lieutenant-colonel in the Loyal American Regiment, commanded by his
father; was a graduate of Columbia College, New York, and at the
commencement of the revolutionary troubles was a student of law in the
office of James Duane. His wife, Nancy, whom he married during the war,
was daughter of the Reverend Henry Barclay, D.D., rector of Trinity
Church, New York, and sister of Colonel Thomas Barclay. At the
evacuation of New York, Lieutenant-Colonel Robinson was placed at the
head of a large number of Loyalists who embarked for Shelburne, Nova
Scotia, and who laid out that place in a very handsome manner, in the
hope of its becoming a town of business and importance. The harbour of
Shelburne is represented to be one of the best in North America; the
population rapidly increased to about 12,000 persons, but soon as
rapidly declined, being outrivalled by Halifax--and many abandoned
Shelburne for other parts of the British provinces. Lieutenant-Colonel
Robinson went to New Brunswick, and resided near the city of St. John.
His deprivations and sufferings for a considerable time after leaving
New York were great, but were finally relieved by the receipt of
half-pay as an officer in the service of the Crown. In New Brunswick he
was a member of his Majesty's Council; and at the period of the French
revolution, and on the occurrence of the Napoleonic war between England
and France, he was entrusted with the command of the regiment raised in
that colony, possessed great energy, and contributed much by his
exertions and influence to settle and advance the commercial emporium of
New Brunswick. In the Confiscation Act of New York, by which his estate
was taken from him, he was styled "Beverley Robinson the younger." He
died in 1816, at New York, while on a visit to two of his sons who were
residing in that city.
15. _Christopher Robinson_, of Virginia, was kinsman of Colonel Beverley
Robinson; entered William and Mary College with his cousin Robert,
escaped with him to New York, and received a commission in the Loyal
Canadian Regiment; served at the South, and was wounded. At the peace he
went first to New Brunswick, and then to Nova Scotia, receiving a grant
of land in each province. He soon removed to Upper Canada, where
Governor Simcoe gave him the appointment of Deputy-Surveyor-General of
Crown Lands. His salary, half pay, and an estate of 2,000 acres, placed
him in comfortable circumstances.
16. _Sir John Beverley Robinson_ was a son of Christopher Robinson, of
Virginia; received his early legal education in England, and was
admitted to the English bar. He returned to Upper Canada while yet
young; served with distinction in the war of 1812, and was in several
battles. He was early appointed Attorney-General, and held a seat in the
House of Assembly for ten years; after which he was appointed Member and
Speaker of the Legislative Council. During the insurrection of 1837, in
Upper Canada, he took his musket and went into the ranks, accompanied by
his two sons. He was born in 1791; was appointed Attorney-General of
Upper Canada in 1818; was raised to the Bench as Chief Justice in 1829;
was created Baronet in 1854; and died in 1863, aged seventy-two.
17. _Sir Charles Frederick Phillipse Robinson_, G.C.B., of New York, was
the son of Colonel Beverley Robinson; entered the King's service early
in the Revolution, and at the peace returned with his father to England,
where he was continued in the British army; became Lieutenant-General,
and received the honour of knighthood. He was with the Duke of
Wellington, and saw much hard service. At the storming of St. Sebastian
he was dangerously wounded. He was in the battle of Vittoria, Nive,
Orthes, and Toulouse. During the war of 1812 he came to America, and was
employed in Canada. He commanded the British force in the attack on
Plattsburg, under Prevost, and protested against the order of his
superior, when directed to retire, because from the position of his
troops he was of opinion that his loss of men would be greater in
retreat than in advance upon the American works. After the conclusion of
hostilities he embarked at New York for England.
18. _Morris Robinson_, of New York, was also son of Colonel Beverley
Robinson, and was captain of the Queen's Rangers. When that corps was
disbanded at the close of the war, most of the officers were dismissed
on half pay, and settled in New Brunswick; but Captain Robinson, by good
fortune, was continued in commission, and at the time of his decease he
was lieutenant-colonel, and assistant-barrackmaster-general in the
British army. He had three sons officers in the British army, and two
daughters, Susan and Joane; the former became the wife of Robert Parker,
judge of the Supreme Court of New Brunswick; and the latter the wife of
Robert T. Hagien, Esq., barrister-at-law, master in chancery, and
formerly mayor of the city of St. John.
19. _John Robinson_, of New York, likewise a son of Colonel Beverley
Robinson, was during the revolution a lieutenant of the Loyal American
Regiment, commanded by his father; and when the corps was disbanded at
the close of the war, he settled in New Brunswick, and received half
pay. He embarked, and successfully, in mercantile pursuits, and held
distinguished public stations, being deputy-paymaster-general of his
Majesty's forces in the Province, a member of the Council, treasurer of
New Brunswick, mayor of St. John, and president of the first bank
chartered in the colony. He died at St. John in 1828, aged sixty-seven.
Several other Robinsons were engaged on the royal side in the American
Revolution, but none of them so prominently connected with the British
provinces as those above mentioned.
20. _Roger Morris_, of New York, was a captain in the British army, in
the French war, and one of the aides of the ill-fated Braddock. He
married Mary, daughter of Frederick Phillipse, Esq., and settled in New
York. At the commencement of the revolution he was a member of the
Council of the colony, and continued in office until the peace, although
the Whigs organized a government, under a written Constitution, as early
as 1777. A part of the Phillipse estate was in possession of Colonel
Morris in right of his wife, and was confiscated. In order that the
whole property should pass from the family into the hands of the
Americans, Mrs. Morris was included with her husband in the New York
Confiscation Act of attainder. It is believed that this lady, her sister
Mrs. Robinson, and Mrs. Ingles, were the only ladies who were attainted
of treason during the revolution, and that merely to get possession of
their property. "Imagination," says Sabine, "dwells upon the attainting
of a lady whose beauty and attractions had won the admiration of
Washington.[138] Humanity is shocked that a woman was attainted of
treason for no crime but that of clinging to the fortunes of the husband
whom she had vowed on the altar of religion never to desert."
But it appeared in due time that the Confiscation Act did not affect the
rights of Mrs. Morris's children, who were not named in, and therefore
not disqualified by the Act of Confiscation. In 1787, the
Attorney-General of England examined the case and gave the opinion that
the reversionary interest (or property of the children at the decease of
the parents) was not included in their attainder, and was recoverable
under the principles of law and of right. In the year 1809, their son,
Captain Henry Gage Morris, of the Royal Navy, in behalf of himself and
his two sisters, sold his reversionary interest to John Jacob Astor,
Esquire, of New York, for the sum of £20,000 sterling. In 1828, Mr.
Astor made a compromise with the State of New York, by which he received
for the rights thus purchased by him (with or without associates) the
large amount of $500,000. The terms of the arrangement required that he
should execute a deed of conveyance in fee simple, with warranty against
the claims of the Morrises, husband and wife, their heirs, and all
persons claiming under them; and that he should obtain the judgment of
the Supreme Court of the United States, affirming the validity and
perfectibility of his title. These conditions were complied with, and
the purchasers of the confiscated lands were thus quieted in their
titles derived from the sales of the Commissioners of Confiscated
Property.
21. _Allan McNab_ was a lieutenant of cavalry in the Queen's Rangers,
under Colonel Simcoe. During the war he received thirteen wounds. He
accompanied his commander to Upper Canada, then a dense unpeopled
wilderness. He was appointed Sergeant-at-Arms of the House of Assembly
of Upper Canada, and held the office for many years. He was father of
the late Sir Allan McNab, who was born at Niagara, in 1798, of Scotch
extraction, whose grandfather, Major Robert McNab, of the 42nd Regiment,
or Black Watch, was Royal Forester in Scotland, and resided on a small
property called Dundurn, at the head of Loch Earn. Sir Allan McNab,
though very young, distinguished himself in the war of 1812. In the
insurrection of 1837 he was appointed to the command of the militia,
dispersed the rebels, and cut out and burnt the rebel steamer
_Caroline_, at Black Rock, for which he was knighted. He was Speaker of
the House of Assembly of Upper Canada before the union of the two
Canadas, and was afterwards Speaker of the Legislative Council of United
Canada.
22. _Luke Carscallen_ (resident of Bay of Quinté) was an Irishman by
birth, and had served in the British army; he had retired and emigrated
to the American colonies prior to the revolution. He desired to remain
neutral and take no part in the contest. The rebels, however, said to
him, that inasmuch as he was acquainted with military tactics, he must
join them or be regarded as a King's man. His reply was that he had
fought for the King, and he would do it again, consequently an order was
issued to arrest him; but when they came to take him, he had secreted
himself. The escape was a hurried one, and all his possessions were at
the mercy of the rebels--land to the amount of 12,000 acres. They,
disappointed at not catching him, took his young and tender son, and
threatened to hang him if he would not reveal his father's place of
concealment. The brave little fellow replied, "Hang away!" and the cruel
men, under the name of liberty, carried out their threat, and three
times was he suspended until he was almost dead, yet he would not tell;
and then, when taken down, one of the monsters actually kicked him.
(Canniff.)
23. _John Diamond_ was born in Albany, with several brothers. An elder
brother was drafted, but he tried to escape a service so repugnant to
his feelings; was concealed for some time, and upon a sick bed. The
visits of the doctor led to suspicion, and the house was visited by
rebels. Although he had been placed in a bed so arranged that it was
thought his presence would not be detected, his breathing betrayed him.
They at once required his father to give a bond for $1,200 that his son
should not be removed while sick. He got well, and some time after again
sought to escape, but was caught, and handcuffed to another. Being
removed from one place to another, the two prisoners managed to knock
their guards on the head, and ran for life through the woods, chained
together. One would sometimes run on one side of a sapling, and the
other on the opposite side. At night they managed to rub their handcuffs
off, and finally escaped to Canada. Of the other brothers, two were
carried off by the rebels and were never more heard of; John was taken
to the rebel army when old enough to do service, but he also escaped to
Canada, and enlisted in Rogers' Battalion, in which he served until the
end of the war, when he settled with the company at Fredericksburg. He
married Miss Loyst, a native of Philadelphia, whose ancestors were
German. She acted no inferior part, for a woman, during the exciting
times of the revolution. They were married in Lower Canada. They spent
their first summer in Upper Canada in clearing a little spot of land,
and in the fall got a little grain in the ground. They slept during the
summer under a tree, but erected a small hut before winter set in.
24. _Ephraim Tisdale_, of Freetown, Massachusetts. In 1775, he fled from
home, and went to New York. During the war, while on a voyage to St.
Augustine, Florida, he abandoned his vessel at sea to avoid capture, and
gained the shore in safety. Though nearly destitute of money, he
accomplished an overland journey to New York, a distance, by the route
which he travelled, of fifteen hundred miles. In 1783 he embarked at New
York for New Brunswick, in the ship _Brothers_, Captain Walker; and on
the passage his wife gave birth to a son, who was named for the master
of the ship. Mr. Tisdale held civil and military offices in New
Brunswick. He removed to Upper Canada in 1808, settled in the Township
of Charlotteville, near Vittoria, and died in 1816. He left eight sons
and four daughters. Walker Tisdale, Esq., of St. John (the son above
referred to), was in Canada in 1845, when the descendants of his father
there were 169, of whom he saw 163. The Tisdales were active on the side
of the Crown in the insurrection of 1837. The whole family have always
been distinguished for loyalty.
25. _Lemuel Wilmot_, of Long Island, New York, entered the King's
service as an officer, and at the peace was captain in the Loyal
American Regiment. In 1783 he settled on the River St. John, New
Brunswick, near Fredericton, where he continued to reside until his
death, which took place in 1814. Five sons survived him. The Honourable
Lemuel A. Wilmot, the son of his younger son William, was a member of
the Legislative Assembly, and leader of the Liberal party; became
Attorney-General, and afterwards Chief Justice, and ultimately
Lieutenant-Governor of the province. He had for many years been
superintendent of the Sunday-school, and leader of the choir in the
(Methodist) Church to which he belonged, and continued to discharge the
duties of both offices during the five years that he was
Lieutenant-Governor, and until his death, which occurred suddenly in
May, 1878.
