family. Lawrence Ermatinger (1736?-1789) was a Swiss merchant who settled in Montreal shortly after the British conquest. The family he founded was important in the Hudson’s Bay Company, in the North West Company, in administration and politics. There are lives of five of the Ermatingers in the volumes of the Dictionary of Canadian Biography which have appeared to date, and they are well noticed in Wallace’s dictionary of the Nor’Westers and the Macmillan Dictionary of Canadian Biography. Lawrence’s eldest son, George Ermatinger (1766-1841), remembered sometimes as George Senior, married Mary Macdonell or Macdonald of St. Raphael’s, probably in 1793. Their son George Oakes Ermatinger (1795-1863 or 1864), remembered sometimes as George Jr., was born in GC. He served in the War of 1812 and was a schoolteacher in GC, and for many years was a farmer just east of Alexandria. The farm (on Lot 34, 2nd Concession of Lochiel Township) was part of the huge grant originally given to Spanish John (John Macdonell). George Oakes Ermatinger (George Jr.) married Elizabeth MacDougald (1807-1879) in 1829. Six sons and three daughters from this marriage went to Chippewa Falls, Wisc., about the 1860s during the great days when Glengarrians were active in the lumber trade of Wisconsin and Michigan. Jim Falls in Wisconsin was known for some years as Ermatinger Falls through the connection with this family. When the Chicago Canadian-American published an article in 1888 on the numerous Glengarrians in the area of Chippewa Falls, Wisc., it recorded that among the “busy loggers” were “the four Ermatinger brothers from east of Alexandria.” The Ermatingers sold the last of their property in the 1890s, thus ending a connection of about a hundred years with the county.
Charles G. Ermatinger (b. 1836) was one of the children of George Oakes Ermatinger (George Jr.) and Elizabeth MacDougald, of GC. He married Elizabeth Kennedy, of Alexandria, Ont., in 1866. They were among the pioneer settlers of Chippewa Falls. Charles G. Ermatinger was registrar of deeds for Chippewa County, Wisc., and he was postmaster of Anson, Wisc. He and his wife also operated a store at Anson and a hotel which was probably in Chippewa Falls. Charles G. Ermatinger wrote a family history with some autobiographical content.
He was presumably the Charles Ermatinger who published a long and valuable letter in the Glengarry Times of Lancaster, Ont., in 1882 on the Glengarrians in the area of Chippewa Falls. He listed Angus and Dan. Ermatinger, of Alexandria, among the “farmers of good standing” who were “making money.” John Ermatinger he mentioned as a hotel keeper. “Besides all these male Glengarryites,” he noted towards the end of a letter full of names, there were “a few female representatives,” one of whom was “Annie Ermatinger, of Alexandria, married to Dennis Carroll,” a prosperous logger. (Letter of Chas. Ermatinger, dated at Chippewa Falls 22 March 1882, in Glengarry Times 22 April 1882)
The Hudson’s Bay Company fur trader Edward Ermatinger (1797-1876), first cousin of George Oakes Ermatinger (George Jr.), is one of our authorities for the story of Big Finnan McDonald’s wrestling match with the buffalo.
Dictionary of Canadian Biography as cited, but see also the many Ermatinger references in the Indexes to the DCB * David G. Anderson, “The Glengarry Ermatingers,” GHS Newsletter Sept. 1996 * the Chicago Canadian-American article of 1888 is repr. Cornwall Freeholder 28 Feb. 1908 from Cornwall Freeholder of 2 March 1888, and repr. again MacGillivray & Ross 132 * Gladys McNeice, The Ermatinger Family of Sault Ste. Marie (1984) * R. E. Gard, et al., The Romance of Wisconsin Place Names (1968), 61, for Jim Falls * obituary of Mrs Charles G. Ermatinger, died aged 86, Glengarry News 25 May 1928, repr. Fraser Obits., I 58 * fragment of Charles G. Ermatinger’s family history in files of present editor