The life of Robert Baldwin forms so important an ingredient in the
political history of this country that we deem it unnecessary to offer any
apology for dealing with it at considerable length. More especially is
this the case, inasmuch as, unlike most of the personages included in the
present series, his career is ended, and we can contemplate it, not only
with perfect impartiality, but even with some approach to completeness. The
twenty and odd years which have elapsed since he was laid in his grave have
witnessed many and important changes in our Constitution, as well as in our
habits of thought; but his name is still regarded by the great mass of the
Canadian people with feelings of respect and veneration. We can still point
to him with the admiration due to a man who, during a time of the grossest
political corruption, took a foremost part in our public affairs, and who
yet preserved his integrity untarnished. We can point to him as the man
who, if not the actual author of Responsible Government in Canada, yet
spent the best years of his life in contending for it, and who contributed
more than any other person to make that project an accomplished fact. We
can point to him as one who, though a politician by predilection and by
profession, never stooped to disreputable practices, either to win votes or
to maintain himself in office.. Robert Baldwin, was a man who was not only
incapable of falsehood or meanness to gain his ends, but who was to the
last degree intolerant of such practices on the part of his warmest
supporters. If intellectual greatness cannot be claimed for him, moral
greatness was most indisputably his. Every action of his life was marked
by sincerity and good faith, alike towards friend and foe. He was not only
true to others; but was from, first to last true to himself. His useful
career, and the high reputation which he left behind him, furnish an apt
commentary upon the advice which Polonius gives to his son Laertes:--
"This above all, to thine own self be true;
And it must follow, as the night the day,
Thou canst not then be false to any man."
To our thinking there is something august in the life of Robert Baldwin.
So chary was he of his personal honour that it was next to impossible to
induce him to pledge himself beforehand, even upon the plainest question.
Once, when addressing the electors at Sharon, some one in the crowd asked
him if he would pledge himself to oppose the retention of the Clergy
Reserves, "I am not here," was his reply, "to pledge myself on any
question. I go to the House as a free man, or I go not at all I am here to
declare to you my opinions. If you approve of my opinions, and elect me, I
will carry them out in Parliament. If I should alter those opinions I will
come back and surrender my trust, when you will have an opportunity of
re-electing me or of choosing another candidate; but I shall pledge myself
at the bidding of no man." A gentleman still living in Toronto once
accompanied him on an electioneering tour in his constituency of North
York. There were many burning questions on the carpet at the time, on some
of which Mr. Baldwin's opinion did not entirely coincide with that of the
majority of his constituents. His companion remembers hearing it suggested
to him that his wisest course would be to maintain a discreet silence
during the canvass as to the points at issue. His reply to the suggestion
was eminently characteristic of the man. "To maintain silence under, such
circumstances," said he, "would be tantamount to deceiving the electors. It
would be as culpable as to tell them a direct lie. Sooner than follow such
a course I will cheerfully accept defeat." He could not even be induced to
adopt the _suppressio veri_. So tender and exacting was his conscience that
he would not consent to be elected except upon the clearest understanding
between himself and his constituents, even to serve a cause which he felt
to be a just one. Defeat might annoy, but would not humiliate him. To be
elected under false colours would humiliate him in his own esteem, a state
of things which, to high-minded man, is a burden intolerable to be borne.
It has of late years become the fashion with many well-informed persons
in this country to think and speak of Robert. Baldwin as a greatly,
over-estimated man. It is on all hands admitted that he was a man of
excellent intentions, of spotless integrity, and of blameless life. It is
not disputed, even by those whose political views are at variance with
those of the party to which he belonged, that the great measures for which
he contended were, in themselves conducive to the public weal, nor is it
denied that he contributed greatly to the cause of political freedom
in Canada. But, it is said, Robert Baldwin was merely the exponent of
principles which, long before his time, had found general acceptance among,
the statesmen of every land where constitutional government prevails.
Responsible government, it is said, would have become an accomplished fact,
even if Robert Baldwin had never lived. Other much-needed reforms with
which his name is inseparably associated would have come, it is contended,
all in good time, and this present year, 1880, would have found us pretty
much where we are. To argue after this fashion is simply to beg the whole
question at issue. It is true that there is no occult power in a mere name.
