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John Jones (died 1818)

businessman and political figure in Lower Canada

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionDec 1, 2023
Entity authorityQ6242034 ↗
Source-derived summary

John Jones (c. 1752 – August 3, 1818) was a businessman and political figure in Lower Canada. He represented the Lower Town of Quebec in the Legislative Assembly of Lower Canada from 1808 to 1810.

Jones came to Quebec City in 1777 and set up business as a seller of imported spirits. His business failed a few years later. In 1789, he set up in business again as an auctioneer and broker, mainly dealing in the sale of goods following bankruptcies, deaths or departures from the province. In 1794, he married Margaret Harrison, possibly the daughter of Edward Harrison; Jones' first wife had died some time earlier. Jones also became involved in wholesale and retail sale of goods, also investing in property.

From 1794 to 1795, he was partner with William Vondenvelden in a print shop and the weekly newspaper Le Cours du tems/The Times, later selling his share to Vondenvelden. He served in the local militia, becoming captain and also served as president of the Quebec Fire Society.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “John Jones (died 1818)” is businessman and political figure in Lower Canada. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through John, Jones and died, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA practical starting point whose main value is the path it opens into stronger specialist and primary sources. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1752, 1818, 1808, 1810—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1752. For this dossier, John, Jones and died is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “businessman and political figure in Lower Canada” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Dec 1, 2023. The linked authority identifier is Q6242034. VIAF identifies the subject as 104538619. 1 of 2 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1752, 1818, 1808 and 1810.

Critical limits

The absence of detail may reflect summary conventions rather than a lack of surviving documentation. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

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Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “John Jones (died 1818)” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.