William Henry Drummond 1854-1907

Photo by Alan L Brown - July 25, 2006

Plaque Location

The District of Temiskaming
The Town of Cobalt
In a park at the SE corner of Silver Street and Prospect Avenue

Plaque Text

Physician and poet, William Henry Drummond was born in Ireland in 1854, and came to Canada with his parents about ten years later. In 1884 he graduated in medicine from Bishop's College, Lennoxville, serving in rural Quebec before establishing a practice in Montreal. The "Poet of the Habitant", Drummond wrote in the broken English of the French-Canadian farmer and woodsman. His poems, published between 1897-1908, were characterized by humour and pathos. They touch the abiding things of life and have never lost their appeal. In 1905 the poet joined his brothers in a silver-mining venture, the Drummond Mine, located some 3 km south-east of this park. Dr. Drummond died here in 1907.