Ship-money, doubtless, was a doomed impost, even if there had been no
particular individual called John Hampden. The practical despotism of the
Stuart dynasty would doubtless have come to an end long before the present
day, even if Oliver Cromwell and William of Orange had never existed. In
the United States, slavery was a fated institution, even if there had
been no great rebellion, and if Abraham Lincoln had never occupied the
Presidential chair. But it would be a manifest injustice to withhold from
those illustrious personages the tribute due to their great and, on the
whole, glorious lives. They were the media whereby human progress delivered
its message to the world, and their names are deservedly held in honour and
reverence by a grateful posterity. Performing on a more contracted stage,
and before a less numerous audience, Robert Baldwin, fought his good
fight--and won. Surrounded by inducements to prove false to his innate
convictions, he nevertheless chose to encounter obloquy and persecution for
what he knew to be the cause of truth and justice.
"Once to every man and nation
Comes the moment to decide,"
says Professor Lowell. The moment came to Robert Baldwin early in life. It
is not easy to believe that he ever hesitated as to his decision; and to
that decision he remained true to the latest hour of his existence. If it
cannot in strictness be said of him that he knew no variableness or shadow
of turning, it is at least indisputable that his convictions never varied
upon any question of paramount importance. What Mr. Goldwin Smith has said
of Cromwell might with equal truth, be applied to Robert Baldwin: "He bore
himself, not as one who gambled for a stake, but as one who struggled for a
cause." These are a few among the many claims which Robert Baldwin has upon
the sympathies and remembrances of the Canadian people; and they are claims
which, we believe, posterity will show no disposition to ignore.
In order, to obtain a clear comprehension of the public career of Robert
Baldwin ft is necessary to glance briefly at the history of one or two of
his immediate ancestors. In compiling the present sketch the writer deems
it proper to say that he some time since wrote an account of Robert
Baldwin's life for the columns of an influential newspaper published in
Toronto. That account embodied the result of much careful and original
investigation. It contained, indeed, every important fact readily
ascertainable with reference to Mr. Baldwin's early life. So far as that
portion of it is concerned there is little to be added at the present time,
and the writer has drawn largely upon it for the purposes of this memoir.
The former account being the product of his own conscientious labour and
investigation, he has not deemed it necessary to reconstruct sentences
and paragraphs where they, already clearly expressed his meaning. With
reference to Mr. Baldwin's political life, however, the present sketch
embodies the result of fuller and more accurate information, and is
conceived in a spirit which the exigencies of a newspaper do not admit of.
At the close of the Revolution which ended in the independence of the
United States, there resided near the City of Cork, Ireland, a gentleman
named William Wilcocks. He belonged to an old family which had once been
wealthy, and which was still in comfortable circumstances. About this time
a strong tide of emigration set in from various parts of Europe to the New
World. The student of history does not need to be informed that there was
at this period a good deal of suffering and discontent in Ireland. The more
radical and, uncompromising among the malcontents staid at home, hoping for
better times, many of them eventually took part in the troubles of '98.
Others sought a peaceful remedy for the evils under which they groaned,
and, bidding adieu to their native land, sought an asylum for themselves,
and their families in the western wilderness. The success of the American
Revolution combined with the hard times at home to make the United States
"the chosen land" of many thousands of these self-expatriated ones. The
revolutionary struggle was then a comparatively recent affair. The thirteen
revolted colonies had become an independent nation, had started on their
national career under favourable auspices, and had already become a
thriving and prosperous community. The Province of Quebec, which then
included the whole of what afterwards became Upper and Lower Canada, had to
contend with many disadvantages, and its condition was in many important
respects far behind that of the American Republic. Its climate was much
more rigorous than was that of its southern neighbour, and its territory
was much more sparsely settled. The western part of the Province, now
forming part of the Province of Ontario, was especially thinly peopled,
and except at a few points along the frontier, was little better than a
wilderness. It was manifestly desirable to offer strong incentives to
immigration, with a view to the speedy settlement of the country. To effect
such a settlement was the imperative duty of the Government of the day, and
to this end, large tracts of land were allotted to persons whose settlement
here was deemed likely to influence colonization. Whole townships were in
some cases conferred, upon condition that the grantees would settle the
same with a certain number of colonists within a reasonable time. One of
these grantees was the William Willcocks above mentioned, who was a man
of much enterprise and philanthropy. He conceived the idea of obtaining a
grant of a large tract of land, and of settling it with emigrants of his
own choosing, with himself as a sort of feudal proprietor at their head.
