Territories | The bones of the sorcerer of Anticosti

Every corner of Quebec is full of stories that are as incredible as they are little-known. Maxime Pedneaud-Jobin takes advantage of the beautiful weather to explore some of them.

Louis-Olivier Gamache^⁠1a citizen of Anticosti Island, was already a legend during his lifetime. In the 19th century^e century, passengers on ships sailing off the island would cross themselves, terrified that the “Wizard of Anticosti” would add their ship to the 400 or so that had already been shipwrecked near the island. He was said to be a servant of Satan, a wrecker and smuggler, part ogre, part werewolf, or even a sorcerer and spellcaster.

The man really existed and he himself contributed to building his legend, you can read a brief overview of his life on a site of the University of Quebec in Trois-Rivières^⁠2.

Faced with this terrifying myth, you had to be fearless to sleep with Gamache’s bones under your bed! You also had to have no fear of the law or the spirit of the deceased to go and bury them alone, in secret, and come back to dig them up 15 years later! That’s what my uncle Luc Jobin did. Here is his story.

It is the spring of 1975. For the past three years, Luc Jobin, an entomologist with the federal government, Canadian Forest Service, has spent part of the year on Anticosti Island to conduct research. A lover of the place since the first day he set foot there, he will spend 28 summers there. To make the history of the island known (and perhaps to avoid alienating the spirit of Gamache!), he will require everyone who comes to visit him to go and pay their respects at the grave of Gamache and his second wife, Catherine Lots.

That day, there were four or five of them making the pilgrimage. When they arrived at the site, there was consternation: the tomb had been ripped open! There was machinery on site: while installing a line of electricity poles, workers had destroyed the site. The scene was macabre. “We could see the bones and even a skull coming out,” says Mr. Jobin. The group mobilized, carefully collected all the human bones and placed them in a large black plastic bag.

How to put everything back in order? The island, private for more than a century, had been bought the previous year from Consolidated Bathurst (Power Corporation) by the Quebec government^⁠3. It was now the Quebec Ministry of Tourism, Hunting and Fishing that was managing the island… a case involving sorcerer’s bones would be administratively hellish to manage! Back in the village, Mr. Jobin consulted an old islander, Jean Poulin, a wise man whom everyone respected and called “Mr. Jean”. The two men were in a quandary: with which administrative authority should they deal? How could they give the Gamache couple a burial worthy of them? Who would pay for a possible monument project? What to do with the bones in the meantime? The matter should not escape the attention of the islanders; they had to take the time to think before alerting anyone.

That year, Luc Jobin lived in the customs officer’s house, the last house still standing in the old village of Baie-Sainte-Claire. “I slept all summer in an abandoned house, for a while with the Gamache bones in a big plastic bag under my bed!” he says with a laugh. At the end of the summer, when it was time to return home to Quebec City, his plan was clear: they would keep the adventure a secret and bury the Gamache bones again until they were sure they could pay them the tribute they deserved, in a place that would never again be desecrated.

Mr. Jobin therefore asked the laboratory where he worked in Quebec City to send him a large Plexiglas box with copper screws. “Luckily, they didn’t ask me any questions!” he exclaimed. He placed the bones in the box, sealed it and returned to bury the human remains in a place known only to him. Foresightedly, he drew a map of the place in his work notebooks. “If something happened to me, they could have found it,” he said. The bones would remain buried there for 15 years!

In 1984, the island was municipalized and elected its first municipal council. At the end of this decade, Mr. Jobin finally revealed his secret to a few people. A consensus emerged: the Gamache family had to be given a decent burial. A big celebration was therefore being prepared.

The Gamache family was buried on the site of their farm, facing Gamache Bay (formerly Ellis Bay), in front of the village of Port-Menier, a place with superb sunsets, next to two large spruce trees, in memory of the spruce trees that one of the Gamache daughters had planted near the original grave. Next step: find and dig up the couple!

On the appointed day, the director of the municipality, two nuns, including Sister Rita Champagne, and Jean-Luc, a friend of Mr. Jobin, and Mr. Jobin himself participate in the operation. The lover of the island has not forgotten anything, the site is found quite quickly.

When the box appears, the town director reminds everyone that it is completely illegal to dig up human bones: “I could call the police, we could be arrested,” he says. And Mr. Jobin replies: “You would ruin a damn beautiful party!” A powerful argument, everyone rallies in enthusiasm and the sorcerer and his wife are finally dug up.

For the party, the community did things right. All adults were treated to a glass of rum, Gamache’s favorite drink. The tombstone was covered with a bear skin: Anticosti means “place where one comes to hunt/catch bears.”⁴ and they were swarming on the island at the time of the sorcerer. A descendant of the Gamache was invited, all expenses paid, to participate in the ceremony. The site is fenced, the tombstone is beautiful.

Wildflowers were thrown over the coffin before it was reburied, hopefully forever. Luc Jobin is now 89 and he is convinced that Gamache, somewhere, is watching over him.

All the information contained in this text comes from my uncle Luc Jobin, a great specialist in the history of Anticosti Island, of which he is an honorary citizen. The island’s community center bears his name. The former mayor of the island once told me that Luc was the only person in the world that all the island’s inhabitants, without exception, would welcome into their home during his visits. Why? An outstanding storyteller, he still knows by heart the history of the ancestors of all the families on the island, a superb evening guaranteed!

1. Listen to the podcast Anticosti and its stories : Louis-Olivier Gamache, from guardian to sorcerer (subscription required)

2. Visit the History and Regional Culture of Quebec website

3. Read “The Night Quebec Prevented Ottawa from Buying Anticosti Island” by Alec Castonguay

4. Consult the website of the Commission de toponymie du Québec