The United Empire Loyalists
by
W. Stewart Wallace
Part 2 out of 2
hundred and eighty persons, and during the remainder of
the year a couple of hundred went from Shelburne. At the
end of 1784, therefore, it is safe to assume that there
were nearly six hundred on the island, or about one-fifth
of the total population.
These refugees found great difficulty in obtaining the
grants of land promised to them. They were allowed to
take up their residence on certain lands, being assured
that their titles were secure; and then, after they had
cleared the lands, erected buildings, planted orchards,
and made other improvements, they were told that their
titles lacked validity, and they were forced to move.
Written title-deeds were withheld on every possible
pretext, and when they were granted they were found to
contain onerous conditions out of harmony with the promises
made. The object of the proprietors, in inflicting these
persecutions, seems to have been to force the settlers
to become tenants instead of freeholders. Even Colonel
Edmund Fanning, the Loyalist lieutenant-governor, was
implicated in this conspiracy. Fanning was one of the
proprietors in Township No. 50. The settlers in this
township, being unable to obtain their grants, resolved
to send a remonstrance to the British government, and
chose as their representative one of their number who
had known Lord Cornwallis during the war, hoping through
him to obtain redress. This agent was on the point of
leaving for England, when news of his intention reached
Colonel Fanning. The ensuing result was as prompt as it
was significant: within a week afterwards nearly all the
Loyalists in Township No. 50 had obtained their grants.
Others, however, did not have friends in high places,
and were unable to obtain redress. The minutes of council
which contained the records of many of the allotments
were not entered in the regular Council Book, but were
kept on loose sheets; and thus the unfortunate settlers
were not able to prove by the Council Book that their
lands had been allotted them. When the rough minutes were
discovered years later, they were found to bear evidence,
in erasures and the use of different inks, of having been
tampered with.
For seventy-five years the Loyalists continued to agitate
for justice. As early as 1790 the island legislature
passed an act empowering the governor to give grants to
those who had not yet received them from the proprietors.
But this measure did not entirely redress the grievances,
and after a lapse of fifty years a petition of the
descendants of the Loyalists led to further action in
the matter. In 1840 a bill was passed by the House of
Assembly granting relief to the Loyalists, but was thrown
out by the Legislative Council. As late as 1860 the
question was still troubling the island politics. In that
year a land commission was appointed, which reported that
there were Loyalists who still had claims on the local
government, and recommended that free grants should be
made to such as could prove that their fathers had been
attracted to the island under promises which had never
been fulfilled.
Such is the unlovely story of how the Loyalists were
persecuted in the Island of St John, under the British
flag.
CHAPTER IX
THE LOYALISTS IN QUEBEC
It was a tribute to the stability of British rule in the
newly-won province of Quebec that at the very beginning
of the Revolutionary War loyal refugees began to flock
across the border. As early as June 2, 1774, Colonel
Christie, stationed at St Johns on the Richelieu, wrote
to Sir Frederick Haldimand at Quebec notifying him of
the arrival of immigrants; and it is interesting to note
that at that early date he already complained of 'their
unreasonable expectations.' In the years 1775 and 1776
large bodies of persecuted Loyalists from the Mohawk
valley came north with Sir John Johnson and Colonel
Butler; and in these years was formed in Canada the first
of the Loyalist regiments. It was not, however, until
the defeat of Burgoyne at Saratoga in 1778 that the full
tide of immigration set in. Immediately thereafter
Haldimand wrote to Lord George Germain, under date of
October 14, 1778, reporting the arrival of 'loyalists in
great distress,' seeking refuge from the revolted provinces.
Haldimand lost no time in making provision for their
reception. He established a settlement for them at
Machiche, near Three Rivers, which he placed under the
superintendence of a compatriot and a protege of his
named Conrad Gugy. The captains of militia in the
neighbourhood were ordered to help build barracks for
the refugees, provisions were secured from the merchants
at Three Rivers, and everything in reason was done to
make the unfortunates comfortable. By the autumn of 1778
there were in Canada, at Machiche and other places, more
than one thousand refugees, men, women, and children,
exclusive of those who had enlisted in the regiments.
