Born at Cossé-le-Vivien (Mayenne), September 13, 1837.
Taking of the habit in N.-D. de l’Osier, April 30, 1858.
Perpetual oblation in Aix, April 14, 1860 (No. 503)
Died in Saint Boniface, Canada, March 23, 1904.
Louis Boisramé was born at Cossé-le-Vivien in the diocese of Laval in France on September 13, 1837, son of Jeanne Chalumeau and Louis Boisramé. A cousin of Father Prosper Boisramé, he began his novitiate at Notre-Dame de l’Osier on April 30, 1858. According to Father Carrière, Louis was “a harness maker by profession.” In the Personnel Registry of 1862 we find written. “A young man without any education whatsoever. He was begging… For his safety and well-being, he was admitted to the novitiate…” In his notes on the novices in 1858-1859, Father Vandenberghe has only praise for this brother: “energetic and prayerful,” “attitude of dedication, very tidy,” “excellent brother as to virtue, for work and for a good disposition,” “upright, devoted and virtuous,” “open hearted and full of good will, is making both interior and exterior progress.” Brother Boisramé made his first vows on July 16, 1859, no doubt at Marseilles where he spent a few months. It was at Aix that he made his perpetual oblation on April 14, 1860 before leaving for Canada.
He spent his life in Western and Northwestern Canada, at Île-à-la-Crosse in 1860-1861, at Fort Resolution in 1862-1863, at Saint Boniface in 1863-1865 where he worked at building the cathedral and the bishop’s house. He then went back to the Mackenzie and lived at Fort Providence from 1865 to 1878, at Fort Rae from 1878 to 1879, at Lac-la-Biche in Alberta from 1879 to 1889. En 1890, he nursed Bishop Henri Faraud who was ill at Saint Boniface and after Bishop Faraud died in September, Brother Boisramé took a few months of vacation in France. From 1891 to 1904, he remained in Saint Boniface where he died on March 23, 1904.
His name appeared often in Missions O.M.I. In a letter to Father Prosper Boisramé dated November 14, 1876, Father Lecomte declared that Brother Boisramé was “a celebrity of the diocese of Laval.” In his Tables analytiques de Missions O.M.I., Father Henri Verkin described Brother Boisramé as “a capable builder,” “a successful hunter” and “a skilled fisherman.” In 1877, for example, he caught 17,000 fish. In the report of the diocese of Saint Boniface made to the Chapter of 1904, the vicar of mission wrote that Brother Boisramé died “after a long life of dedication and a prayer life that was very admirable.”
Yvon Beaudoin
and Gaston Carrière, o.m.i.