With this object in view he came out to Canada in or about the year 1790,
to spy out the land, and to judge from personal inspection which would be
the most advantageous site for his projected colony. In setting out upon
this quest he enjoyed an advantage greater even than was conferred by his
social position. A cousin of his, Mr. Peter Russell, a member of the Irish
branch of the Bedfordshire family of Russell, had already been out to
Canada, and had brought home glowing accounts of the prospects held out
there to persons of capital and enterprise. Mr. Russell had originally gone
to America during the progress of the Revolutionary War, in the capacity of
Secretary to Sir Henry Clinton, Commander-in-chief of the British forces
on this continent. He had seen and heard enough to convince him that the
acquisition of land in Canada was certain to prove a royal road to wealth.
After the close of the war he returned to the Old Country, and gave his
relatives the benefit of his experience. Mr. Russell also came out to
Canada with Governor Simcoe in 1792, in the capacity of Inspector-General.
He subsequently held several important, offices of trust in Upper Canada.
He became a member of the Executive Council, and as the senior member of
that body the administration, of the Government devolved upon him during
the three years (1796-1799) intervening between Governor Simcoe's departure
from Canada, and the appointment of Major-General Peter Hunter as
Lieutenant-Governor. His residence in Canada, as will presently be seen,
was destined to have an important bearing on the fortunes of the Baldwin
family. Meanwhile, it is sufficient to note the fact that it was largely
in consequence of the valuable topographical and statistical information,
furnished by him to his cousin William Willcocks that the latter was
induced to set out on his preliminary tour of Asenation.
The result of this preliminary tour was to convince Mr. Willcocks that his
cousin had not overstated the capabilities of the country, as to the future
of which he formed the most sanguine expectations. The next step to be
taken was to obtain his grant; and, as his political influence in and
around his native city was considerable, he conceived that this would be
easily managed. He returned home, and almost immediately afterwards crossed
over to England, where he opened negotiations with the Government. After
some delay he succeeded in obtaining a grant of a large tract of land
forming part of the present Township of Whitchurch, in the County of York.
In consideration of this liberal grant he on his part agreed to settle
not fewer than sixty colonists on the laud so granted within a certain
specified time. An Order in Council confirmatory of this arrangement seems
to have been passed. The rest of the transaction is involved in some
obscurity. Mr. Willcocks returned to Ireland, and was soon afterwards
elected Mayor of Cork--an office which he had held at least once before his
American tour. Municipal and other affairs occupied so much of his time
that he neglected to take steps for settling his trans-Atlantic domain
until the period allowed him by Government for that purpose had nearly
expired. However, in course of time--probably in the summer of 1797--he
embarked with the full complement of emigrants for New York, whither they
arrived after a long and stormy voyage. They pushed on without unnecessary
delay, and in due coarse arrived at Oswego, where Mr. Willcocks received
the disastrous intelligence that the Order in Council embodying his
arrangement with the Government had been revoked.
Why the revocation took place does not appear, as no change of Government
had taken place, and the circumstances had not materially changed. Whatever
the reason may have been the consequences to Mr. Willcocks and his
emigrants were very serious. The poor Irish families who had accompanied
him to the New World--travel-worn and helpless, in a strange land, without
means, and without experience in the hard lines of pioneer life--were
dismayed at the prospect before them. Mr. Wilcocks, a kind and honourable
man, naturally felt himself to be in a manner responsible for their forlorn
situation. He at once professed his readiness to bear the expense of their
return to their native land. Most of them availed themselves of this offer,
and made the best of their way back to Ireland--some of them, doubtless, to
take part in the rising of '98. A few of them elected to remain in America,
and scattered themselves here and there throughout the State of New York.
