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Le Tanneur | The Tanner

A tanneur, or tanner, prepared the skins of animals with tan or tannin (tree bark powder), in order to produce leather by hand. A tannery was where the tanner worked. Tanning was considered a noxious or "odoriferous trade" and relegated to the outskirts of town and near a river or stream, usually amongst the poor. In other words, tanneries smelled horrible.

Tanning in New France began in the 1600s in Québec City and Montréal. In the beginnings, leather artisans would get skins delivered from France. Eventually, with the arrival of more butchers, skins were produced locally. The first tannery in New France was established at Pointe-Lévy in 1668. This tannery was particularly important, as it was awarded several contracts to supply footwear to the troops. Montreal saw its first tannery at the end of the 17th century. Rural, small-scale tanneries also existed. These tanners produced leather based on the needs of the local inhabitants.

Tanners mostly used sheepskin and cattle hides, but hunters and fisherman were able to supply other types of skins such as walrus, seal, moose, deer and bear.

The first tanners came from France, and using methods from the old country, taught their apprentices. Tanning mills were powered by wind, water or animals. The tanning process had many steps. First, skins were soaked and softened in a lime pit, which burned off animal hair and flesh debris. Then, to neutralize the effects of the lime, the skins were washed with chicken droppings diluted in water. Next, the skins spent a few months soaking in tannin basins. The tannin used in New France was made of hemlock or spruce bark, eventually evolving to oil and alum tanning, and finally chrome tanning.

Once removed from the basins, the leather was stretched, covered in cod liver oil and hung to dry. Finally, to prevent the leather from hardening, it was polished with liquid tallow. All these steps required specific tools and equipment, like various knives for dehairing and fleshing, a workbench and a tanner’s bench.

Based on the needs of his family, a cultivator would bring his animal skins to the tanner, and four months later would return to pick up his leather. Since the tanner’s vats could hold dozens of skins at once from different clients, they needed to be marked. As such, the first client’s skins would be marked with one line, the next with two lines, and so on.

Most of the leather that was made was tough—used for shoes, boots and harnesses. Work in the tanneries was hard. Handling heavy, water-soaked hides was exhausting. The odours from decomposing organic materials were so strong that nauseous workers sometimes vomited on the job. Others could not eat upon their return home. The risk of infection was high, and during hide finishing, the omnipresent leather dust caused respiratory problems. On top of all this, the tanner earned unenviable nickname: “crotte de poule”, or chicken dropping.

Known persons that had this occupation: Michel André dit St-Michel, Sébastien Aubry, Jacques Baillet, François Barsalou, Gérard Barsalou, Jean Baptiste Barsalou, Didas Beaupré, Pierre Bedagaray, Jacques Bédard, Lean Bélair, Nathaniel Boulter, Étienne Brunet, Étienne Charest, Étienne Charest (fils), Pierre Chazal, Louis Chevalier, Pierre Chezal, Paul Collette, Jean de Dieu, Jean-Marie Deguise dit Flamand, Charles Delaunay, Jacques Delavaux, Joseph Destroismaisons dit Picard, Jacques Drolet, Dominique Dubroca, François Dulaurent, Germain Estivalet, Richard Freeman, Jacques Gaudry, Jean-Elie Gaut(h)ier, Alexis Gauvreau, Etienne Gauvreau, Pierre Gauvreau, Pierre Gendron, Charles Giroux, Noël Giroux, François Goyet, Joseph Guyon dit Després, Pierre Haya, René Hautbois, Thomas Huguet, Antoine Huppé dit Lagrois (Lagroix), Claude Hurel, Jacques Jahan dit Laviolette, Charles Larche, Jean-Baptiste Larchevêque dit Grandpré, Benjamin Lauzon, Antoine Leblanc, Octave Lemieux, Claude Lenoir dit Roland, Laurent Loraine dit Lagiroflée, Augustin Laurent dit Lorty, Jean Laurent dit Lorty, Louis Mallet, Jean Baptiste Maranda, Jean Moreau, Jean Mouchère dit Desmoulins, Louis Régis Morin, Guillaume Nantel, Joseph Normand, Charles Paquet, Paschal Parsiller dit Lachapelle, George Phillip, Jean Louis Plessis dit Bélair, Charles Poliquain, Joachim Primeau, Pierre Robereau dit Duplessis, Joseph Roberge, Pierre Robitaille, Charles Roy, John Selby, Hippolyte Thibierge, Pierre Thomelet, Narcisse Vincent, Asa Willett.

Here’s a clip from J&FJ Baker, Britain's only remaining traditional oak bark tannery

Sources:

• Jeanne Pomerleau, Arts et métiers de nos ancêtres : 1650-1950 (Montréal, Québec: Guérin, 1994), 411-416.

• Thivierge, Marise, and Nicole Thivierge, "Leatherworking". The Canadian Encyclopedia. Article published February 07, 2006; Last Edited December 06, 2016. Historica Canada, https://www.thecanadianencyclopedia.ca/en/article/leatherworking.

• "Tanneries", Ville de Québec, Online Heritage article (https://www.ville.quebec.qc.ca/en/citoyens/patrimoine/quartiers/saint_roch/interet/tanneries.aspx).