COMPENSATION AND HONOUR
Throughout the war the British government had constantly
granted relief and compensation to Loyalists who had fled
to England. In the autumn of 1782 the treasury was paying
out to them, on account of losses or services, an annual
amount of 40,280 pounds over and above occasional payments
of a particular or extraordinary nature amounting to
17,000 pounds or 18,000 pounds annually. When peace had
been concluded, and it became clear that the Americans
had no intention of making restitution to the Loyalists,
the British government determined to put the payments
for their compensation on a more satisfactory basis.
For this purpose the Coalition Government of Fox and
North appointed in July 1783 a royal commission 'to
inquire into the losses and services of all such persons
who have suffered in their rights, properties, and
professions during the late unhappy dissensions in America,
in consequence of their loyalty to His Majesty and
attachment to the British Government.' A full account of
the proceedings of the commission is to be found in the
_Historical View of the Commission for Inquiry into the
Losses, Services, and Claims of the American Loyalists_,
published in London in 1815 by one of the commissioners,
John Eardley Wilmot. The commission was originally
appointed to sit for only two years; but the task which
confronted it was so great that it was found necessary
several times to renew the act under which it was appointed;
and not until 1790 was the long inquiry brought to an
end. It was intended at first that the claims of the men
in the Loyalist regiments should be sent in through their
officers; and Sir John Johnson, for instance, was asked
to transmit the claims of the Loyalists settled in Canada.
But it was found that this method did not provide sufficient
guarantee against fraudulent and exorbitant claims; and
eventually members of the commission were compelled to
go in person to New York, Nova Scotia, and Canada.
The delay in concluding the work of the commission caused
great indignation. A tract which appeared in London in
1788 entitled _The Claim of the American Loyalists Reviewed
and Maintained upon Incontrovertible Principles of Law
and Justice_ drew a black picture of the results of the
delay:
It is well known that this delay of justice has produced
the most melancholy and shocking events. A number of
sufferers have been driven into insanity and become
their own destroyers, leaving behind them their helpless
widows and orphans to subsist upon the cold charity
of strangers. Others have been sent to cultivate the
wilderness for their subsistence, without having the
means, and compelled through want to throw themselves
on the mercy of the American States, and the charity
of former friends, to support the life which might
have been made comfortable by the money long since
due by the British Government; and many others with
their families are barely subsisting upon a temporary
allowance from Government, a mere pittance when compared
with the sum due them.
Complaints were also made about the methods of the inquiry.
The claimant was taken into a room alone with the
commissioners, was asked to submit a written and sworn
statement as to his losses and services, and was then
cross-examined both with regard to his own losses and
those of his fellow claimants. This cross-questioning
was freely denounced as an 'inquisition.'
Grave inconvenience was doubtless caused in many cases
by the delay of the commissioners in making their awards.
But on the other hand it should be remembered that the
commissioners had before them a portentous task. They
had to examine between four thousand and five thousand
claims. In most of these the amount of detail to be gone
through was considerable, and the danger of fraud was
great. There was the difficulty also of determining just
what losses should be compensated. The rule which was
followed was that claims should be allowed only for losses
of property through loyalty, for loss of offices held
before the war, and for loss of actual professional
income. No account was taken of lands bought or improved
during the war, of uncultivated lands, of property
mortgaged to its full value or with defective titles, of
damage done by British troops, or of forage taken by
them. Losses due to the fall in the value of the provincial
paper money were thrown out, as were also expenses incurred
while in prison or while living in New York city. Even
losses in trade and labour were discarded. It will be
seen that to apply these rules to thousands of detailed
claims, all of which had to be verified, was not the work
of a few days, or even months.
It must be remembered, too, that during the years from
1783 to 1790 the British government was doing a great
deal for the Loyalists in other ways. Many of the better
class received offices under the crown. Sir John Johnson
was appointed superintendent of the Loyalists in Canada,
and then superintendent of Indian Affairs; Colonel Edmund
Fanning was made lieutenant-governor of Nova Scotia; Ward
Chipman became solicitor-general of New Brunswick. The
officers of the Loyalist regiments were put on half-pay;
and there is evidence that many were allowed thus to rank
as half-pay officers who had no real claim to the title.
'Many,' said the Rev. William Smart of Brockville, 'were
placed on the list of officers, not because they had seen
service, but as the most certain way of compensating them
for losses sustained in the Rebellion'; and Haldimand
himself complained that 'there is no end to it if every
man that comes in is to be considered and paid as an
officer.' Then every Loyalist who wished to do so received
a grant of land. The rule was that each field officer
should receive 5,000 acres, each captain 3,000, each
subaltern 2,000, and each non-commissioned officer and
private 200 acres. This rule was not uniformly observed,
and there was great irregularity in the size of the
grants. Major Van Alstine, for instance, received only
1,200 acres. But in what was afterwards Upper Canada,
3,200,000 acres were granted out to Loyalists before
1787. And in addition to all this, the British government
clothed and fed and housed the Loyalists until they were
able to provide for themselves. There were those in Nova
Scotia who were receiving rations as late as 1792. What
all this must have cost the government during the years
following 1783 it is difficult to compute. Including the
cost of surveys, official salaries, the building of
saw-mills and grist-mills, and such things, the figures
must have run up to several millions of pounds.
When it is remembered that all this had been already
done, it will be admitted to be a proof of the generosity
of the British government that the total of the claims
allowed by the royal commission amounted to 3,112,455
pounds.
The grants varied in size from 10 pounds, the compensation
paid to a common soldier, to 44,500 pounds, the amount
paid to Sir John Johnson. The total outlay on the part
of Great Britain, both during and after the war, on
account of the Loyalists, must have amounted to not less
than 6,000,000 pounds, exclusive of the value of the
lands assigned.
With the object possibly of assuaging the grievances of
which the Loyalists complained in connection with the
proceedings of the royal commission, Lord Dorchester (as
Sir Guy Carleton was by that time styled) proposed in
1789 'to put a Marke of Honor 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.' It was therefore resolved that all
Loyalists of that description were 'to be distinguished
by the letters U. E. affixed to their names, alluding to
their great principle, the unity of the empire.' The land
boards were ordered to preserve a registry of all such
persons, 'to the end that their posterity may be
discriminated from future settlers,' and that their sons
and daughters, on coming of age, might receive grants of
two hundred acre lots. Unfortunately, the land boards
carried out these instructions in a very half-hearted
manner, and when Colonel John Graves Simcoe became
lieutenant-governor of Upper Canada, he found the regulation
a dead letter. He therefore revived it in a proclamation
issued at York (now Toronto), on April 6, 1796, which
directed the magistrates to ascertain under oath and to
register the names of all those who by reason of their
loyalty to the Empire were entitled to special distinction
and grants of land. A list was compiled from the land
board registers, from the provision lists and muster
lists, and from the registrations made upon oath, which
was known as the 'Old U. E. List'; and it is a fact often
forgotten that no one, the names of some of whose ancestors
are not inscribed in that list, has the right to describe
himself as a United Empire Loyalist.