Including the troops, probably no less than three thousand
had found their way to Canada.
With the conclusion of peace came a great rush to the
north. The resources of government were strained to the
utmost to provide for the necessities of the thousands
who flocked over the border-line. At Chambly, St Johns,
Montreal, Sorel, Machiche, Quebec, officers of government
were stationed to dole out supplies. At Quebec alone in
March 1784 one thousand three hundred and thirty-eight
'friends of government' were being fed at the public
expense. At Sorel a settlement was established similar
to that at Machiche. The seigneury of Sorel had been
purchased by the government in 1780 for military purposes,
and when the war was over it was turned into a Loyalist
reserve, on which huts were erected and provisions
dispensed. In all, there must have been nearly seven
thousand Loyalists in the province of Quebec in the winter
of 1783-84.
Complete details are lacking with regard to the temporary
encampments in which the Loyalists were hived; but there
are evidences that they were not entirely satisfied with
the manner in which they were looked after. One of the
earliest of Canadian county histories, [Footnote: _Dundas,
or a Sketch of Canadian History_, by James Croil, Montreal,
1861.] a book partly based on traditionary sources, has
some vague tales about the cruelty and malversation
practised by a Frenchman under whom the Loyalists were
placed at 'Mishish.' 'Mishish' is obviously a phonetic
spelling of Machiche, and 'the Frenchman' is probably
Conrad Gugy. Some letters in the Dominion Archives point
in the same direction. Under date of April 29, the
governor's secretary writes to Stephen De Lancey, the
inspector of the Loyalists, referring to 'the uniform
discontent of the Loyalists at Machiche.' The discontent,
he explains, is excited by a few ill-disposed persons.
'The sickness they complain of has been common throughout
the province, and should have lessened rather than
increased the consumption of provisions.' A Loyalist who
writes to the governor, putting his complaints on paper,
is assured that 'His Excellency is anxious to do everything
in his power for the Loyalists, but if what he can do
does not come up to the expectation of him and those he
represents, His Excellency gives the fullest permission
to them to seek redress in such manner as they shall
think best.'
What degree of justice there was in the complaints of
the refugees it is now difficult to determine. No doubt
some of them were confirmed grumblers, and many of them
had what Colonel Christie called 'unreasonable
expectations.' Nothing is more certain than that Sir
Frederick Haldimand spared no effort to accommodate the
Loyalists. On the other hand, it would be rash to assert
that in the confusion which then reigned there were no
grievances of which they could justly complain.
In the spring and summer of 1784 the great majority of
the refugees within the limits of the province of Quebec
were removed to what was afterwards known as Upper Canada.
But some remained, and swelled the number of the 'old
subjects' in the French province. Considerable settlements
were made at two places. One of these was Sorel, where
the seigneury that had been bought by the crown was
granted out to the new-comers in lots; the other was in
the Gaspe peninsula, on the shores of the Gulf of St
Lawrence and of Chaleur Bay. The seigneury of Sorel was
well peopled, for each grantee received only sixty acres
and a town lot, taking the rest of his allotment in some
of the newer settlements. The settlement in the Gaspe
peninsula was more sparse; the chief centre of population
was the tiny fishing village of Paspebiac. In addition
to these settlements, some of the exiles took up land on
private seigneuries; these, however, were not many, for
the government discouraged the practice, and refused
supplies to all who did not settle on the king's land.
At the present time, of all these Loyalist groups in the
province of Quebec scarce a trace remains: they have all
been swallowed up in the surrounding French population.
