Calvet House - one of Montreal's oldest buildings - on sale now for just $9.5 million

This house, one of the city's oldest, is now on sale in Olde Montreale for $9.5 million.
   This glorious fieldstone shack at 401 de Bonsecours - adjacent to Montreal's nicest vista -  is still standing after being built around 1725 and getting its name from its most famous owner Pierre du Calvet.
   Ogilvy's department store restored it in the mid 70s and it was long used for art exhibitions. 
   It's a hotel now charges about $350 a night, which is sort of justified as city taxes alone cost $90,000 a year.
   We know that four people were killed in a fire in a building across the street in 1946 but this joint seems a-ok.
   The 1725 construction date is only a guesstimate but other than its much-larger-than-average size, the house is typical of the times with the customary steep roof and twin chimneys joined in a gable. The small windows are in its original red but paint is now used rather than the ox blood that initially tinted the wood.
 Fur trader du Calvet - a French Protestant aka Huguenot, a rare species indeed in Quebec -  got the house in 1770 after arriving in about 1758 at the age of 23
   Protestant Pete Calvet wanted what became Canada to join the American Revolution and befriended American revolutionary General Richard Montgomery. Calvet was promoted to ensign due to his role as a supplier in the effort to bring Quebec into what would be the United States.
  In the spring of 1776 he held secret meetings between some Montreal Jesuits and their counterparts from south of the border. But the locals didn't bite on the pitch to join the Yanks.
  It's said that Benjamin Franklin stayed at the house in 1775 and the Montreal Gazette say its inception there apparently.
  Alas the Yanks were kicked out of Montreal in 1776.  Protestant Pete sent a messenger to the U.S. with an invoice for his services but the messanger was intercepted and a case for treason was made against Calvet.
   He was released and lobbied for payment of the services he rendered the Americans in London and Paris, impressing Ben Franklin, who wrote Congress urging them to pay their debt to the guy in 1783. "He appears an honest man and his case is a hard one. I have undertaken to forward his papers and I beg leave to recommend them to the speedy consideration of congress," wrote Franklin.
   Calvet pretended that he was not involved in the conspiracy in a pair of books he penned pleading his case. He was lost at sea in the Shelburne sinking of 1786.
   The building belonged was also owned by Gabriel Cotte (founder of the Beaver Club) and his widow Dame Angelique blondeau then sold it to the Delvecchio family until 1946 and was restored by CIL in 1967 which rediscovered five bricked-up fireplaces.
   Gaetan Trottier is the current owner and he gave a tour of the premises to a site called Towertrip, whose excellent post can be seen here.