Place:St. Stephen, Charlotte, New Brunswick, Canada

the text in this section is based on an article in Wikipedia

St. Stephen (2011 population: 4,817) is a Canadian town in Charlotte County, New Brunswick, situated on the east bank of the St. Croix River around the intersection of New Brunswick Route 170 and the southern terminus of New Brunswick Route 3. The St. Croix River marks a section of the international boundary between the United States and Canada, and forms a natural border between Calais, Maine and St. Stephen. U.S. Route 1 parallels the St. Croix river for a few miles, and is accessed from St. Stephen by three cross-border bridges.

Prior to World War II, St. Stephen’s local economy was heavily based in the lumber and ship building industry. At the end of the 19th century, Calais and St. Stephen had no less than one hundred various dry docks and slips along the river between them. Many of the larger families in the area (such as the Merchies, and the Todds) ran much of the town’s economy due to the monopoly they had on the St. Croix River system. Many various lumbering companies were situated along the river, both on the Canadian and American side, and they distinguished each company’s lumber from another’s by branding each log with a specific symbol, unique to each lumbering company. Both the lumbering and shipping industry employed thousands of individuals, and by the early 1900s, 200 ships had been built in the St. Croix waters. Circa 1866, the Douglas Axe Manufacturing Company built their factory on Dennis Stream. This enterprise continued under the management of different companies until it ceased trading in 1943. It was responsible for the construction of a dam and power canal at Grand Falls. The water turbine is still in use covering the electrical requirements of St. Stephen and Calais. A textile mill with 20,000 spindles also operated with its own hydro-electric generating station at Milltown, a short distance downstream of St. Stephen. St. Stephen's main employer is now the Ganong Bros. Limited chocolate company (established 1873, Canada's oldest candy company).

In 1973, the municipalities of St. Stephen and Milltown joined together to become what is now simply known as St. Stephen. For a short time, the town was called St. Stephen-Milltown, but when it was realized that the new name had not caught on, the municipality reverted to the Town of St. Stephen. But it is obliged to employ "the Town of St.Stephen-Milltown" on official documents.

Research Tips

• New Brunswick Provincial Archives. This is the introductory page. The tabs will lead you to more precise material.
• The FamilySearch wiki. This lists the availability of vital statistics indexes for New Brunswick.
• New Brunswick GenWeb. A round-up of a lot of genealogical information at the province, county and parish level. Lists of cemeteries and monumental inscriptions can be found here.
• The Provincial Archives website titled The Placenames of New Brunswick has maps of all of its parishes and descriptions of some communities within them. This site contains "cadastral" maps for each parish illustrating the grantee’s name for land granted by the province. These maps are cumulative, showing all grants regardless of date.
• Microfilm images of all Canadian censuses 1851-1911 are online at Library and Archives Canada, as well as at FamilySearch and Ancestry. The 1921 census appears to be available only at Ancestry.
• The CanGenealogy page for New Brunswick. An overview of available online sources with links written by Dave Obee.
• More possibilities can be found by googling "New Brunswick province family history" and investigating the results.
• The word "rencensement", found in Sources, is French for "census".