There are a number of interesting references in the literature of the
times to the part played by Negro refugees in defending the frontier
of Canada during the troubles of 1838. The outbreaks in both Upper and
Lower Canada in 1837 were followed by a series of petty attacks along
the border in which American sympathizers participated. Sandwich, on
the Detroit River, was one of the objectives of the attacking parties
and there were also threats on the Niagara River frontier. One of the
parties of "rebels" had taken possession of Navy Island, in the
Niagara River, and a small ship, the _Caroline_, was used for
conveying supplies. A Canadian party under command of Colonel MacNab
crossed the river, seized the ship and after setting it afire allowed
it to drift over the falls. This gave rise to an international issue
and was the occasion of much bluster on both sides of the line that
happily ended as bluster. All along the border on the American side
there were "Hunter's Lodges"[1] organized during 1838 and this
movement, joined with the widespread political disaffection, made the
times unhappy for the Canadian provinces.
Sir Francis Bond Head, who was Governor of Upper Canada when the
troubles of 1837 began and whose conduct did not tend materially to
quelling the unrest, wrote his "apologia" a couple of years later and
in it he speaks of the loyalty of the colored people, almost all of
whom were refugees from slavery. He says:
"When our colored population were informed that American
citizens, sympathizing with their sufferings, had taken violent
possession of Navy Island, for the double object of liberating
them from the domination of British rule, and of imparting to
them the blessings of republican institutions, based upon the
principle that all men are born equal, did our colored brethren
hail their approach? No, on the contrary, they hastened as
volunteers in wagon-loads to the Niagara frontier to beg from me
permission that, in the intended attack upon Navy Island, they
might be permitted to form the forlorn hope--in short they
supplicated that they might be allowed to be foremost to defend
the glorious institutions of Great Britain."[2]
Rev. J. W. Loguen, in the narrative of his life, says that he was
urgently solicited by the Canadian government to accept the captaincy
of a company of black troops who had been enrolled during the
troubles. As the affair was then about all over by the joint effort of
the Canadian and United States governments, he did not accept the
offer but he makes this interesting comment:
"The colored population of Canada at that time was small compared
to what it now is; nevertheless, it was sufficiently large to
attract the attention of the government. They were almost to a
man fugitives from the States. They could not, therefore, be
passive when the success of the invaders would break the only arm
interposed for their security, and destroy the only asylum for
African freedom in North America. The promptness with which
several companies of blacks were organized and equipped, and the
desperate valor they displayed in this brief conflict, are an
earnest of what may be expected from the swelling thousands of
colored fugitives collecting there, in the event of a war between
the two countries."[3]
Josiah Henson, founder of the Dawn colony in Upper Canada and famous
as the reputed "original" of Mrs. Stowe's Uncle Tom, says in his
narrative that he was captain of the second company of Essex colored
volunteers and that he and his men assisted in the defence of Fort
Malden (Amherstburg) from Christmas 1837 to May of 1838. He says
further that he assisted in the capture of the schooner _Anne_, an
affair which took place on January 9, 1838.[4]
John MacMullen, in his _History of Canada_, says that among the troops
on the border during 1838 "were two hundred Indians from Delaware, and
a body of colored men, settlers in the western part of the province,
the poor hunted fugitives from American slavery, who had at length
found liberty and security under the British flag."[5]
A rather interesting aftermath of the rebellion is contained in an
item appearing in the _Amherstburg Courier_ of March 10, 1849,
reporting a meeting of Negroes in Sandwich township to protest against
the Rebellion Losses Bill.[6] Colonel Prince was thanked for his
opposition to the measure.[7]
Eighty years after the rebellion the Negro men of Canada were again
called upon to fight, this time in another land and in a conflict that
was destined to affect every race and every land. The service that was
rendered in the Canadian army by the colored companies of pioneers
will some day receive due recognition at the hands of an historian. In
the meantime, it is not forgotten by the people of Canada.
FRED LANDON
THE PUBLIC LIBRARY,
LONDON, ONTARIO