I have not space to extend these notices of individual combatants in the
American Revolution, though I might add scores to the number of those I
have already noticed, equally loyal and courageous, and equal in their
energy, sacrifices and sufferings in fleeing to Canada from American
Republican persecution, far beyond anything endured by the Pilgrim and
Puritan Fathers of New England, to whose enterprise, energy, and
privations I have done ample justice in the first volume of this
history.
The Loyalists fled to Canada, and settled chiefly in Lower Canada, on
the northern banks of the St. Lawrence, between Montreal and Kingston,
on the Bay of Quinté, Prince Edward, the frontiers of the Niagara
district, and the northern shores of Lake Erie. In the following chapter
I will present an epitome of the immigration of the first Loyalists to
the Bay of Quinté, to the Niagara frontier, and to the northern shores
of Lake Erie, especially of what was called the "Long Point" country,
their modes of struggling their way thither, the privations and labours
of their early settlement. I will here add a few passages from Dr.
Canniff's _Settlement of Upper Canada, with Special Reference to Bay
Quinté_, in regard to the Loyalists fleeing into Lower Canada, and
making their way up the St. Lawrence to Kingston and Bay Quinté.
"The batteaux," says the late Sheriff Sherwood, of Brockville, "by which
the refugees emigrated were principally built at Lachine, nine miles
from Montreal. They were calculated to carry four or five families, with
almost two tons weight. Twelve boats constituted a brigade, and each
brigade had a conductor, with five men in each, one of whom steered. The
duty of the conductor was to give directions for the safe management of
the boats, to keep them together, and when they came to a rapid they
left a portion of the boats in charge of one man. The boats ascending
were doubly manned, and drawn by a rope fastened at the bow of the boat,
having four men in the boat with setting poles; thus the men walked
along the side of the river, sometimes in the water or on the edge of
the bank, as circumstances occurred. Having reached the head of the
rapids the boats were left with a man, and the other men went back for
the other boats;" and so they continued until the rapids were mounted.
Lachine was the starting place--a place of some twenty dwellings.
It was by these batteaux that the Loyalist refugee officers and their
families, as well as the soldiers and their families, passed from the
shores of Lake Champlain, from Sorel and St. Lawrence, where they had
temporarily lived, to Upper Canada. It was also by these or the
Schenectady or Durham boat that the pioneer Loyalists made their way
from Oswego.
"Thus it is seen that to gain the northern shore of the St. Lawrence and
Lake Ontario was a task of no easy nature, and the steps by which the
Loyalists came were taken literally inch by inch, and were attended by
hard and venturesome labour. Records are not wanting of the severe
hardships endured by families on their way to their wooded lands.
Supplied with limited comforts, perhaps only the actual necessaries of
life, they advanced slowly by day along dangerous rapids, and at night
rested under the blue sky. But our Loyalist forefathers and mothers were
made of stern stuff, and all was borne with noble heroism.
"This toilsome mode of travelling continued for many a year. John
Ferguson, writing in 1788 from Fredericksburg, Bay Quinté, to a friend
in Lachine, Lower Canada, says of his journey: 'After a most tedious
and fatiguing journey I arrived here, nineteen days on the way,
sometimes for whole days up to the waist in water or mire.' But the
average time required to ascend the rapids was from ten to twelve days,
and three or four to descend.
"With the later coming loyal refugees was introduced another kind of
flat bottomed boat. It was generally small, rigged with an ungainly
sail; and usually built in the town of Schenectady; hence its name.
Schenectady is a German word, and means _pine barren_. Families about to
come to Canada would build one or more of these boats to meet their
requirements.
"The Loyalists not only came in summer, by batteaux or the Schenectady
boat, but likewise in winter. They generally followed, as near as
possible, some one of the routes taken in summer. To undertake to
traverse a wilderness with no road, and guided only by rivers and
creeks, or blazed trees, was no common thing. Several families would
sometimes join together to form a train of sleighs. They would carry
with them their bedding, clothes, and the necessary provisions. We have
received interesting accounts of winter journeyings from Albany along
the Hudson, across to the Black River country, and to the St. Lawrence.
Sometimes the train would follow the military road, along by Champlain,
St. George, as far as Plattsburg, and then turn north to the St.
Lawrence, by what was then called the Willsbury wilderness, and
'Chataquee' woods. At the beginning of the present century there was but
one tavern through all that vast forest, and that of the poorest
character. Indeed, it is said that while provision might be procured for
the horses, none could be had for man. Those who thus entered Canada in
winter found it necessary to stay at Cornwall until spring. Two or more
of the men would foot it along the St. Lawrence to the Bay Quinté, and
at the opening of navigation, having borrowed a batteau, descend to
Cornwall for the women, children, and articles brought with them. While
the families and sleighs were transported in the batteaux, the horses
were taken along the shore by the larger boys, if such there were among
them. The French train was occasionally employed in these winter
journeys. It consisted of a long rude sleigh, with several horses
driven tandem style; this allowed the passage among the trees to be made
more easily.
"Travellers from Montreal to the west would come by a batteau, or Durham
boat, to Kingston. Those who had business further west, says Finkle,
'were conveyed to Henry Finkle's, in Ernest Town, where they commonly
stopped a few days. Thence they made their journey on horseback. A white
man conducted them to the River Trent, where resided Colonel Bleecker,
who was at the head and had control of all Mississauga Indians, and
commanded the entire country to Toronto. At this place the traveller was
furnished with a fresh horse, and an Indian guide to conduct him through
an unsettled country, the road being little better than a common Indian
path, with all its windings. The road continued in this state until
about the year 1798. Sometimes the traveller continued his journey
around the head of Lake Ontario, on horseback, to Queenston, where
resided Judge Hamilton."
FOOTNOTES:
[Footnote 138: An interesting incident occurred in the early life of
Mrs. Morris--no other than that Washington desired to become her
suitor--a fact which rests on the highest authority. In Sparks' Life of
Washington there is the following passage: "While in New York, in 1756,
Washington was lodged and kindly entertained at the house of Mr.
Beverley Robinson, between whom and himself an intimacy of friendship
subsisted, which indeed, continued without change till severed by their
opposite fortunes twenty years afterwards in the revolution. It happened
that Miss Mary Phillipse, a sister of Mrs. Robinson, and a young lady of
rare accomplishments, was an inmate of the family. The charms of the
lady made a deep impression upon the heart of the Virginia colonel. He
went to Boston, returned, and was again welcomed to the hospitality of
Mr. Robinson. He lingered there till duty called him away; but he was
careful to entrust his secret to a confidential friend, whose letters
kept him informed of every important event. In a few months intelligence
came that there was a rival in the field, and that consequences could
not be answered for if he delayed to renew his visits to New York.
Whether time, the bustle of the camp, or the scenes of war, had
moderated his admiration, or whether he despaired of success, is not
known. He never saw the lady again, till she was married to that same
rival, Captain Morris, his former associate in arms, and one of
Braddock's aide-de-camps."]
CHAPTER XLI.
FIRST SETTLEMENT OF LOYALISTS IN THE BRITISH PROVINCES, ESPECIALLY UPPER
CANADA--THEIR ADVENTURES AND HARDSHIPS, AS WRITTEN BY THEMSELVES OR
THEIR DESCENDANTS.
In 1861 I addressed a printed circular to the United Empire Loyalists
and their descendants in the British Provinces of North America, stating
the design and scope of the history I proposed to write respecting them,
in compliance with a call which had been made upon me by the press and
members of all parties, and requesting the surviving Loyalists and their
descendants to communicate to me, at my expense, any letters or papers
they might possess which would throw light upon the early history of the
fathers and founders of our country.
This chapter contains the letters and papers which I received in answer
to my circular. These letters and papers, with repetitions of some
incidents, contain, in a variety of style, statements and narratives of
a remarkable character, and of intense interest, and introduce the
reader to the inner life and privations of the bold, self-denying, and
energetic pioneers of Canada and of other British provinces.
_First Settlement of the First Company of Loyalists, after the close of
the Revolutionary War._
Letter from the Rev. Dr. Richardson, late Bishop of the Methodist
Episcopal Church in Canada:
"_To the Rev. Dr. Ryerson._
"DEAR SIR,--
"The following is the narrative of which I spoke to you, relative to the
early settlement of Upper Canada, as related to me by the late Mr. John
Grass, of the Township of Kingston, some years since, and which you
requested might be furnished for insertion in your forthcoming history
of _our_ country. I give it to you as near as may be in Mr. Grass's own
words. The old gentleman, his father, I knew well when I was a boy; his
residence was next to my father's for several years in Kingston. He was
a genuine sample of an honest, plain, loyal German. The narrator was
about eleven years old at the time he migrated with his father and the
company of Loyalists from New York to 'Frontenac,' and therefore had a
distinct recollection of all the incidents he relates. Being seated in
his parlour one evening, while partaking of his hospitality, the
conversation naturally turned on events connected with the first
settlement of the township of Kingston and its early inhabitants, most
of whom had descended to their graves; Mr. Grass was led to state as
follows:
"My father had been a prisoner among the French at Frontenac (now
Kingston), in the old French war, and at the commencement of the
American revolution he resided in a farm on the borders of the North
River, about thirty miles above New York. Being solicited by General
Herkimer to take a captain's commission in the American service, he
replied, sternly and promptly, that he had sworn allegiance to one King,
meaning George the Third, and could not violate his oath, or serve
against him.
"For this he was obliged to fly from his home and take refuge within New
York, under British protection. His family had soon to follow him, being
driven from their home, which by the enemy was dilapidated and broken
up. They continued in that city till the close of the war, living on
their own resources as best they could. On the return of peace, the
Americans having gained their independence, there was no longer any home
there for the fugitive Loyalists, of which the city was full; and the
British Governor was much at a loss for a place to settle them. Many had
retreated to Nova Scotia or New Brunswick; but this was a desperate
resort, and their immense numbers made it difficult to find a home for
them all, even there. In the meantime, the Governor, in his perplexity,
having heard that my father had been a prisoner among the French at
Frontenac, sent for him and said: 'Mr. Grass, I understand you have
been at Frontenac, in Canada. Pray tell me what sort of a country is it?
Can people live there? What think you?' My father replied: 'Yes, your
Excellency, I was there a prisoner of war, and from what I saw I think
it a fine country, and that people might live there very well.' 'Oh! Mr.
Grass,' exclaims the Governor, 'how glad I am to hear that, for the sake
of these poor Loyalists. As they cannot all go to Nova Scotia, and I am
at a loss how to provide for them, will you, Mr. Grass, undertake to
lead thither as many as may choose to accompany you? If so, I will
furnish a conveyance by Quebec, and rations for you all till such time
as you may be able to provide for yourselves.' My father requested his
Excellency to allow him three days to make up his mind. This was
granted, and accordingly, at the expiration of the three days, my father
went to the Governor and said he would undertake it. Notices were then
posted up through the city, calling for all that would go to Frontenac
to enrol their names with Mr. Grass; so in a short time the company of
men, women, and children was completed, a ship provided and furnished,
and off they started for the unknown and far distant region, leaving the
homes and friends of their youth, with all their endearing
recollections, behind them--the fruits of all their former toil and
suffering--a sacrifice to their loyalty. The first season they got no
further than Sorel, in Lower Canada, where they were obliged to erect
log huts for the winter. Next spring they took boats, and proceeding up
the St. Lawrence, at length reached _Frontenac_, and pitched their tents
on _Indian Point_, where the marine docks of Kingston now stand. Here
they awaited the surveying of the lands, which was not accomplished so
as to be ready for location before July. In the meantime several other
companies had arrived by different routes under their respective
leaders, who were all awaiting the completing of the surveys. The
Governor, also, who by this time had himself come to Quebec, paid them a
visit, and riding a few miles along the lake shore on a fine day,
exclaimed to my father: 'Why, Mr. Grass, you have indeed got a fine
country! I am really glad to find it so.' While the several companies
were together waiting for the survey, some would say to my father: 'The
Governor will not give you the first choice of the townships, but will
prefer Sir John Johnson and his company, because he is a great man.'
But my father replied that he did not believe that, for if the Governor
should do so he should feel himself injured and would leave the country,
as he was the first man to mention it to the Governor in New York, and
to proceed hither with his company for settlement.
"At length the time came, in July, for the townships to be given out.