Mr. Wilcocks himself, accompanied by one or two families, continued his
journey to Canada, where he soon succeeded in securing a considerable
allotment of land in Whitchurch and elsewhere. It is probable that he was
treated liberally by the Government, as his generosity to the emigrants had
greatly impoverished him, and it is certain that a few years later he was
the possessor of large means. Almost immediately after his arrival in
Canada he took up his abode at York, where he continued to reside down to
the time of his death. Being a man of education and business capacity he
was appointed Judge of the Home District Court, where we shall soon meet
him again in tracing the fortunes of the Baldwin family. He had not been
long in Canada before he wrote home flattering reports about the land of
his adoption to his old friend Robert Baldwin, the grandfather of the
subject of this sketch. Mr. Baldwin was a gentleman of good family and some
means, who owned and resided on a small property called Summer Hill, or
Knockmore, near Cairagoline, in the County of Cork. Influenced by the
prospects held out to him by Mr. Willcocks, he emigrated to Canada with his
family in the summer of 1798, and settled on a block of land on the north
shore of Lake Ontario, in what is now the Township of Clarke, in the County
of Durham. He named his newly-acquired estate Annarva (Ann's Field), and
set about clearing and cultivating it. The western boundary of his farm was
a small stream much until then was nameless, but which has ever since been
known in local parlance as Baldwin's Creek. Here he resided for a period of
fourteen years, when he removed to York, where he died in the year 1816. He
had brought with him from Ireland two sons and four daughters. The eldest
son, William Warren Baldwin, was destined to achieve considerable local
renown as a lawyer and a politician. He was a man of versatile talents, and
of much firmness and energy of character. He had studied medicine at the
University of Edinburgh, and had graduated there two years before
his emigration, but had never practised his profession as a means of
livelihood. He had not been many weeks in this country before he perceived
that his shortest way to wealth and influence was by way of the legal
rather than the medical profession. In those remote times, men of education
and mental ability were by no means numerous in Upper Canada. Every man was
called upon to play several parts, and there was no such organization
of labour as exists in older and more advanced communities. Dr. Baldwin
resolved to practice both professions, and, in order to fit himself for the
one by which he hoped to rise most speedily to eminence, he bade adieu to
the farm on Baldwin's Creek and came up to York. He took up his quarters
with his father's friend and his own, Mr. Willcocks, who lived on Duke
street, near the present site of the La Salle Institute. In order to
support himself while prosecuting his legal studies, he determined to
take in a few pupils. In several successive numbers of the _Gazette and
Oracle_--the one newspaper published in the Province at that time--we
find in the months of December, 1802, and January, 1803, the following
advertisement:--"Dr. Baldwin, understanding that some of the gentlemen of
this town have expressed some anxiety for the establishment of a Classical
School, begs leave to inform them and the public that he intends, on
Monday, the first day of January next, to open a School, in which he will
instruct Twelve Boys in Writing, Reading, Classics and Arithmetic. The
terms are, for each boy, eight guineas per annum, to be paid quarterly or
half-yearly; one guinea entrance and one cord of wood to be supplied by
each of the boys on opening the School. N.B.--Mr. Baldwin will meet his
pupils at. Mr. Willcocks' house on Duke street. York, December 18th, 1802."
This advertisement produced the desired effect. The Doctor got all the
pupils he wanted, and several youths, who, in after life; rose to high
eminence in the colony, received their earliest classical teaching from
him.
It was not necessary at that early day that a youth should spend a fixed
term in an office under articles as a preliminary for practice, either at
the Bar or as an attorney. On the 9th of July, 1794, during the regime
of Governor Simcoe, an act had been passed authorizing the Governor,
Lieutenant-Governor, or person administering the Government of the
Province, to issue licenses to practise as advocates and attorneys to such
persons, not exceeding sixteen in number, as he might deem fit. We have no
means of ascertaining how many persons availed themselves of this statute,
as no complete record of their names or number is in existence. The
original record is presumed to have been burned when the Houses of
Parliament were destroyed during the American invasion in 1813. It is
sufficient for our present purpose to know that Dr. Baldwin was one of the
persons so licensed. By reference to the Journals of the Law Society at
Osgoode Hall, we find that this license was granted on the 6th of April,
1803, by Lieutenant-Governor Peter Hunter. We further find that on the same
day similar licenses were granted to four other gentlemen, all of whom were
destined to become well-known citizens of Canada, viz., William Dickson,
D'Arcy Boulton, John Powell, and William Elliott. Dr. Baldwin, having
undergone an examination before Chief Justice Henry Alcock, and having
received his license, authorizing him to practise in all branches of the
legal profession, married Miss Phoebe Willcocks, the daughter of his
friend and patron, and settled down to active practice as a barrister and
attorney. He took up his abode in a house which had just been erected
by his father-in-law, on what is now the north-west corner of Front and
Frederick streets. [It may here be noted that Front Street was then known
as Palace Street, from the circumstance that it led down to the Parliament
buildings at the east end of the town, and because it was believed that the
official residence or "palace" of the Governor would be built there.] Here,
on the, 12th of May, 1804, was born Dr. Baldwin's eldest son, known to
Canadian history as Robert Baldwin.
