Samuel Neilson (1771-1793) was an innovative and
well-advised young business man constantly on the look-out
for current events. In September 1792, for the very first
number of his new monthly the Quebec Magazine / Le
magasin de Québec, he hired J. G. Hochstetter to
engrave a view of Québec City. The Quebec
Gazette published an account of Louis XVI's death on 18
April 1793. The engraving of the event appeared in the April
1793 edition of the Magasin du Québec.
Colonial authorities bought 150 copies and made them public
in an attempt to fight a rebellion against the Crown. The
portrayal of the event was different from Parisian
engravings in that the neo-Palladian architectural style of
the buildings was typical of British provinces. Urban
landscapes, such the Cockburn in this exhibition, regularly
show these posters glued to houses and churches - one of the
many public uses of printed material.
Anonymous, The Tragic Death of the
King of France. View of the Guillotine, or Newly invented
Machine to behead those condemned to Death [free
translation of French], 1793, engraving, image 13,7
x 8 cm, plate 15,8 x 9,8 cm, sheet 55,5 x 44,5 cm,
Montréal, McGill University, Rare Books, Lawrence
Lande Canadiana Collection.
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