The Governor came, and having assembled the companies before him, called
for Mr. Grass, and said: 'Now, you were the first person to mention this
fine country, and have been here formerly as a prisoner of war. You must
have the first choice. The townships are numbered first, second, third,
fourth, and fifth. Which do you choose?' My father says: 'The _first_
township (Kingston).' Then the Governor says to Sir John Johnson, 'Which
do you choose for your company?' He replies, 'The _second_ township
(Ernest Town).' To Colonel Rogers, 'Which do you choose?' He says, 'The
_third_ township (Fredericksburg).' To Major Vanalstine, 'Which do you
choose?' He replies, 'The _fourth_ township (Adolphustown).' Then
Colonel M'Donnell, with his company, got the fifth township
(Marysburgh). So after this manner the first settlement of Loyalists in
Canada was made.
"But before leaving, the Governor very considerately remarked to my
father, 'Now, Mr. Grass, it is too late in the season to put in any
crops.' What can you do for food? My father replied, 'If they were
furnished with turnip seed, they might raise some turnips.' 'Very well,'
said the Governor, 'that you shall have.' Accordingly from Montreal he
sent some seed, and each man taking a handful thereof, they cleared a
spot of ground in the centre of where the town of Kingston now stands,
and raised a fine crop of turnips, which served for food the ensuing
winter, with the Government rations.
"The above is at your service.
"With much respect,
"JAS. RICHARDSON.
"Clover Hill, Toronto, 1st December, 1859."
Transmitted to the Author by a gentleman in Nova Scotia, taken from the
"Political Magazine," published in London 1783:
"When the loyal refugees from the Northern provinces were informed of
the resolution of the House of Commons against offensive war with the
rebels, they instantly saw there were no hopes left them of regaining
their ancient settlements, or of settling down again in their native
country.
"Those of them, therefore, who had been forward in taking up arms, and
in fighting the battles of the mother country, finding themselves
deserted, began to look out for a place of refuge, and Nova Scotia being
the nearest place to their old plantations, they determined on settling
in that province. Accordingly, to the number of 500 embarked for
Annapolis Royal; they had arms and ammunition, and one year's
provisions, and were put under the care and convoy of his Majesty's ship
the _Amphitrite_, of 24 guns, Captain Robert Briggs. This officer
behaved to them with great attention, humanity, and generosity, and saw
them safely landed and settled in the barracks at Annapolis, which the
Loyalists soon repaired. There was plenty of wild fowl in the country,
and at that time, which was last fall, a goose sold for two shillings,
and a turkey for two shillings and sixpence. The captain was at £200
expense out of his own pocket in order to render the passage and arrival
of the unfortunate Loyalists in some degree comfortable to them. Before
Captain Briggs sailed from Annapolis, the grateful Loyalists waited on
him with the following address:
"_To Robert Briggs, Esquire, Commander of His Majesty's Ship
'Amphitrite.'_
"The loyal refugees who have emigrated from New York, to settle in Nova
Scotia, beg your acceptance of their warmest thanks for the kind and
unremitted attention you have paid to their preservation and safe
conduct at all times during their passage.
"Driven from their respective dwellings for their loyalty to our King,
after enduring innumerable hardships, and seeking a settlement in a land
unknown to us, our distresses were sensibly relieved during an
uncomfortable passage by your humanity, ever attentive to our
preservation.
"Be pleased to accept of our most grateful acknowledgments, so justly
due to you and the officers under your command, and be assured we shall
remember your kindness with the most grateful sensibility.
"We are, with the warmest wishes for your health, happiness,
and a prosperous voyage,
"With the greatest respect,
"Your most obedient humble servants,
"In behalf of the refugees,
"AMOS BOTSFORD,
"TH. WARD,
"FRED. HANSIR,
"SAM. CUMMINS,
"ELIJAH WILLIAMS.[139]
"Annapolis Royal, the 20th of October, 1782."
_Letter with Enclosure from the Hon. R. Hodgson, Chief Justice of Prince
Edward Island._
"CHARLOTTETOWN, Prince Edward Island, 12th June, 1861.
"SIR,--
"I recently perused, in a newspaper published in Halifax, Nova Scotia,
called the 'British Colonist,' a statement to the purport that you
contemplate publishing a history of 'The British United Empire Loyalists
of America,' and have issued a circular to the descendants of the
Loyalists, asking for information relating to the lives and adventures
of their forefathers.
"I have not seen your circular, and possibly the whole thing may be a
mere newspaper fabrication; but it is stated so circumstantially as to
carry with it an air of truth, and I have been induced to copy a brief
memoir of my maternal grandfather, Lieut.-Colonel Joseph Robinson, in
his own handwriting, now in my possession, and to enclose it to you
herewith, to be made use of as you think fit in your intended
publication. The memoir would appear, from a statement contained in it,
to be written in obedience to some order from the then Secretary at War,
possibly calling upon the Loyalists in receipt of half-pay from the
British Government for a record of their services, to meet parliamentary
enquiry; it is marked on the back of the draft, in Colonel Robinson's
handwriting, as 'transmitted.' He died in this Island (formerly St.
John's Island, now Prince Edward Island) in 1808 or 1809. Colonel
Robinson was a native of Virginia, and emigrated from somewhere about
James River, in that province, to South Carolina, where he resided at
the commencement of the revolution. After a reward had been offered for
his life, as stated in his memorial, and he had been compelled to
abscond, a party of rebels visited his plantation and burned to the
ground his dwelling-house and every building upon it, scarcely giving
time to my grandmother (as she has often told me) to drag out of the
house her two female children in time to save their lives. My
grandmother was a woman of heroic spirit, and she, accompanied by a
single faithful negro slave, made her way on horseback, in an overland
journey of several hundred miles, to East Florida, where she joined her
husband. In this journey she carried one of her children before her on
the same horse, and the negro man carried the other in the same way on
the horse he rode.
"At the termination of the contest, my grandfather's property, a large
and valuable one, was confiscated by the victors, and he embarked with
his family for the island of Jamaica, was unfortunately shipwrecked by
the way, and lost every particle of property he had left, he, his wife
and children, with difficulty escaping drowning. After a short residence
in that island he emigrated to St. John's, in the Province of New
Brunswick, and ultimately came to this island.
"He was a member of the House of Assembly of this colony, and its
Speaker afterward; an Assistant-Justice of the Supreme Court, and member
of the Executive Council, such Council at that time also exercising
legislative functions. These last-named offices of Judge and member of
Council he held up to his decease.
"I was much too young at his death to be enabled to say anything of my
personal knowledge of him; but from his papers which I have perused, I
am warranted in saying that he was a man of a refined mind, an excellent
classical scholar, with a great taste for astronomy, and possessing no
ordinary talent in that science, which seems to have amused and occupied
his mind in his latter years. The only reward he received was the
half-pay of a lieutenant-colonel (his Judgeship was an honorary one,
having no salary or emolument); this he enjoyed up to the period of his
decease.
"I have somewhat hurriedly put together these observations. You may rely
upon the truth of the facts stated, and they are at your service if
coming within the scope and meaning of your intended history. At the
same time, if the thing be a newspaper hoax, I must beg you to excuse
the liberty I have taken in addressing you, and please burn this and the
copy of the memoir.
"I have the honour to be, Sir,
"Your obedient servant,
"R. HODGSON,
"_Chief Justice of Prince Edward Island._"
_Report of Joseph Robinson, Lieutenant-Colonel of the late Regiment of
South Carolina Royalists, now residing in the Island of St. John, in the
Gulf of St. Lawrence._
"To the Right Honourable William Wyndham, Secretary at War.
"At the commencement of the American rebellion, I was an inhabitant of
the Province of South Carolina, and major of a regiment of the King's
Militia in Cambden District.
"The insurgents formed a camp in Ninety-six district, and were
recruiting men, declaring that as soon as they had forces sufficient for
their purpose they would burn and destroy the houses and property of all
persons who refused to join them in opposing the King and the authority
of Great Britain.
"I then waited upon Lord William Campbell, the Governor of the Province,
and received written orders from his lordship to levy forces and march
against the rebels, in consequence of which I advanced with about 2,000
men, and found them fortified at Ninety-six Court-house. We defeated
them and destroyed their fortifications.
"But in the meantime the violence of the insurgents obliged Lord William
Campbell to depart from his Province, and our small army of Royal
Volunteers was left without further orders, money, or military stores;
wherefore, with much reluctance, I was under the necessity of desiring
the men to return to their respective habitations, and by all means not
to suffer any false pretences of the rebel party to deceive them, or to
efface their principles of loyalty, until we should enjoy a more
favourable opportunity.
"A reward being then offered for my life, personal safety induced me to
retire to the Cherokee Indian nation, afterwards to the Creek Indians,
and, passing through many dangers and suffering various hardships, at
length arrived at Saint Augustine, in the Province of East Florida, in
the year 1777. Soon afterwards, a party of about 300 men, being some of
those I formerly commanded in South Carolina, joined me there.
"I formed the regiment, which was styled the South Carolina Royalists,
of which General Prevost appointed me lieutenant-colonel, and soon after
I received my commission from Sir Henry Clinton, the Commander-in-Chief.
"The said regiment acted in East Florida, Georgia, and South Carolina,
in the course of which service I was in several engagements against the
enemy--viz., at the Alligator Bridge, in East Florida; at Doctor
Brimstone's Plantation, in Georgia; at New Port Meeting-house, in
Georgia; at New Port Bridge, in Georgia; at Stone Ferry, in South
Carolina; and afterwards at the reduction of Sunbury Fort, in the
Province of Georgia, and the fortifications of Charlestown, in South
Carolina. The order from the office of the Secretary at War was not seen
or known by me until the 24th of April, 1797; and that I am now
fifty-five years of age.
(Signed) "JOSEPH ROBINSON,
"_Lieut.-Colonel of the late South Carolina Royalist Regiment._
"Charlottetown, Island of St. John,
"April 26th, 1797.
"Half-pay commenced 7th November, 1783."
_Letter from Colonel John C. Clark, respecting his Father's Sufferings
in the Revolutionary War, and Settlement in the Midland District._
"ERNEST TOWN, July 9th, 1861.
"Rev. Egerton Ryerson, D.D.
"REVEREND SIR,--
"Having seen your circular, I write to inform you of my late father's
connection with the war of the revolution in the then British colonies.
My father, Robert Clark, Esq., late of the township of Ernest Town, in
the county of Addington, deceased, was born March 16th, 1744, on Quaker
Hill, in Dutchess county, and Province of New York. He learned the trade
of carpenter and millwright, and was the owner of two farms. When the
war commenced, his loyal proclivities made it dangerous for him to
remain at home, and he joined the British standard as a volunteer in
1776. He had a few opportunities of visiting his family privately, who
consisted then of a wife and two children (boys); another son was born
during his absence, who was called Robert (after his father), on which
occasion the nurse--being a violent _Tory_--whispered the secret to some
of the rebels' wives in the vicinity, that Robert Clark was at home,
well knowing the secret would be divulged; and for several days and
nights after 'there were liers-in-wait' about the house to capture the
Tory when he made his exit. At length the said nurse told them they had
been hoaxed.
"I have a powder-horn now in my possession, which my father owned in the
time of the war, with his name cut on it, with the date 'Fort Edward,
November 4th, 1776.' His family were driven from their home and his
lands confiscated. Being with General Burgoyne's army on the 16th of
October, 1777, the day previous to the general's surrender of his army
to Generals Gates and Arnold, Burgoyne mustered the provincial
volunteers, and told them that he was obliged to surrender his army;
that they must leave the camp that night, and, if possible, avoid the
army, and try to find their way to Canada.
"They left accordingly, and after some weeks of great suffering and
privation, my father reached Canada. He subsequently served two years in
his Majesty's provincial regiment called 'Loyal Rangers,' commanded by
Major Edward Jessup, and was in Captain Jonathan Jones' company, and was
discharged the 24th of December, 1783.
"In 1782-83 he was employed by Government to erect the Kingston Mills
(then Cataraqui), preparatory to the settlement of the Loyalists in this
section of the Province of Quebec. While there employed, his wife and
three children arrived in Canada, in the autumn of 1783; they wintered
at Sorel, where they all were afflicted with the small-pox, and being
entirely among strangers, most of whom spoke a language not understood
by them, they were compelled to endure more than the usual amount of
suffering incident to that disease; the husband being at a distance, and
in the employ of Government, could not leave to administer to their
necessity.
