Carbonear council says changing street name because of marauder’s history would be too much trouble

By Mark Squibb/March 24, 2023

A request from a resident to rename D’iberville Street, so named after the French solider and explorer Pierre Le Moyne d’Iberville, has not found favour amongst Carbonear staff or council.

The request was briefly discussed during last week’s public meeting.

“This street was named by council over 10 years ago, from a list of possible street names provided by the Carbonear Heritage Society,” explained Deputy Mayor Sam Slade. “The request was not received from a resident of the street, and a change to the street name will result in an inconvenience to the residents on the streets, as they will be required to make changes to their address information on various documents, such as driver’s licences, vehicle registrations, insurance, and so on.”

Slade added the Public Works committee did not recommend changing the name of the road without the support of residents who live on the street, due to the inconvenience it would cause.

Furthermore, the committee recommended that if council were to consider changing the name, the Town would have to inform D’iberville Street residents of the request, and that residents will be responsible for making the required changes to their documents should the street name be changed.

“Mr. Mayor, I’ve got to say this,” said Slade. “Some people may think, ‘Well, he was a pirate or he was a plunderer,’ or whatever the case may be. But years ago, when we asked the Heritage Society for names, no matter if they were a pirate or a plunderer or whatever the case may be, it’s still a part of our history, and it needs to be recognised as so. The committee looked at it in that light, and we don’t feel strongly that it should be renamed. I just wanted to put that out there. Our history dictates, whether they were pirates or whatever the case may be, it is what it is, and it is a part of our history, and there’s nothing we can do to change history.”

Mayor Frank Butt was also not in favour of the name change.

“Sometimes if you remove it from history, people forget about it,” said Butt. “And they forget where something came from.”

Town CAO Cynthia Davis pointed out any change to the street name would have to be approved by a motion of council, and the committee was not, at this point, recommending a change.

Councillors Danielle Doyle and Chris O’Grady declared a conflict on the matter and did not participate in the discussion, as Doyle lives on D’iberville Street and O’Grady has a relative who lives there.

Council agreed to send a letter to the resident who had requested the name change.

In recent years, certain groups have called for the tearing down of statues and renaming of roads and universities that bear the name of historical figures whose ideologies and practises do not match the mores of the 21 first century.

One example was the decision last year to rename Ryerson University the Toronto Metropolitan University due to founder Egerton Ryerson’s involvement in the residential school system.

D’iberville, for his part, led a direct attack against Newfoundland during a war between England and France.

In 1696, he attacked outport communities and besieged St. Johns’, where he scalped at least one prisoner.