Chelsea Creek adjacent to the barn which still stands. When the Meach Lake Road was rerouted through the Chamberlin farm sixteen years ago. the house was moved to a lot on the Padden Road by the late Mr. James Dunn.
Today, the house looks much the same as it always did, except that it was traditionally painted white. not yellow. Apparently there was a summer kitchen attached to it at one time that has since been removed.
The first occupants of the house were probably Charles Lennox Brigham and his wife Louisa Abigail Aylwin. Charles‘ father, Thomas Brigham. is reported to have built a saw and grist mill on the creek at Old Chelsea in the early 182O’s. This house. no doubt. was framed with wood from that mill.
Charles Lennox Brigham is listed in the 1861 census for Ranges 6 to 10 in the Township of Hull as a 42 year old miller living in a 1 1/2 storey frame house on 1 1/2 acres of land. The census" report shows that $800 had been invested in a saw mill which produced annually 300,000 lengths of pine valued at $600. The mill employed one man at $20 per month.
Louisa Abigail Aylwin was the daughter of William Aylwin, who came to Hull in 1810. Her mother was Abigail Chamberlin, the daughter of Ephraim Chamberlin and Mary Wright. Louisa and Charles were married in 1850, and had two children, Mary and Florence. Charles died in 1861. It is interesting to note that Charles was the grandson of Philemon Wright, and Louisa was the great- grand-daughter of Philemon Wright.
The Brighams are said to have donated land for the building of St. Stephen's Roman Catholic Church. The first church was a frame structure built in 1840. Although the Brighams were Church of Englanders, their land holdings were extensive in this part of the Township of Hull. In 1856 Charles and Louisa Brigham sold property to Michael Scott, along what later became known as the Scott Road. Mr. Scott took over a £150 debt to Allan Gilmour as payment for the land.
The saw mill on Brigham Creek, as Chelsea Creek was then called, may have been sold to Charles Watters Chamberlin around 1850, and later to his brother Josiah. Four Chamberlin brothers had come to this area from Lowell, Mass. between 1801 and 1803 to work as millwrights in the Wright settlement. One of the four settled on Lot 12 in Range 10 at Eaton Chute on the Gatineau River. This was Josiah Chamberlin, father of Watters and Josiah. in the 1861 census all three are listed as millwrights.
In the early 1860's, Charles Watters Chamberlin married Louisa, the recent widow of Charles Lennox Brigham. She was about 30 years old at the time. In 1867 she died. Watters then married Emma Blair from Gilmour's Mills. As the years went by he gained the reputation of being something of an eccentric and lived to be 103.
ln 1875 Charles Watters Chamberlin is listed in the Ottawa Directory for the Chelseas as a contractor and farmer. Apparently he had a small shingle mill and a dam on the creek just below the house. People in the village today, still remember the sound of his water ram which supplied ample water from the creek for his personal use. Watters also worked at Gilmour’s Mills in Chelsea.
Apparently the lights in the Chamberlin house went off at nine pm. and on at five a.m. every day like clockwork. Watters had some sort of foot ailment, and he used to walk around his house every night before bed in his bare feet.
Watters’ brother Albert, lived in Skinner’s house (now Barry Bryant’s) on Highway 105, and since the Scott Road area was dense bush in those days, he tied pieces of white cotton on the trees between the two houses so that his wife could find her way home!
Watters and Emma Chamberlin had eight children: Bruce, Abel, Nobel, Percy, Grace, Louise, Regina and Hilda. Emma is remembered as a ‘well scrubbed lady with white hair and cheeks the colour of beet juice‘.
Watters died in 1931.
The house remained unoccupied for many years, and in 1962 was moved to its present location on the Padden Road. It is presently owned by Mr. and Mrs. John Walker.
This is an excerpt from a report on the heritage buildings in the heart of Old Chelsea, Que, as researched and written by Heather Quipp for The Historical Society of the Gatineau.