"In 1784 his family joined him at the Mills, after immense suffering,
having been separated by the vicissitudes of war for the term of _seven
years_.
"In 1785 he removed with his family to lot No. 34, in the 1st concession
of Ernest Town (where he had three children born, and of the six I am
the only survivor), in which year he was again employed by Government to
build the Napanee Mills.
"He was appointed a Justice of the Peace for the (then) district of
Mecklenburg in July, 1788, and subsequently an officer in the militia;
he joined the first Methodist class formed in Ernest Town by the Rev.
William Losee, in 1791, and remained a consistent member during his
life. He died the 17th December, 1823.
"If you can glean anything from the above sketch to assist you in your
new work, I shall be much gratified.
"I have the honour to be, Rev. Sir,
"Your obedient servant,
"JOHN C. CLARK."
_Adventures and Sufferings of Captain William Hutchison, and his
Settlement in Walsingham, County of Norfolk; communicated by his
grandson, J.B. Hutchison, Esquire._
"In the beginning of the wars of 1776, William Hutchison (my
grandfather) was urged to join the rebel army (he living at that time in
New Jersey); but he boldly declared, _death_ before _dishonour_. After
being harassed about for some time, and leaving a wife and eight
children to the mercy of their enemies, he with a number of others tried
to make their way to the British army, and were followed by a large
force of the enemy; but when they found themselves so greatly
outnumbered (being about ten to one), they tried to make their escape to
an old barn; but every one of the unfortunate men was caught and hanged
but himself. They did not succeed in finding him, he hiding among the
bushes. While he lay hidden among some elder bushes, one of the enemy
pulled up the bush where he lay, saying 'this would be a d----d good
place for a----to hide,' but the shadow falling on him completely hid
him from sight. His captain, James J. Lett, was among the unhappy
victims, grandfather being lieutenant under him at the time. His
comrades being all killed, he tried to escape from his covert, but they
had stationed sentries all around; he could hear them swearing vengeance
on him if they could find him. It being bright moonlight, he could see
quite a long distance. He crawled along on his hands and knees across a
field, and got into the middle of the road; when the sentries, one on
either side of him, got into a quarrel and came close to him before they
settled their dispute; having done so, they turned to go away; he then
made his escape and got to the British army. After suffering all the
horrors of a war lasting seven years, losing his property--everything
but his loyalty--and that, having extended faithfully through the _whole
family_, is not likely to be lost. His wife and six of his children died
from the sufferings consequent upon such a war. Previous to this he had
received a captain's commission. After the war closed, he went to New
Brunswick, and remained there fourteen years, coming to Canada in 1801,
and settled in the township of Walsingham. My father, Alexander
Hutchison, was the only surviving son by his first wife. In the war of
1812, my grandfather went out against the enemy with his sons,
Alexander, David, and James, in which war my father lost his life.
"Hoping you may be able to find something in these fragments which will
be interesting to you,
"I remain, with the greatest respect,
"Yours most faithfully,
"J.B. HUTCHISON."
_Patriotic feelings--Early Settlement of Prince Edward County and
Neighbouring Townships._
Extracts of an address entitled "Scraps of Local History," delivered by
Canniff Haight, Esq., before the Mechanics' Institute of Picton, March
16th, 1859:
"If I feel a pride in one thing more than another, it is that I am a
Canadian. I rejoice more in being the descendant of these early pioneers
of Canada, than if noble blood coursed my veins. I point you back with
more unmitigated pleasure to that solitary log cabin in the wilderness
which once bordered your fine bay, as the home of my fathers, than I
would to some baronial castle in other lands.
"Is there for honest poverty,
That hangs his head, and a' that?
"The coward slave we pass him by--
We dare be poor for a' that.
For a' that, and a' that,
Our toils obscure and a' that;
The rank is but the guinea's stamp,
The man's the gowd for a' that!'
"We love our country. Thousands of sweet recollections cluster round our
childhood's homes, and as we think of them the words of Scott occur to
us:
"'Breathes there a man with soul so dead,
Who never to himself hath said,
This is my own, my native land;
Whose heart hath ne'er within him burned.
As home his footsteps he hath turned'----
"What part of the world can you point me to to show such rapid changes
as have occurred here? Where among the countries of the earth shall we
find a quicker and more vigorous growth? Seventy years ago this
beautiful and wealthy county of Prince Edward was one dense and untrod
forest. We can hardly realize the fact, that even one century has not
passed away since those strong-hearted men pushed their way into the
wilderness of Upper Canada. Were they not heroes?
"In the summer of the year 1795, or thereabouts, a company of six
persons, composed of two married men and their wives, with two small
children, pushed a rough-looking and somewhat unwieldy little boat away
from the shore in the neighbourhood of Poughkeepsie, and turned its prow
up the Hudson. A rude sail was hoisted, but it flapped lazily against
the slender mast. The two men betake themselves to the oars. The sun was
just showing his face above the eastern woods as they pulled out into
the river. The boat was crowded with sundry household matters--all
carefully packed up and stowed away; a very small place was left at the
stern, and was occupied by the two women and the children. The mother
was a small and delicate-looking creature, well and neatly dressed. Had
you been there, you would have observed tear after tear dropping from
the pale cheek, as she bent in silence over her youngest babe; and see,
the eyes of that young father, too, are suffused with tears. Why do they
weep? Whither are they bound? Not a word is spoken. They are too sad to
talk. Still the oar keeps its measured stroke, and they glide slowly
on, and thus may we follow them day after day. Now and then a gentle
breeze fills the sail, and wafts the small boat on. When the shades of
evening begin to fall around them, they push to shore, and rear a
temporary tent. Then the frugal supper is spread upon the green grass,
and they gather round it, and forget their toils in speculations upon
the future. But the morrow draws on, with its demands upon their
strength; so they lay them down to rest. In due course they reach
Albany, then a small Dutch town filled with Dutch people, Dutch comforts
and frugality, and Dutch cabbage. This in those days was one of the
outposts of civilization. Beyond was a wilderness-land but little known.
Some necessaries are purchased, and again our little company launch
away. They reach the place where the city of Troy now stands, and turn
away to the left into the Mohawk river, and proceed slowly, and often
with great difficulty, up the rapids and windings of the stream. The
rich and fertile valley of the Mohawk of to-day was then the home of the
Indian. There the celebrated Chief Brant had lived but a short time
before, but had now withdrawn into the wilds of Western Canada. The
voyagers, after several days of hard labour and difficulty, emerge into
the little lake Oneida, lying in the north-western part of the State of
New York, through which they pass with ease and pleasure. The most
difficult part of their journey had been passed. They reach the Onondago
river, and soon pass down it to Oswego, then an old fort which the
French had reared when they possessed the country as a barrier against
the encroachments of the wily Indian. Several bloody frays have occurred
here, but our friends did not pause to learn their history. Their small
craft now danced upon the wide bosom of Ontario, but they did not push
out into the lake, and away across it. No; they are careful sailors, and
they believed no doubt 'that small boats should not venture far from
shore,' and so they wind along it until they reach Gravely Point, now
known by the more dignified name of Cape Vincent. Here they strike
across the channel, and thence around the lower end of Wolf Island, and
into Kingston Bay, when they come to shore and transact some business.
There were not many streets or fine store-houses in Kingston at this
time. A few log-houses composed the town. An addition was made to their
diminished stock of eatables, and away they push again. They steer now
up the Bay of Quinté; and what a wild and beautiful scene that must have
been! Could those toil-worn voyagers have failed to mark it? Why do they
slacken their pace? Why do they so often rest upon their oars and look
around? Why do they push into this little cove and that? Why do they
laugh and talk more than usual? Perhaps their journey is drawing to an
end! We shall see. They go up the bay until they reach township number
five. This township, now known as Adolphustown, is composed of five
points or arms of land, which run out into the bay. They run round three
of these points, and turn down an arm of the bay called Hay-bay, and
after proceeding some two miles pull to shore. Their journey it would
seem had come to an end, for they begin at once to unload their boat and
build a tent. The sun sinks down behind the western woods, and they,
weary and worn, lay down to rest. Six weeks had passed since we saw them
launch away in quest of this wilderness home. Look at them, and tell me
what you think of the prospect. Is it far enough away from the busy
haunts of men to suit you? or would you not rather sing,
"'Oh, Solitude, where are the charms
Which sages have seen in thy face?
Better dwell in the midst of alarms,
Than reign in this horrible place.'
"With the first glimmer of the morning's light, all hands are up and at
work. A small spot is cleared away; trees are felled and a house is
built. I fancy that it was not large nor commodious; that the rooms were
not numerous nor spacious. The furniture, I suppose, did not amount to
much either in quality or quantity; an inventory thereof would probably
run somewhat after this fashion--a pot or two, perhaps a few quite
common plates, cups and saucers, knives and forks, a box or two of
linen, a small lot of bed-clothes, etc., with a
"'Chest contriv'd a double debt to pay--
A bed by night, a chest of drawers by day.'
"This, ladies and gentlemen, is no fancy sketch, but one drawn from the
shadows of the past. You may find hundreds of similar adventures in the
past history of our country. Such was the first home of the young wife
whom I have mentioned. She had once lived in comfort, but by the fate
of war the home of a father and husband had been confiscated, and hence
they had sought for a dwelling-place in Canada, when England offered
other homes to those who had fought her battles. A grandchild of that
couple now stands before you.
"We can form no correct idea of the difficulties which beset these early
inhabitants, nor of the hardships and privations they endured. They were
not unfrequently reduced to the very verge of starvation, yet they
struggled on. Tree after tree fell before the axe, and the small
clearing was turned to immediate account. A few necessaries of life were
produced, and even these, such as they were, were the beginnings of
comfort--comfort indeed, but far removed from the idea we associate with
the term.
"But time rolled on. The openings in the forest grew larger and wider.
The log cabins began to multiply, and the curling smoke told a silent
but cheerful tale. There dwelt a neighbour, miles perhaps away, but a
neighbour nevertheless. The term bears a wide difference now-a-days. If
you would like an idea of the proximity of humanity and the luxury of
society in those days, just place a few miles, say six or eight, of
dense woods between you and your neighbour, and you may get a faint
conception of the delights of a home in the woods.
"There are some here, I presume, who have heard their parents or their
grandparents tell of the dreadful sufferings they endured the second
year after the settlement of the Bay of Quinté country. The Government
was to provide food, etc., for two years. It could hardly be expected
that men could go into the woods with their families, and clear up and
raise enough for their support, the first or even the second year. The
second year's Government supply, through some bad management, was frozen
up in the lower part of the St. Lawrence, and in consequence the people
were reduced to a state of famine. Men willingly offered pretty much all
they possessed for food. I could show you one of the finest farms in
Hay-bay that was offered to my grandfather for a half hundred of flour,
and refused. A very respectable old lady, whom numbers of you knew, but
who some time since went away to her rest--whose offspring, some at
least, are luxuriating in comfort above the middle walks of life--was
wont in those days to wander away early in the spring to the woods and
gather and eat the buds of the basswood, and then bring an apron or
basketfull home to the children. Glad were they to pluck the rye and
barley heads, as soon as the kernel had formed, for food; and not many
miles from Picton a beef's bone passed from house to house, and was
boiled again and again in order to extract some nutriment. It seems
incredulous, but it is no fiction, and surely no homoeopathist would
desire to be placed on a lower regimen.
"I feel it unnecessary almost for me to tell you that the largest
proportion of the first settlers of this province were Americans who had
adhered to the cause of England. After the capture of General Burgoyne,
many of the Royalists with their families moved into Canada; and upon
the evacuation of New York, at the close of the war, a still greater
number followed. A large proportion of these were soldiers, disbanded
and left without employ. Some there were who had lost their estates by
confiscation; so that nearly all were destitute and dependent upon the
liberality of the country whose battles they had fought, and for whose
cause they had suffered. In order, therefore, to reward their loyalty
and relieve their present necessities, as well as to supply some means
of future subsistence, the British Government determined upon making
liberal grants of the land in Upper Canada and other provinces to the
American Loyalists. The measure was not only an act of justice and
humanity, but it was sound in policy and has been crowned with universal
success.