The Eastern Townships in the province of Quebec were not
settled by the United Empire Loyalists. In 1783 Sir
Frederick Haldimand set his face like flint against any
attempt on the part of the Loyalists to settle the lands
lying along the Vermont frontier. He feared that a
settlement there would prove a permanent thorn in the
flesh of the Americans, and might lead to much trouble
and friction. He wished that these lands should be left
unsettled for a time, and that, in the end, they should
be settled by French Canadians 'as an antidote to the
restless New England population.' Some of the more daring
Loyalists, in spite of the prohibition of the governor,
ventured to settle on Missisquoi Bay. When the governor
heard of it, he sent orders to the officer commanding at
St Johns that they should be removed as soon as the season
should admit of it; and instructions were given that if
any other Loyalists settled there, their houses were to
be destroyed. By these drastic means the government kept
the Eastern Townships a wilderness until after 1791, when
the townships were granted out in free and common socage,
and American settlers began to flock in. But, as will be
explained, these later settlers have no just claim to
the appellation of United Empire Loyalists.
CHAPTER X
THE WESTERN SETTLEMENTS
Sir Frederick Haldimand Offered the Loyalists a wide choice
of places in which to settle. He was willing to make land
grants on Chaleur Bay, at Gaspe, on the north shore of
the St Lawrence above Montreal, on the Bay of Quinte, at
Niagara, or along the Detroit river; and if none of these
places was suitable, he offered to transport to Nova
Scotia or Cape Breton those who wished to go thither. At
all these places settlements of Loyalists sprang up. That
at Niagara grew to considerable importance, and became
after the division of the province in 1791 the capital
of Upper Canada. But by far the largest settlement was
that which Haldimand planned along the north shore of
the St Lawrence and Lake Ontario between the western
boundary of the government of Quebec and Cataraqui (now
Kingston), east of the Bay of Quinte. Here the great
majority of the Loyalists in Canada were concentrated.
As soon as Haldimand received instructions from England
with regard to the granting of the lands he gave orders
to Major Samuel Holland, surveyor-general of the king's
territories in North America, to proceed with the work
of making the necessary surveys. Major Holland, taking
with him as assistants Lieutenants Kotte and Sutherland
and deputy-surveyors John Collins and Patrick McNish,
set out in the early autumn of 1783, and before the winter
closed in he had completed the survey of five townships
bordering on the Bay of Quinte. The next spring his men
returned, and surveyed eight townships along the north
bank of the St Lawrence, between the Bay of Quinte and
the provincial boundary. These townships are now
distinguished by names, but in 1783-84 they were designated
merely by numbers; thus for many years the old inhabitants
referred to the townships of Osnaburg, Williamsburg, and
Matilda, for instance, as the 'third town,' the 'fourth
town,' and the 'fifth town.' The surveys were made in
great haste, and, it is to be feared, not with great
care; for some tedious lawsuits arose out of the
discrepancies contained in them, and a generation later
Robert Gourlay wrote that 'one of the present surveyors
informed me that in running new lines over a great extent
of the province, he found spare room for a whole township
in the midst of those laid out at an early period.' Each
township was subdivided into lots of two hundred acres
each, and a town-site was selected in each case which
was subdivided into town lots.
The task of transporting the settlers from their
camping-places at Sorel, Machiche, and St Johns to their
new homes up the St Lawrence was one of some magnitude.
General Haldimand was not able himself to oversee the
work; but he appointed Sir John Johnson as superintendent,
and the work of settlement went on under Johnson's care.
On a given day the Loyalists were ordered to strike camp,
and proceed in a body to the new settlements. Any who
remained behind without sufficient excuse had their
rations stopped. Bateaux took the settlers up the St
Lawrence, and the various detachments were disembarked
at their respective destinations. It had been decided
that the settlers should be placed on the land as far as
possible according to the corps in which they had served
during the war, and that care should be taken to have
the Protestant and Roman Catholic members of a corps
settled separately. It was this arrangement which brought
about the grouping of Protestant and Roman Catholic
Scottish Highlanders in Glengarry. The first battalion
of the King's Royal Regiment of New York was settled on
the first five townships west of the provincial boundary.
