Search Website Design and Content © by Eric Krause, Krause House Info-Research Solutions (© 1996)
      All Images © Parks Canada Except Where Noted Otherwise
Report/Rapport © Parks Canada / Parcs Canada  --- Report Assembly/Rapport de l'assemblée © Krause House Info-Research Solutions

Researching the Fortress of Louisbourg National Historic Site of Canada
  Recherche sur la Forteresse-de-Louisbourg Lieu historique national du Canada

DOMESTIC BUILDING CONSTRUCTION 
AT THE FORTRESS OF LOUISBOURG, 1713 - 1758

By

Eric Krause

1996 Draft Report

(Fortress of Louisbourg
Report Number H G 10)

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

PARTITIONS

The common partitions were non-bearing, consisting only of vertical boards. The boards were planed on both sides, tongued and grooved and fastened to the floor and ceiling with nails and a wooden tringle, a simple molding perhaps only one-half to one pouce high. Such partitions could be easily moved when necessary, as was often the case.

Both one and 2 pouce partitions were assembled in the same house for no apparent difference of reason. Likewise, the degree to which partitions were finished could vary within the same building. For example, in the Block 23A residence of Louis Levasseur, who was well-to-do, there were a mix of planed and non-planed partitions. In other homes there were some partitions that were planed on one side only, or not at all.

Other types of non-bearing partitions consisted of Boston boards with beveled joints (such as were placed in the magasin general in 1749), boards with butt joints (a private Barrachois building), a combination of paneled boards below and trellis work above (the residence of the commissaire-ordonnateur), a brick wall built as a security precaution (commissaire-ordonnateur), and the ever popular piquet partition (second in use to the common board partition). Piquet partitions also often co-existed with board partitions in the same house.

Piquet partitions were built from small, split, hewn, re-sawn or round piquets. Those in a complex of piquet buildings on Isle Saint-Jean were, surprisingly, no different than the outer perimeter walls: made from logs set vertically in the ground with a caulking of clay. Even a fine residence like the one on Block 23A had several partition partitions, though these were plastered with gypsum, either on one side only, or on both sides. Gypsum, as a rendering however, was more expensive than line and sand, which would have been more frequently used.

Bearing partitions were more common to masonry structures than to those of wood which generally were not as wide. Such partitions occurred whenever a builder needed to transfer stress. If he raised them in masonry he often finished them like the main walls.

Some masonry bearing partitions ran the length of a building with similar ones set across its width, not only to handle stress but also to create rooms. The one in the proposed masonry Rodrigue house would have divided the building into two separate residences, but would not have created individual rooms. Non-bearing plank partitions served that function instead.

In Port La Joie a piquet complex had a piquet bearing partition, while the armourer's and surgeon's charpente lodging had one of charpente. In one case the framed members measured 8 by 8 pouces, perhaps the same size as those of the perimeter charpente walls. Several masonry structures had framed wooden partitions as well. One, in 1723, was referred to as a separation de colombage. Builders would also place or propose framed partitions for the Royal Battery, the Block One magasin general, and for the Block 13 royal hospital. Installed temporarily to retain a room at the end of the hospital, then undergoing a major extension, the partition was eventually shingled as a weather precaution.