"The grants were made free of expense and upon the following scale: A
field-officer received 5,000 acres; a captain, 3,000; a subaltern,
2,000; and a private soldier, 200 acres. A survey was accordingly made,
commencing near Lake St. Francis, then the highest French settlement,
and extended along the shores of the St. Lawrence up to Lake Ontario,
and thence along the lake, and round the Bay of Quinté. Townships were
laid out, and then subdivided into concessions and lots of 200 acres.
These townships were numbered, but remained without names for many years
afterwards. Of these numbers there were two divisions--one including the
townships below Kingston on the river, east to the St. Francis
settlement; the others from Kingston, west to the head of the Bay of
Quinté. This will at once explain to you the reason why the old people
used to talk of first, second, third, fourth town, etc., as far back as
we can remember and up to the present. No names were given to the
townships by legal proclamation, as we said before, until long after
they were settled, and hence the habit was formed of designating them by
numbers.
"The settlement of the surveyed portion of the Midland district, so
named because of its then central position, commenced in the summer of
1784. The new settlers were supplied with farming utensils, building
materials, provisions, and some clothing, for the two first years, at
the expense of the nation; and in order that the love of country may
take deeper root in the hearts of these true men, the Government
determined to put a mark of honour, as the Orders of Council expressed
it, upon the families who had adhered to the unity of the empire, and
joined the Royal standard in America before the treaty of separation in
the year 1783. A list of such persons was directed in 1789 to be made
out and returned, to the end that their posterity might be discriminated
from the future settlers. From these two emphatic words, the Unity of
the Empire, it was styled the U.E. List, and they whose names were
entered upon it were distinguished as U.E. Loyalists. You are aware of
the fact that this was not a mere empty distinction, but was, in
reality, a title of some consequence; for it not only provided for the
U.E.'s themselves, but guaranteed unto all their children, upon arriving
at the age of twenty-one years, 200 acres of land free from all expense.
I always look back on these early acts of the English nation with the
fathers of this growing Canada with pleasure, and I venerate the memory
of those true and noble-hearted men, who loved their fatherland so well
that they even preferred to live under the protection of her flag in the
wild woods of Canada, and endure hunger and want, than enjoy the
comforts of home under the banner of a rebellious but now independent
people. And I hope, ladies and gentlemen, that we, the sons and
daughters of those whom our mother country was wont to honour, may never
love our country and its institutions less than they.
"Kingston is the oldest Upper Canadian town by many years. Here the
white man found his way over a century before any settlement was made or
thought of. The crafty and industrious French Governor, De Courcelles,
in order to check the encroachments of the Five Nations, despatched a
messenger from Quebec to their chiefs, stating that he had some business
of great importance to communicate, and desired them to proceed to
Cataraqui, where he would meet them. (I observe here that Cataraqui is
an Indian name, and means 'Rocks above water.') As soon as the deputies
of the Indians arrived, a Council was held. The Governor informed them
that he was going to build a fort there, simply to facilitate the trade
between them and to serve as a depot for merchandise. The chiefs,
ignorant of the real intent of the design, readily agreed to a
proposition which seemed to be intended for their advantage; but this,
so far from being the case, or what the Indians expected, was really to
be a barrier against them in future wars. While measures were being
completed to build the fort, Courcelles was recalled and Count de
Frontenac sent out in his place. Frontenac carried out the designs of
his predecessor and completed the fort in 1672, which received and
retained his name for many years. Kingston was subsequently substituted,
and the county received the name of Frontenac."
_Letters from the late Rev. George J. Ryerse, dated June 12th and June
23rd, 1861, give some particulars of his father's coming to Canada, and
of the earliest settlement of the London District._
His father, Colonel Samuel Ryerse, was appointed Lieutenant of the
county, and authorized to organize the militia and appoint the officers,
as also the local civil court, of which he was the first Judge. The
following letters indicate what he sacrificed and endured for his
allegiance to the unity of the empire, and for which allegiance he and
thousands of others were banished from the United States and their
property confiscated; but the writer has never heard a word from any one
of these veteran Loyalists regretting the part he had taken:
"PORT RYERSE, 12th June, 1861.
"MY DEAR COUSIN,--
"I received your circular some time since, but, through forgetfulness, I
did not at once give an answer. I am highly gratified with your noble
undertaking, and humbly trust that you may live to succeed and be amply
rewarded. I am sorry that I have no documents that would be of use to
you. You are aware of the staunch loyalty that was inherent in our
parents, that made them sacrifice everything out of regard for the
British Throne, and endure every privation in their early settlement in
this country. It was in 1794 my father came here, and gave orders to his
family that if he should decease while on his way through the United
States, to take his body to British soil for burying. At that time there
were but eight families residing within thirty miles of this place,
except Indians; no roads; the nearest mill 100 miles distant by water
(at Niagara Falls). My father purchased corn of the Indians at the Grand
River, thirty miles from home, and carried it home on his shoulders.
Afterwards he bought a yoke of oxen of the Indians, and on a toboggin
sled put his son, and with his axe and compass made his way through the
woods and streams to his beloved home. Two years afterwards he built a
saw mill, and afterwards a grist mill. These nearly proved his ruin, not
understanding the business, and very little to sustain them; they were
badly built, and proved a bother to him, but still a great help to the
settlement for a long time. Merchandise was so very expensive and
produce so very cheap that the early settlers could barely exist; but
they loved their country, and they have gone to their rest, and I feel
proud that so many of their children inherit their spirit.
"I am, yours truly,
"GEORGE J. RYERSE.
"Rev. E. Ryerson."
"PORT RYERSE, 23rd June, 1861.
"DEAR COUSIN,--
"Your kind letter I received, and in answer to your suggestions I have
to state that my father was a captain in the New Jersey Volunteers
during the American Revolution; and at its close in 1783, having his
property confiscated in the United States, he went to New Brunswick and
drew lands according to his rank as captain; but being disappointed both
in soil and climate, finding it to be sterile and uncongenial, he
determined to remove to Canada. In the spring of 1794 he started and
went to Long Island, the place where the city of Brooklyn now stands,
and there left his family. While on foot, he went to Canada (U.C.) to
better his condition by looking out a more congenial place. Having
accomplished his purpose, he started, at the opening of navigation, with
his family, in company with Captain Bonta's family, first on board a
sloop (as all was then done by sloops) to Albany, thence by land to
Schenectady, where they procured a flat-bottomed boat, in which families
and baggage were put; thence, with poles and oars, against a strong
current, they made their way up the Mohawk river a long distance, until
they came to a place called Wood Creek, which they again navigated for a
long-distance toward Lake Ontario, until they approached a stream called
the Oswego, which to enter they had to draw their boat by hand across a
portage (I think some two miles); thence down this stream to the lake to
Oswego; thence up the lake in this boat westward to the Niagara river;
thence up the Niagara as far as Queenston, where again they had to pass
over a portage of nine miles around the Falls to Chipawa; thence up the
river eighteen miles to Lake Erie; thence up the lake westward eighty
miles to the place my father had selected (and which is now my home),
arriving here 1st July, 1795. It was in this boat that they went to
mill, as before stated to you. A kind Providence furnished plenty of
fish and game at this early day, or the people could not have survived.
The total absence of roads, schools, and religious teachers for many
years were among the heavy privations that the early settlers had to
endure.
"I remain, yours truly,
"GEORGE J. RYERSE.
"Rev. E. Ryerson."
_Historical Memoranda by Mrs. Amelia Harris, of Eldon House, London,
Ontario, only daughter of the late Colonel Samuel Ryerse, and sister of
the late Rev. Geo. J. Ryerse, writer of the foregoing short letters._
The husband of Mrs. Harris was an active and scientific officer in the
Royal Navy, having been employed with the late Admirals Bayfield and
Owen in the survey of the Canadian lakes and rivers, by the Admiralty,
during the years 1815 to 1817. It was during the progress of this survey
that Miss Ryerse married. After a few years' residence at Kingston, Mr.
and Mrs. Harris returned to a beautiful homestead on Long Point Bay,
intending to reside there permanently. In the days of the early
settlement, a more refined and cultivated society was to be found in the
country than usually in the towns and villages. Mr. Harris was at once
selected by the various Governments of the day to be the recipient of
various Government offices. During the years 1837-38 he took an active
part in quelling the rebellion, and is believed by many to have been the
head and front and organizer of the expedition which sent the steamer
_Caroline_ over the Falls. He was the first man on her deck, and the
last to leave, having set her on fire.
The late Edward Ermatinger, in his Life of Colonel Talbot, refers to the
Harris family as follows:
A.D. 1834. "By degrees the officers of the Court removed to London, and
Mr. Harris was the first to build a house of considerable dimensions on
a handsome piece of ground highly elevated above the banks of the River
Thames. This house was long the resort of the first men in Canada, and
in this house the venerable founder of the Talbot settlement lay during
his first serious illness, while on his way to England. Every man of
rank or distinction who visited this part of Canada became the guest of
Mr. Harris--the late Lord Sydenham, the various lieutenant-governors and
governor-generals, and the present Lord Derby, were among the number."
In the following memoranda, which Mrs. Harris wrote more than twenty
years since, at the wish of her children, but not for publication, she
gives a graphic and highly interesting account of her father's early
settlement in Canada, and the circumstances of the first settlers, and
the state of society of that time:
"Captain Samuel Ryerse, one of the early settlers in Canada, was the
descendant of an old Dutch family in New Jersey, and both his father and
grandfather held judicial appointments under Kings George II. and III.
When the rebellion commenced in 1776, and the British Government was
anxious to raise provincial troops, they offered commissions to any
young gentlemen who could enlist a certain number of young men; sixty, I
think, entitled them to a captaincy. My father, Captain Ryerse, being
popular in his neighbourhood, found no difficulty in enlisting double
the number required, and on presenting himself and men at headquarters,
New York, was gazetted captain in the 4th Battalion New Jersey
Volunteers, in which regiment he served with distinction during the
seven years' war.
"After the acknowledgment of American Independence by England, and the
British troops were about to be disbanded, the British Government
offered them a free transport to New Brunswick, and a grant of land.
When there, little choice was left to those who had sacrificed all for
connection with the mother country. On my father's arrival in New
Brunswick he obtained a lot of land in or near Fredericton, the present
seat of government; and there he met my mother, who was a refugee also,
and they were married.
"After remaining there several years, his friends entreated him to
return to New York, holding out great inducements if he would consent to
do so. He accepted the offer of his friends and returned, but he soon
discovered that the rancorous, bitter feelings which had arisen during
the war were not extinct, and that it was too soon for a British subject
to seek a home in the United States. My mother loved her native city,
and might not have been induced again to leave it had it not been for
domestic affliction. She brought from the healthy climate of New
Brunswick four fine children, all of whom she buried in New York in
eight weeks. She gave birth to four more; three of those had died also,
and she felt sure if she stayed there she would lose the only remaining
one. Therefore she readily consented to my father's proposal to come to
Canada, where his old friend, General Simcoe, was at that time governor.
In the summer of 1794 my father and a friend started for Canada. The
journey was then a most formidable one, and before commencing it wills
were made and farewells given, as if a return was more than doubtful.
"On his arrival at Niagara he was warmly greeted by his old friend,
General Simcoe, who advised him by all means to settle in Canada,
holding out many inducements for him to do so. He promised my father a
grant of 3,000 acres of land as a captain in the army, 1,200 as a
settler, and that my mother and each of her sons should have a grant of
1,200, and each of her daughters a grant of 600 acres.
"My father was pleased with what he saw of the country, and heard a
favourable account of the climate, and decided at once to return as
early the ensuing year as possible. On his return to New York he
commenced making arrangements for his move the ensuing spring.
"It would be much easier for a family to go from Canada to China now,
than it was to come from New York to Canada then. He had to purchase a
boat large enough to hold his family and goods, with supplies of
groceries for two or three years, with farming utensils, tools, pots,
boilers, etc., and yet the boat must not be too large to get over the
portage from the Hudson to the Mohawk. As there were no waggon roads
from Albany to the Niagara frontier, families coming to Canada had to
come down the Mohawk to Lake Ontario, and enter Canada in that way. My
father found it a weary journey, and was months in accomplishing it.
"On my father's arrival at Niagara, at that time the seat of government,
he called on his Excellency General Simcoe, who had just returned from a
tour through the Province of Canada West, then one vast wilderness. He
asked General Simcoe's advice as to where he should choose his
resting-place. He recommended the county of Norfolk (better known for
many years as Long Point), which had been recently surveyed.