The plain, unpretending structure in which Robert-Baldwin first saw light
has a history of its own. Dr. Baldwin resided in it only about three years,
when he removed to a small house, long since demolished, on the corner of
Bay and Front streets. Thenceforward the house at the foot of Frederick
Street was occupied by several tenants whose names are famous in local
annals. About 1825 it was first occupied by Mr. William Lyon Mackenzie, who
continued to reside in it for several years. It was here that the _Colonial
Advocate_ was published by that gentleman, at the time when his office was
wrecked and the type thrown into the bay by a "genteel mob," a farther
account of which lawless transaction will be found in the sketch of the
life of W. L. Mackenzie, included in the present series. The building
subsequently came into the possession of the Cawthra family--called by
Dr. Scadding "the Astors of Upper Canada"--who carried on a large and
marvellously successful mercantile business within its walls. It was
finally burned down in the winter of 1854-5.
Dr. Baldwin applied himself to the practice of his several professions
with an energy and assiduity which deserved and secured a full measure of
success. His legal business was the most profitable of his pursuits, but in
the early years of his residence at York he seems to have also had a fair
share of medical practice. It might not unreasonably have been supposed
that the labour arising from these two sources of employment would have
been sufficient for the energies and ambition of any man; but we find that
for at least two years subsequent to his marriage he continued to take in
pupils. Half a century later than the period at which we have arrived, Sir
John Beverley Robinson, then a baronet, and Chief Justice of the Province,
was wont to pleasantly remind the subject of this sketch that their mutual
acquaintance dated from a very early period in the latter's career. At the
time of Robert Baldwin's birth, John Robinson, then a boy in his thirteenth
year, was one of a class of seven pupils who attended daily at Dr.
Baldwin's house for classical instruction. Two or three days after the
Doctor's first-born came into the world, Master Robinson was taken into the
nursery to see "the new baby." Differences of political opinion in after
years separated them far as the poles asunder on most public questions,
but they never ceased to regard each other with personal respect. The late
Chief Justice Maclean was another pupil of Dr. Baldwin's, and distinctly
remembered that a holiday was granted to himself and his fellow students on
the day of the embryo statesman's birth. Doctor Baldwin seems to have
been fully equal to the multifarious calls upon his energies, and to
have exercised his various callings with satisfaction alike to clients,
patients, and pupils. It was no uncommon occurrence in those early days,
when surgeons were scarce in our young capital, for him to be compelled to
leave court in the middle of a trial, and to hurry away to splice a broken
arm or bind up a fractured limb. Years afterwards, when he had retired from
the active practice of all his professions, he used to cite a somewhat
ludicrous instance of his professional versatility. It occurred soon after
his marriage. He was engaged in arguing a case of some importance before
his father-in-law, Judge Willcocks, in the Home District Court, when a
messenger hurriedly arrived to summon him to attend at the advent of a
little stranger into the world. The circumstances were, explained to the
Judge, and--it appearing that no other surgical aid was to be had at
the moment--that functionary readily consented to adjourn the further
consideration of the argument until Dr. Baldwin's return. The latter
hurriedly left the court-room with the messenger, and after the lapse of
somewhat more than an hour, again presented himself and prepared to resume
his interrupted argument. The Judge ventured to express a hope that matters
had gone well with the patient; whereupon the Doctor replied, "Quite well.
I have much pleasure in informing your Honour that a man-child has been
born into the world during my absence, and that both he and his mother are
doing well." The worthy Doctor received the congratulations of the Court,
and was permitted to conclude his argument without any further demands upon
his surgical skill.
Almost from the outset of his professional career, Dr. Baldwin took a
strong interest in political matters. The fact that he was compelled to
earn his living by honest labour, excluded him from a certain narrow
section of the society of Little York. The society from which he was
excluded, however, was by no means of an intellectual cast, and it is
not likely that he sustained much loss by his exclusion. By intellectual
society in Toronto, he was regarded as a decided acquisition. He could well
afford to despise the petty littleness of the would-be aristocrats of the
Provincial capital. Still, it is probable that his political convictions
were intensified by observing that, among the members of the clique above
referred to; mere merit was regarded as a commodity of little account. He
became known for a man of advanced ideas, and was not slow in expressing
his disapprobation of the way in which government was carried on whenever a
more than ordinarily flagrant instance of injustice occurred. In 1812, he
became treasurer of the law Society of Upper Canada, and while filling that
position, he projected a scheme for constructing a suitable building for
the Society's occupation. The times, however, were impropitious for such
a scheme, which fell through in consequence of the impending war with the
United States.