In 1845 Alice Parker, b. 1817, married Robert Gillespie, b. 1802 in Lanarkshire, Scotland.  Robert was living at the time in St. Paul d’Abbotsford, Quebec.  Alice died in 1858, leaving five motherless children between the ages of 3 and 12.  Not long before her sister’s untimely death, Harriet (Parker) Nash had lost her husband, and she was the mother of one child (posthumously) Helen Sophia, b. May 3, 1848.  It was soon arranged that Aunt Harriet should come and care for her sister’s motherless children – which she did faithfully and well for she was a very efficient woman.

But one small boy who was only five when his mother died was often lonely.  He could well remember the day his mother was buried in the cemetery on the slope of Yamaska Mountain, but he could never recall her features.  (Photographs were uncommon then.)

There were a number of French-speaking families in Abbotsford at that time, and this little lad, whose name was Robert like his father, became perfectly familiar with the French tongue.  A large French family who were very poor lived near his home.  Robert often visited them, not, as one might suppose, to play with the many boys and girls, but to listen to the mother tell stories.  She was “un vrai raconteur” who could tell a tale of times past and was not unable to spin a fresh one of her own making.  Wee Robert spent many a pleasant hour with Madame, listening to her stories as she sat with her endless piles of sewing.  But, as children often are, he was sensitive to the want in this household that included the lack of enough buttons for the garments his hostess was producing.  So, when leaving for one of the story-telling sessions he would slip a few buttons in his pocket from the well-filled button jar.  (Aunt Harriet never threw away a button.)  Then he would offer his buttons in exchange for stories – not all at once, but with his heritage of New England prudence and Scotch thrift, he would dole them out – a button for a story.  Thus, many a pleasant, profitable hour was spent by both the storyteller and her eager listener.
-Ruth Willard

revised 03 Jan 2000