"As it was now drawing towards the close of summer, it would require all
their time to get up a shanty and prepare for the winter. Consequently,
arrangements were made immediately for continuing their journey. The
heavy batteau was transported from Queenston to Chippawa, around the
Falls, a distance of twelve miles. Supplies were added to those brought
from New York, and they once more started on their journey, bidding
goodbye to the last vestige of civilization. They were twelve days
making 100 miles--not bad travelling in those days, taking the current
of the river and lake, adverse winds, and an unknown coast into
consideration.
"When my father came within the bay formed by Long Point, he watched the
coast for a favourable impression, and, after a scrutiny of many miles,
the boat was run into a small creek, the high banks sloping gradually on
each side.
"Directions were given to the men to erect the tent for my mother. My
father had not been long on shore before he decided that that should be
his home. In wandering about, he came to an eminence which would, when
the trees were felled, command a view of the harbour. He gazed around
him for a few moments and said, 'Here I will be buried,' and there,
after fourteen years' toil, he sleeps in peace.
"The men my father hired in New York all wished to settle in Canada, and
were glad to avail themselves of an opportunity of coming free of
expense, and promised to remain with him until he had a log-house built,
and had made himself comfortable. He had paid them a great portion of
their wages in advance, to enable them to get necessaries in New York.
Immediately on his arrival at Niagara they left him, with one exception,
and went in search of localities for themselves, very little regard at
that time being paid to engagements, and there being no means to enforce
them; consequently, he had to hire fresh hands at Niagara, who were men,
like the former, on the look-out for land. After one day's rest at
Ryerse Creek, they re-embarked, and went fourteen miles further up the
bay, to the house of a German settler who had been there two years, and
had a garden well stocked with vegetables.
"The appearance of the boat was hailed with delight by those solitary
beings, and my mother and child were soon made welcome, and the best
that a miserable log-house, or rather hut, could afford was at her
service. This kind, good family consisted of father, mother, one son and
one daughter. Mr. Troyer, the father, was a fine-looking old man with a
flowing beard, and was known for many years throughout the Long Point
settlement as 'Doctor Troyer.' He possessed a thorough knowledge of
witches, their ways and doings, and the art of expelling them, and also
the use of the divining rod, with which he could not only find water,
but could also tell how far below the surface of the earth precious
metals were concealed, but was never fortunate enough to discover any in
the neighbourhood of Long Point. Here my father got his goods under
shelter and left my mother, and returned to Ryerse Creek, intending to
build a log-house as soon as possible. Half a dozen active men will
build a very comfortable primitive log-house in ten or twelve days; that
is, cut and lay up the logs and chink them, put on a bark roof, cut
holes for the windows and door, and build a chimney of mud and sticks.
Sawing boards by hand for floor and doors, making sash and shingles, is
an after and longer process.
"But soon after my father returned he fell ill with Lake fever; his men
erected a shanty, open in front like an Indian camp, placed my father in
it, and left him with his son, a lad of fifteen years of age, the son of
a former wife, as his only attendant. When my father began to recover,
my half brother was taken ill, and there they remained almost helpless,
alone for three weeks.
"My mother hearing nothing of or from them, became almost frantic, as
some of the party were to have returned in a few days. She prevailed
upon Mike Troyer, the son, to launch his bark canoe, and to take her and
my brother, then a year and a half old, in search of my father. On
approaching Ryerse Creek, after a many days' paddle along the coast,
they saw a blue smoke curling above the trees, and very soon my mother
stood in front of the shanty, where my father sat with a stick, turning
an immense turkey, which hung, suspended by a string, before a bright
fire. The day previous, a large flock of wild turkeys had come very near
his camp, and commenced fighting. Without moving from his shanty, he
killed six at one shot. He afterwards, at single shots, killed eight
more, and the united strength of him and my brother was scarcely
sufficient to bring them into camp. My mother used to look back upon
that evening as one of the happiest of her life. She had found her loved
ones, after torturing her mind with all sorts of horrors--Indians, wild
beasts, snakes, illness, and death had all been imagined. The next day,
Mike Troyer's canoe was laden with wild turkeys, and he returned alone,
as my mother refused to separate herself again from my father. A few
days after, a party of pedestrians arrived, on the look-out for land,
and they at once set to work and put up the wished-for log-house or
houses, for there were two attached, which gave them a parlour, two
bedrooms, and a kitchen and garret. On removing from the shanty to this
house, my mother felt as if in a palace. They bought a cow from Mr.
Troyer and collected their goods, and when cold weather set in they were
comfortable.
"My father found it necessary to return to Niagara to secure the patent
for the lands he had selected, and also to provide for wants not
previously known or understood. The journey was long and tedious,
travelling on foot on the lake shore, and by Indian paths through the
woods, fording the creeks as he best could. At the Grand River, or River
Ouse, there was an Indian reservation of six miles on each side of the
river from its mouth to its source, owned by two tribes of Indians,
Mohawks and Cayugas, whose wants were well supplied with very little
exertion of their own, as the river and lake abounded with fish, the
woods with deer and smaller game, and the rich flats along the river
yielded abundance of maize with very little cultivation. They were kind
and inoffensive in their manner, and would take the traveller across the
river, or part with their products for a very small reward.
"On my father's application for the lots he had chosen, he was told by
the Council that the two at Ryerse Creek could only be granted
conditionally, as they possessed very valuable water privileges, and
that whoever took them must build both a flour and a saw-mill. My father
accepted the conditions, secured the grant for his own lands, but left
my mother's for a future day, and at once made arrangements for
purchasing the necessary material for his mills--bolting cloths,
mill-stones, iron, and screws, etc.--and then with a back load of twine,
provisions for his journey, and his light fusee, he commenced his return
home, where he arrived in good health, after an absence of twelve days.
It is only the settlers in a new country that know what pleasure a safe
return can give.
"Long Point now boasted four inhabitants in twenty miles, all settled on
the lake shore. Their nearest neighbour, Peter Walker, at the mouth of
Patterson's Creek [now Port Dover], was three miles distant by water and
six by land. But from this time, 1795, for several years to come, there
was a constant influx of settlers.
"Few days passed without some foot traveller asking a night's rest. The
most of the travellers would set to work cheerfully for a few days, and
assist in cutting roads, making sheds, sawing boards, or felling timber.
The winter was now fast approaching, and much was to be done in
preparation for the coming spring. My father succeeded in hiring five or
six men for as many months. The great object was to get some land
cleared, so that they could plant maize, potatoes, and garden vegetables
for the next year's consumption. They had also to make preparations for
sugar-making, by hollowing out troughs, one to each tree that was
tapped, sufficiently large to hold the sap that would run in one day.
"Their evenings were devoted to netting the twine, which my father had
purchased at Niagara for that purpose. My mother hired Barbara Proyer as
a help, and time passed less heavily than she had imagined. My father
had brought with him a sufficient quantity of flour and salt pork to
last them a year; for fresh meat and fish he depended upon his gun and
spear, and for many years they had always a good supply of both. My
father had a couple of deer-hounds, and he used to go to the woods for
his deer as a farmer would go to his fold for a sheep. Wild turkey and
partridge were bagged with very little skill or exertion, and when the
creek and lake were not frozen he need scarcely leave his own door to
shoot ducks; but the great sporting ground--and it is still famous, and
the resort of sporting gentlemen from Toronto, London, and indeed all
parts of Canada West--is at the head of Long Point Bay. I have known
him, several years later, return from there with twenty wild geese and
one hundred ducks, the result of a few days' shooting. Pigeons were so
plentiful, so late as 1810 and 1812, that they could be knocked down
with poles. Great would have been the sufferings of the early settlers
had not a kind and heavenly Father made this provision for them. But
deer were not the only animals that abounded in the woods; bears and
wolves were plentiful, and the latter used to keep up a most melancholy
howl about the house at night, so near that my mother could scarcely be
persuaded that they were not under the window. The cow, for security,
was tied to the kitchen door every night; during the day she accompanied
the men to the field they were chopping, and fed upon browse, which kept
her fat and in good heart--the men making a point of felling a maple
tree each morning for her special benefit. Their first sugar-making was
not very beautiful, but they made sufficient of a very bad quality for
the year's consumption. The potatoes gave a great yield; the maize was
eaten and destroyed by the racoons; the apple and pear pips grew nicely,
as did the peach, cherry, and plum stones, and my mother's balsams and
few flowers from the new rich soil were beautiful.
"The summer of 1796 passed away with few incidents at Ryerse Creek,
except the arrival of settlers.
"This year there was a total failure of the grain crops, not only in the
new settlements, but throughout the United States. The Indians alone had
preserved the maize from destruction by the racoons, squirrels and
bears, which had invaded the settlements by thousands in search of food,
as there were no nuts in the woods. The settlers had now to depend upon
the Indians at the Grand River for their bread, and they continued to
sell their maize at the same price as formerly, and during the year of
scarcity never raised it. My father procured his year's supply, but
there were no mills; the nearest ones were south of the Short Hills,
seventy miles distant. Lucky was the family that owned a coffee mill in
the winter of 1797. My father had a number of hands getting out timber
for his mills and clearing land, and when they returned from their work
in the evenings they used to grind in the coffee-mill maize for the next
day's consumption. They soon learned the exact quantity required, and
each man ground his own allowance, dividing that of the rest of the
household amongst them. The meal was made into johnny-cakes, eaten hot
for breakfast, cold for dinner, and the remainder in mush with milk for
supper; and upon this fare they enjoyed perfect good health, were always
cheerful, and apparently happy.
"The greatest good-feeling existed amongst the settlers, although they
were of all nations and creeds and no creeds. Many of those families who
had remained neutral during the revolution to save their property, and
still retained their preference for the British Government, now sought
homes in Canada, or assisted their sons to do so. The Quakers and
Yunkers were amongst the best settlers, as they always brought some
property with them, and were generally peaceable and industrious.
"Lands were so easily obtained, and so much encouragement was given by
Government to settlers, that many of the half-pay officers and soldiers
who had gone to New Brunswick found their way here, as well as many of
the idle, discontented, dissipated, vicious and worthless of the United
States. But at the Settler's Home all were made welcome; the meals,
victuals and night's lodging were freely given to all, and for years
after, to my recollection, during the summer season our house was never
free from travellers; not that there was any particular merit due to our
hospitality, for the man that would have closed his door against a
traveller would have been looked upon as worse than a savage. My mother,
this summer, had a dreadful alarm, which she used to describe to me with
great feeling many years after. My little brother (George), for whose
sake she had encountered all the privations and hardships of an early
settler, gave rise to numerous fears and anxieties if he was out of her
sight a few minutes. Endless misfortunes might befall him; he might be
eaten up by wild beasts; or, he might be stolen by the Indians (their
stealing children not being a very uncommon occurrence in those days,
and during the summer season there used to be hundreds encamped on the
beach); or, he might be drowned; or, he might wander away and be lost in
the woods; and he would steal away and follow the men to the field when
not closely watched. One day George was missing, and great was the
commotion. Search was made everywhere, and George's name sounded through
the forest in every direction. At last his hat was found in the creek.
My mother sat perfectly quiet on the bank, with feelings not easily
described, while my father probed the deep holes, and thrust his spear
under the driftwood, expecting every time he drew it out to see George's
red frock rise to the surface, when she heard with delight a little
voice say 'Mamma,' from the opposite side of the creek. And there was
George, with his little bare head peeping through the bushes, with his
pet cat by his side. The reaction was too much for my mother; she fell
fainting to the ground. George had lost his hat walking over a log which
the men used as a bridge.
"The settlement was now considered in a most prosperous state; in a
half-circle of twenty miles, probably there was a population of a
hundred. People had ceased to count the families on their fingers, but
no census was taken. The mills were fast advancing towards completion.
Some few of the settlers grew wheat sufficient for their own
consumption, and a little to sell; but the squirrels, racoons, and
pigeons were very destructive to the grain of the early settlers. A dog
that was trained for hunting the racoons, or a 'coon dog,' as they were
called, was of great value, and the young lads, for many years after,
used to make coon parties on fine moonlight nights, and go from farm to
farm, killing those animals; and, although the necessity has long passed
away, these parties still continue; and, though a virtue and kindness in
the commencement, have ended in vice, and the coon parties now meet
together to rob orchards and gardens of their best fruit and melons. One
bitter cold night in February, 1798, the household was alarmed by the
announcement of my mother's illness. No assistance was to be had nearer
than three miles; no horses and no roads--only a track through the
woods. Mr. Powel, who had just secured a lot near us, volunteered to go
in search of Granny McCall, with the ox-team. After some weary hours'
watching, the 'gee haw!' was heard on the return in the woods, and Mrs.
