Melbourne is a township municipality located in Le Val-Saint-François Regional County Municipality in the Estrie region of Quebec, Canada.
The name Melbourne comes from the name of an English town in Derbyshire and Hampshire.
History The village was founded by Irish immigrants from New England after the famine in Ireland. These settlers, who arrived around 1860, decided to try their luck here, because these lands were still available, accessible, open and cultivable. The municipality was officially created in 1855 but has since lost parts of its territory. First in 1860 when the village section of Melbourne (now merged with Richmond) became its own entity. In 1889, New Rockland separated (it has since been merged with Kingsbury). In 1896, Kingsbury separated also. Finally, in 1920, Brompton Gore (now part of Racine) separated.
Demographics
In the 2021 Census of Population conducted by Statistics Canada, Melbourne had a population of living in of its total private dwellings, a change of from its 2016 population of . With a land area of , it had a population density of in 2021.
Mother tongue (2021) Language Population Pct (%) French only 765 69.9% English only 285 26.0% English and French 25 2.3% Non-official languages 25 2.3% English and non-official language 5 0.5%
Notable people
Marie-Claire Blais (1939 – 2021) writer and novelist F. S. Coburn (1871 – 1960) illustrator and photographer William Hoste Webb (1820 – 1890) lawyer and political figure
See also List of anglophone communities in Quebec List of township municipalities in Quebec
References
External links
Municipality of Township of Melbourne (in English)