The Stehelin family consisted of Emile Charles Adolphe and his wife Marie Therese. Their children were Emile Jean (born 1870), Jean (1871), Charles (1872), Therese (1873), Adeline Sophie (1974), Louis (1875), Roger (1876), Paul (1878) and Germain (1879), Maurice (1882), Simone (1885) and Bernard (1886).

“Approaching the closing decade of the last century, Emile Charles Adolphe Stehelin was living very comfortably in his spacious home, St. Charles, near Gisors, in Normandy.”

“Being a democrat, .. he approved steps taken by the government to raise the standard of life for the labouring class. He believed in compulsory education to all and with it, a stronger economic base and a rich intellectual development. Of course he believed in free enterprise, providing it was free and competitive. Such an egalitarian philosophy was frowned upon in the chateaux of Gisors.”

“The decision to send Emile Jean to Canada to look over the situation was taken in the summer of  1894 and he started preparing to leave France in the autumn. He was then twenty-four years old, had finished university, his military service and had some experience at the felt factory.”

“At that point Roger, who was eighteen and Paul, who was sixteen, declared that they too wanted to go to Canada with their older brother. After much thinking and soul-searching and a lot of persistence on the part of the two boys, the father consented to let them go, but on the firm undertaking that they would enroll at Sainte Anne College on arrival and finish their education there. Father Blanche was consulted and he agreed to enroll them.”

“One can easily imagine the upheaval om the minds of thee young men and the general air of excitement in the home as preparations went on. Going to Canada where one would live among Indians and wild animals was a thought indeed unbelievably exciting and daring.”

“Well knowing that he might meet his brothers that night, Jean had prepared himself to play the role that would dazzle them and enflame their imaginations. Throwing the rich looking buffalo robe off his lap, he jumped to the ground, the true picture of the hunter woodsman, they had expected to see. On his head he wore a large fur cap and on his feet knee high mocassins. At the waist of his checkered mackinaw coat down to his knees, he wore a wide leather belt from which hung a long and dangerous looking hunting knife. In his hand he carried his carbine at the ready. To his three brothers this was a sight to their taste and very much in line with the kind of adventure in the forest they had been dreaming of, the mirage they had travelled so far to overtake.”

“Jean regaled his brothers, very green and avid novices, in the ways of the woods, with stories about life in the forest. Firstly the road was very bad. In the winter the snow made the going by sleigh much easier and very pleasant. Jean found a bottle of rum somewhere and as the night wore on, the stories got bigger and better. He told his brothers of almost daily encounters with bears and wild cats, the latter resembling small tigers. There were also lots of moose, birds, small game and abundant trout in the many streams and rivers.”