McCall soon stood beside my mother, and very soon after the birth of a
daughter was announced. That daughter is now making this record of the
past. The settlement was now increasing so fast that the general voice
was for a town, and my father was petitioned to lay one out at the mouth
of Ryerse Creek, and was at last prevailed upon to do so, and called it
Clarence. The first applicant for a lot was a Mr. Corklin, a very good
blacksmith, a mechanic that was very much wanted in the settlement. He
was a very intelligent young man for his class, and a great favourite
with everyone, although he had one fault, that of indulging in strong
drinks occasionally. He bargained for a lot, and put up a frame for a
house. My father bought him a set of blacksmith's tools to commence
with, and built him a shop. The next thing was a wife. My mother soon
saw that a tender feeling was growing up between the young blacksmith
and her nurse, a pretty girl, to whom she was much attached. My mother's
advice was against the marriage, on account of his one bad habit; but of
course she was not listened to, and they were married.
"A few months after the marriage, Mr. Corklin went in a log canoe to the
head of the bay, on business, and was to return the next day; but day
after day passed, and no Mr. Corklin appeared. At last the poor wife's
anxiety became so great that a messenger was sent in search of him. He
had been at Dr. Proyer's, but left the day he was expected home. The
alarm was given, and search commenced along the lake shore. They found
his canoe drifted on shore, laden with game, vegetables and a few
apples, his hat, and an empty bottle that smelt of rum; but he was gone.
They supposed that he had fallen overboard without upsetting the canoe.
His body they could not find for days after, and his wife used to wander
along the lake shore, from early dawn until dark, with the hope that she
might find his body. One day she saw a number of birds on a drift log
that was half out of the water. By the side of this log lay the remains
of her husband. The eagles had picked his eyes out, but had only
commenced their feast. This was the first death in the settlement. My
father took back the lot, paid for the frame house, kept his smith's
tools, and so ended his town.
"Upon more mature reflection, he decided that the neighbourhood of a
small town would be the reverse of agreeable, as the first inhabitants
would be those that were too idle to improve a farm for themselves, and
bad habits are generally the attendants of idleness, and that he, in
place of being the owner of all, would only be proprietor in common with
all the idle and dissipated of a new country.
"On my father's arrival in the country he had been sworn in a justice of
the peace for the London and Western districts--a very extensive
jurisdiction over wild lands with few inhabitants; for those districts
embraced all the lands between Lake Erie and Lake Huron, the Grand
River, and Rivers Detroit and St. Clair. Courts were held at Sandwich, a
distance of nearly two hundred miles, without roads, so that magistrates
had to settle all disputes as they best could, perform all marriages,
bury the dead, and prescribe for the sick. In addition to the medicine
chest, my father purchased a pair of tooth-drawers, and learned to draw
teeth, to the great relief of the suffering. So popular did he become in
that way, that in after years they used to entreat him to draw their
teeth in preference to a medical man--the one did it gratuitously, the
other, of course, charged. My father put up two or three small
log-houses which were tenanted by very poor people whose labour he
required. From one of these houses my mother hired a nurse, Poll
Spragge, who was a merry, laughing, 'who-cares' sort of girl. Upon my
mother remarking the scantiness of her wardrobe, which was limited to
one garment, a woollen slip that reached from the throat to the feet,
Poll related a misfortune which had befallen her a short time before.
She then, as now, had but the one article of dress, and it was made of
buckskin, a leather something like chamois; and when it became greasy
and dirty, her mother said she must wash it that afternoon, as she was
going visiting, and that Poll must have her slip dry to put on before
her father and brother returned from the field. During the interval, she
must, of necessity, represent Eve before her fall. Poll had seen her
mother, in the absence of soap, make a pot of strong ley from wood
ashes, and boil her father's and brother's coarse linen shirts in it.
She subjected her leather slip to the same process. We all know the
effect of great heat upon leather. When Poll took her slip from the pot
it was a shrivelled-up mass, partly decomposed by the strong ley. Poor
Poll was in despair. She watched for the return of her family with no
enviable feelings, and when she heard them coming she lifted a board and
concealed herself in the potato hole, under the floor. Her mother soon
discovered what had befallen Poll, and search was made for her. After a
time, a feeble voice was heard from under the floor, and Poll was
induced to come forth, by the promise of her mother's second petticoat,
which was converted into the slip she then wore. She ended her recital
with a merry laugh, and said now she had got service she would soon get
herself clothes. But clothing was one of the things most difficult to
obtain then. There were very few sheep in the settlement, and if a
settler owned two or three, they had to be protected with the greatest
care, watched by the children during the day that they might not stray
into the woods, and at night penned near the house in a fold, built very
high, to secure them from the bears and wolves, which could not always
be done.
"There were instances of wolves climbing into pens that they could not
get out of. On these occasions they did not hurt the sheep, but were
found lying down in a corner like a dog. It is said that the first
thought of a wolf on entering a fold is how he is to get out again; and
if he finds that difficult, his heart fails him and he makes little
effort.
"Wolves were the pests of the country for many years, and, even after
they were partially expelled by the settlers, they used to make
occasional descents upon the settlements, and many a farmer that counted
his sheep by twenties at night, would be thankful if he could muster
half a score in the morning. It was flax, the pedlar's pack, and
buckskins that the early settlers had to depend upon for clothing when
their first supply was run out. Deerskins were carefully preserved and
dressed, and the men had trowsers and coats made of them. Though not
very becoming, they were said to be very comfortable and strong, and
suitable to the work they had to do. Chopping, logging, and clearing
wild lands required strong clothing.
"One part of the early clearing was always appropriated to flax, and
after the seed was in the ground the culture was given up to the women.
They had to weed, pull and thrash out the seeds, and then spread it out
to rot. When it was in a proper state for the brake, it was handed over
to the men, who crackled and dressed it. It was again returned to the
women, who spun and wove it, making a strong linen for shirts and plaid
for their own dresses. Almost every thrifty farmhouse had a loom, and
both wife and daughters learnt to weave. The pedlar's pack supplied
their little finery, the pack generally containing a few pieces of very
indifferently printed calicoes at eight and ten shillings, New York
currency, a yard; a piece of book-muslin at sixteen and eighteen
shillings a yard, and a piece of check for aprons at a corresponding
price; some very common shawls and handkerchiefs, white cotton stockings
to match, with two or three pieces of ribbon, tape, needles, pins and
horn combs; these, with very little variety, used to be the contents of
the pedlar's pack. Opening the pack caused much more excitement in a
family then than the opening of a fashionable shopkeeper's show-room
does at the present day.
"About this time, 1799, a great number of old soldiers, who had served
under and with my father, found their way to the Long Point Settlement.
One of these soldiers had been taken prisoner with my father at
Charleston, and when they were plundered of everything he managed to
conceal a doubloon in his hair. With this he supplied my father's wants,
who was wounded and suffering. My father now exchanged with him one of
his choice lots, that he might be in the settlement and near a mill; and
took his location, which was far back in the woods. My uncle [Joseph
Ryerson], and several other half-pay officers, came from New Brunswick
to visit my father. The pleasure of seeing those loved and familiar
faces, and again meeting those who had fought the same battles, shared
the same dangers, and endured the same hardships, fatigues, and
privations for seven long years, and had the same hopes and fears, and
the bitter mortification of losing their cause, was indeed great. How
many slumbering feelings such a reunion awakened! how many long tales of
the past they used to tell, of both love and war! Those officers that
came from New Brunswick to visit the country all returned, after a few
years, as settlers. The climate of Canada was much preferable, and as an
agricultural country was very superior. The population was now becoming
so great that the Government thought it necessary to have all the male
population, between the ages of sixteen and sixty, enrolled in the
Militia. My father was requested to organize a regiment, and to
recommend those whom he thought, from their intelligence, good conduct,
and former service, most entitled to commissions. He was appointed
Lieutenant-Colonel of Militia and Lieutenant of the County, a situation
that was afterwards done away with. This duty of selecting officers gave
rise to the first ill-natured feelings that had been exhibited towards
him in the settlement. Every man thought he ought to be a captain at the
least, and was indignant that my father did not appreciate his merits.
Some threatened to stone him; others, to shoot him. The more moderate
declared they would not come to his mill, although there was no other
within seventy miles. John McCall did not care for my father; he would
be a captain without his assistance. He built a large open boat and
navigated her for several years, and gloried in the designation of
Captain McCall. But, notwithstanding all opposition, the regiment of
militia was formed. They used to meet one day in the year for company
exercise, and there was a general muster on the 4th of June, the King's
birthday, for a general training. These early trainings presented a
strange mixture. There were a few old officers, with their fine military
bearing, with their guns and remains of old uniforms; and the old
soldier, from his upright walk and the way he handled his gun, could
easily be distinguished, though clothed in home-spun and buckskin, with
the coarse straw hat. The early settlers all had guns of some
description, except the very juvenile members, who used to carry canes
to represent guns. Those trainings used to be looked forward to with
intense interest by all the boys of the neighbourhood, and afforded
subjects of conversation for the ensuing year. It was no easy thing in
that day to find a level piece of ground that was tolerably clear from
stumps sufficiently large to serve for their general trainings.
"Amongst the early settlers there were very few who could afford to hire
assistance of any kind. Those that could pay found it easy to get men as
labourers; but women servants, unless by mere chance, were not to be
had. The native American women would not and will not, even at the
present day, go out to service, although almost any of the other
neighbours' daughters would be glad to go as helps, doing the same work
and eating at the table with their mistress. My father, for many years,
used occasionally to take the head of the table with his labourers, to
show them he was not too proud to eat with them. My mother was exempt
from this, but the help ate at her table, which was considered a
sufficient proof of her humility. Many of those helps of early days have
since become the wives of squires, captains, majors and colonels of
Militia, and are owners of large properties, and they and their
descendants drive in their own carriages.
"In the summer of 1800 my mother had a very nice help as nurse. Jenny
Decow had been apprenticed to a relative, and, at the age of eighteen,
she received her bed, her cow, and two or three suits of clothing (those
articles it was customary to give to a bound girl), and was considered
legally of age, with the right to earn her own living as she best could.
"My mother soon discovered that Jenny had a wooer. On Sunday afternoon,
young Daniel McCall made his appearance, with that peculiar, happy,
awkward look that young lads have when they are 'keeping company,' as it
is called. At that time, when a young man wanted a wife, he looked out
for some young girl whom he thought would be a good help-mate, and,
watching his opportunity, with an awkward bow and blush he would ask her
to give him her company the ensuing Sunday evening. Her refusal was
called 'giving the mitten,' and great was the laugh against any young
man if it was known that he had 'got the mitten,' as all hopes in that
quarter would be at an end. But young McCall had not got 'the mitten;'
and it was customary on those occasions, when the family retired to
bed, for the young man to get up and quietly put out the candles, and
cover the fire, if any; then take a seat by the side of his lady-love,
and talk as other lovers do, I suppose, until twelve o'clock, when he
would either take his leave and a walk of miles to his home, that he
might be early at work, or he would lie down for an hour or two with
some of the boys, and then be away before daylight. Those weekly visits
would sometimes continue for months, until all was ready for marriage.
But they did not always end in matrimony. Sometimes those children of
the woods were gay Lotharios in their way, as well as in more refined
society, and it would be discovered that a favourite Adonis was keeping
company with two or three young girls at the same time, and _vice versa_
with some young coquettes. But such unprincipled conduct would furnish
gossip for a whole neighbourhood, and be discountenanced by all. Nor
must you for a moment imagine that there was anything wrong in this
system of wooing. It was the custom of the country in an early day, and
I think it is still continued in settlements remote from towns. But the
lives of hundreds of estimable wives and mothers have borne testimony to
the purity of their conduct. When Jenny had been with my mother about
six months, young McCall made his appearance in the middle of the week,
and my father and some visitors commenced bantering him why he did not
marry at once. Why did he spend his time and wear out his shoes in the
way he was doing? He said he would go and talk to Jenny, and hear what
she said. He returned in a few minutes and said they would be married.
In an hour afterwards they were man and wife. They married in their
working dresses--he in his buckskin trowsers, and she in her home-spun.
She tied up her bundle of clothes, received her wages, and away they
walked to their log-house in the woods. Thirty years afterwards they
used to show me some little articles that had been purchased with
Jenny's wages; and they appeared to look back upon that time with
pleasure. They became rich; he was colonel of militia, and some of their
descendants are worth thousands. During their early struggles, Mrs.
McCall was in the field with her husband, pulling flax, when she felt
what she thought was a severe blow on her foot. A rattlesnake had bitten
her. Her husband killed the snake; vulgar prejudice thought that, by
killing the snake, the poison would be less severe. He then put his lips
to the wound, sucked it, and, taking her in his arms, carried her to the
house. Before he reached it, her foot had swollen and burst. They
applied an Indian remedy, a peculiar kind of plantain, which relieved
her, but she was years before she perfectly recovered from the effects
of the poison. Two children that were born during that time turned
spotted, became sore and died; but her third child was strong and
healthy, and is still living. These reptiles, that are now almost
unknown in the country, were then plentiful. They had a den at the mouth
of the Grand River, and there was another at the Falls. For many years
the boatmen going up and down Lake Erie used to stop at the mouth of the
Grand River for an hour or two's sport, killing rattlesnakes. My father
and boat's crew, on one of these occasions, killed seventy. The oil of
the rattlesnake was thought to possess great medicinal virtues.
"There was a sad want of religious instruction amongst the early
settlers. For many years there was no clergyman nearer than Niagara, a
distance of 100 miles, without roads. My father used to read the Church
Service every Sunday to his household, and any of the laborers who would
attend. As the country became more settled, the neighbours used to meet
at Mr. Barton's, and Mr. Bostwick, who was the son of a clergyman, used
to read the service, and sometimes a sermon. But there were so few
copies of sermons to be obtained, that after reading them over some
half-a-dozen times they appeared to lose their interest. But it was for
the children that were growing up that this want was most severely felt.
When the weekday afforded no amusements, they would seek them on Sunday;
fishing, shooting, bathing, gathering nuts and berries, and playing
ball, occupied, with few exceptions, the summer Sundays. In winter they
spent them in skating, gliding down the hills on hand sleighs. And yet
crime was unknown in those days, as were locks and bolts. Theft was
never heard of, and a kindly, brotherly feeling existed amongst all. If
a deer was killed, a piece was sent to each neighbour, and they, in
turn, used to draw the seine, giving my father a share of the fish. If
anyone was ill, they were cared for by the neighbours and their wants
attended to. But the emigrant coming to the country in the present day
can only form a very poor idea of the hardships endured by the early
pioneers of the forest, or the feelings which their isolated situation
drew forth. Education and station seemed to be lost sight of in the one
general wish to be useful to each other, to make roads and improve the
country.
"I think it was in 1802 that I first saw Colonel Talbot, a distinguished
settler, who had a grant of lands seventy miles further up the lake, at
a place afterwards called Port Talbot, where he had commenced building
mills. People were full of conjecture as to the cause that could induce
a young gentleman of his family (the Talbots of Malahide) and rank in
the army to bury himself in Canada.
"He and Sir Arthur Wellesley had been at the same time on the staff of
the Duke of Buckingham, when Lord Lieutenant of Ireland, and it was said
the field of glory was equally open to both. Colonel Talbot afterwards
came to this country, and was on the staff of General Simcoe when he
made a tour through the Upper Province. At that time he selected his
future home. Some said that he left the army in disgust at not getting
an appointment that he felt himself entitled to; others, again, said
that neither Mars nor Venus presided at his birth. But one thing was
certain: he had chosen a life of privation and toil, and right manfully
he bore the lot he had chosen. When in the army, he was looked upon as a
dandy; but my first impressions would place him in a very different
light. He had come to Port Ryerse with a boat-load of grain to be ground
at my father's mill. The men slept in the boat, with an awning over it,
and had a fire on shore. In front of this fire, Colonel Talbot was
mixing bread in a pail, to be baked in the ashes for the men. I had
never seen a man so employed, and it made a lasting impression upon my
childish memory. My next recollection of him was his picking a wild
goose, which my father had shot, for my mother to dress for dinner. Thus
commenced an acquaintance which lasted until his death in 1853.
"My father, on his arrival at Long Point, promised my mother that if she
would remain contented for six years at Port Ryerse, and give the
country a fair trial, if she then disliked it, and wished to return to
New York, he would go back with her--that party feeling would by that
time have greatly subsided. My mother now claimed my father's promise.
He at once acquiesced, and left it to her to decide when they should go,
my father well knowing that however much my mother might wish to return,
when left to her to decide, her better judgment would say 'Not yet,' as
his improvements must all be a sacrifice. To sell his property was
impossible. My mother postponed the return for a few years, but could
not relinquish the hope of emerging from the woods, and being once more
within the sound of the church-going bell. My father's property was fast
improving. He had planted an orchard of apple, peach, and cherry trees,
which he procured from Dr. Proyer, whose young trees were a year or two
in advance of his own, and he had procured a few sheep which were
pastured in a field immediately in front of the house. But all their
watching could not preserve them from the wolves. If they escaped by the
greatest care for a year or two, and the flock increased to twenty or
thirty, some unlucky day they would find them reduced to ten or a dozen.
"A tree sometimes unobserved would fall across the fence, and the sheep
would stray into the woods, which was fatal to them; or, the fastening
to their pen would be left just one unlucky night not secured, and the
morning would show a melancholy remainder of the fine flock that had
been folded the night before. All of these mishaps were serious
vexations to the early settlers. The mill was a constant draw upon my
father's purse. A part of his lands had been sold at a very low price
(but not low at that time)--one dollar the acre--to assist in building
it, and now it had to be kept in repair. The dam breaking, machinery
getting out of order, improvements to be made, bolting cloths wanted,
and a miller to be paid--to meet all this was the toll, every twelfth
bushel that was ground. During the summer season the mill would be for
days without a bushel to grind, as farmers got their milling done when
they could take their grists to the mill on ox-sleds upon the snow. Few
grew more than sufficient for their own consumption and that of the
new-coming settler; but had they grown more, there was no market, and
the price of wheat, until the war of 1812, was never more than half a
dollar a bushel; maize, buckwheat, and rye, two shillings (York) a
bushel. The flour mill, pecuniarily speaking, was a great loss to my
father. The saw-mill was remunerative; the expense attending it was
trifling, its machinery was simple, and any commonly intelligent man
with a day or two's instruction could attend to it. People brought logs
of pine, oak, and walnut from their own farms, and my father had half
the lumber for sawing; and this, when seasoned, found a ready sale, not
for cash (cash dealings were almost unknown), but for labour, produce,
maple sugar or anything they had to part with which my father might
want, or with which he could pay some of his needy labourers. There were
some wants which were almost unattainable with poor people, such as
nails, glass, tea, and salt. They could only be procured in Niagara, and
cash must be paid for them. There was not yet a store at Long Point.
Great were the advantages of the half-pay officers and those who had a
little money at their command, and yet their descendants appear not to
have profited by it. It is a common remark in the country that very many
of the sons of half-pay officers were both idle and dissolute; but I am
happy to say there are many honourable exceptions. At the head of the
list of these stand our present Chief Justice (Sir John Robinson), and
Dr. Ryerson, the Superintendent of Education, and many others who deem
it an honour to be descended from an United Empire Loyalist. From a
multiplicity of care, my father had postponed, from time to time, going
to Toronto, or Little York, as it was then called (where the seat of
government had been removed), to secure the grant of land which had been
promised to his family, until after the departure of his friend General
Simcoe, who was succeeded as Governor by General Hunter.
"When my father made application to General Hunter, he was told that an
order from the Home Government had limited the grants to the wives and
children of the U.E. Loyalists to 200 acres each; but said that if the
Order in Council had passed for the larger grants, of course my father
should have the lands he had selected; but he, not foreseeing the
change, had not secured the order, and General Simcoe's verbal promise
could not be acted upon.
"The autumn of 1804 found us still in the original log-house. It had
been added to and improved, but the stick chimney had not been replaced
by brick, as my father looked forward from year to year to building a
better house in a better situation; but he found so many improvements
actually necessary, and so much to be done each spring and summer, that
although a great deal of material had been prepared, the house was not
yet commenced. One fine bright morning, as some visitors were taking
their departure, there was an alarm of fire, and, sure enough, the stick
chimney had caught and communicated to the garret, and in a few minutes
the whole of the upper part of the house was in flames. Our visitors,
who had not gone beyond the threshold, joined with the family and
labourers in getting out the furniture as fast as possible. Nearly
everything was saved from the lower part of the house, but all that was
in the garret was lost. The garret had been used as a store-room, and
contained cases which had not been unpacked since they came from New
York, but were left until a better house could be built. These
things--linen, bedding, and some nice little articles of furniture, and
various little nicknacks which were prized beyond their value--were a
great loss: but the greatest loss was a box or two of books. These were
not to be replaced this side of New York, and to a young family the loss
was irreparable. A part of Pope's works, a copy of Milton's Paradise
Lost, Buchan's Family Medicine, and a Testament with commentaries, were
all that were saved. A small quantity of plate also, which had not been
unpacked, was found in a very unsatisfactory state. The family took
shelter in a house built for and occupied by the miller and his family,
sending them to a smaller tenement. The situation was airy and
beautiful, and, with a few alterations and improvements, was more
comfortable than the first log-house. This my mother rather regretted,
as discomfort would have hastened the new house. Although allusions were
made to New York, no time had yet been named for their return. My father
used to assure my mother and friends that he would go as soon as she
said the word; yet these remarks were always accompanied by a
particularly humorous expression of countenance.
"About this time the London district was separated from the Western, and
composed what now forms the counties or districts of Middlesex, Elgin,
Huron, Bruce, Oxford, and Norfolk. The necessary appointments were made,
and the London district held its own courts and sessions at Turkey
Point, six miles above us on the lake shore. The people, in a most
patriotic manner, had put up a log-house, which served the double
purpose of court-house and jail. The courts were held in the upper
story, which was entered by a very rough stairway, going up on the
outside of the building. The jail consisted of one large room on the
ground floor, from which any prisoner could release himself in half an
hour unless guarded by a sentinel. The juries for some years held their
consultations under the shade of a tree. Doubtless it was pleasanter
than the close lock-up jury-room of the present day. My father, in
addition to his other commissions, was appointed Judge of the District
Court and Judge of the Surrogate Court. Turkey Point is a very pretty
place; the grounds are high, and from them there is a very fine view of
the bay and lake. General Simcoe had selected it for the county town,
and the site of a future city. Now it boasted of one house, an inn kept
by Silas Montross. There was also a reservation of land for military
purposes. But the town never prospered; it was not in a thoroughfare,
and did not possess water privileges. Twenty years afterwards it
contained but the one solitary house. The county town was changed to a
more favourable situation, Vittoria. My father's young family now gave
him great anxiety. How they were to be educated was a question not
easily solved. Schools there were none, nor was it possible to get a
tutor. A man of education would not go so far into the woods for the
small inducement which a private family could offer.
"Magistrates were not allowed to marry by license, nor could the parties
be called in church, for there were no churches in the country. The law
required that the parties should be advertised--that is, that the banns
should be written out and placed in some conspicuous place for three
Sundays. The mill door was the popular place, but the young lads would
endeavour to avoid publicity by putting the banns on the inside of the
door; others would take two or three witnesses and hold it on the door
for a few minutes for three successive Sundays, allowing no one but
their friends to see it. In many places marriages used to be solemnized
by persons not authorized, and in a manner that made their legality very
doubtful; but the Legislature have very wisely passed Acts legalizing
all marriages up to a certain date. The marriages that took place at my
father's used to afford a good deal of amusement. Some very odd couples
came to be united. The only fee my father asked was a kiss from the
bride, which he always insisted on being paid; and if the bride was at
all pretty, he used, with a mischievous look at my mother, to enlarge
upon the pleasure that this fee gave him, and would go into raptures
about the bride's youth, beauty, and freshness, and declare that it was
the only public duty he performed that he was properly remunerated for.