This was Sir John Johnson's regiment, and most of its
members were his Scottish dependants from the Mohawk
valley. The next three townships were settled by part of
Jessup's Corps, an offshoot of Sir John Johnson's regiment.
Of the Cataraqui townships the first was settled by a
band of New York Loyalists, many of them of Dutch or
German extraction, commanded by Captain Michael Grass.
On the second were part of Jessup's Corps; on the third
and fourth were a detachment of the second battalion of
the King's Royal Regiment of New York, which had been
stationed at Oswego across the lake at the close of the
war, a detachment of Rogers's Rangers, and a party of
New York Loyalists under Major Van Alstine. The parties
commanded by Grass and Van Alstine had come by ship from
New York to Quebec after the evacuation of New York in
1783. On the fifth township were various detachments of
disbanded regular troops, and even a handful of disbanded
German mercenaries.
As soon as the settlers had been placed on the townships
to which they had been assigned, they received their
allotments of land. The surveyor was the land agent, and
the allotments were apportioned by each applicant drawing
a lot out of a hat. This democratic method of allotting
lands roused the indignation of some of the officers who
had settled with their men. They felt that they should
have been given the front lots, unmindful of the fact
that their grants as officers were from five to ten times
as large as the grants which their men received. Their
protests, contained in a letter of Captain Grass to the
governor, roused Haldimand to a display of warmth to
which he was as a rule a stranger. Captain Grass and his
associates, he wrote, were to get no special privileges,
'the most of them who came into the province with him
being, in fact, mechanics, only removed from one situation
to practise their trade in another. Mr Grass should,
therefore, think himself very well off to draw lots in
common with the Loyalists.' A good deal of difficulty
arose also from the fact that many allotments were inferior
to the rest from an agricultural point of view; but
difficulties of this sort were adjusted by Johnson and
Holland on the spot.
By 1784 nearly all the settlers were destitute and
completely dependent on the generosity of the British
government. They had no effects; they had no money; and
in many cases they were sorely in need of clothes. The
way in which Sir Frederick Haldimand came to their relief
is deserving of high praise. If he had adhered to the
letter of his instructions from England, the position of
the Loyalists would have been a most unenviable one.
Repeatedly, however, Haldimand took on his own shoulders
the responsibility of ignoring or disobeying the
instructions from England, and trusted to chance that
his protests would prevent the government from repudiating
his actions. When the home government, for instance,
ordered a reduction of the rations, Haldimand undertook
to continue them in full; and fortunately for him the
home government, on receipt of his protest, rescinded
the order.
The settlers on the Upper St Lawrence and the Bay of
Quinte did not perhaps fare as well as those in Nova
Scotia, or even the Mohawk Indians who settled on the
Grand river. They did not receive lumber for building
purposes, and 'bricks for the inside of their chimneys,
and a little assistance of nails,' as did the former;
nor did they receive ploughs and church-bells, as did
the latter. For building lumber they had to wait until
saw-mills were constructed; instead of ploughs they had
at first to use hoes and spades, and there were not quite
enough hoes and spades to go round. Still, they did not
fare badly. When the difficulty of transporting things
up the St Lawrence is remembered, it is remarkable that
they obtained as much as they did. In the first place
they were supplied with clothes for three years, or until
they were able to provide clothes for themselves. These
consisted of coarse cloth for trousers and Indian blankets
for coats. Boots they made out of skins or heavy cloth.
Tools for building were given them: to each family were
given an ax and a hand-saw, though unfortunately the axes
were short-handled ship's axes, ill-adapted to cutting
in the forest; to each group of two families were allotted
a whip-saw and a cross-cut saw; and to each group of five
families was supplied a set of tools, containing chisels,
augers, draw-knives, etc. To each group of five families
was also allotted 'one fire-lock ... intended for the
messes, the pigeon and wildfowl season'; but later on a
fire-lock was supplied to every head of a family. Haldimand
went to great trouble in obtaining seed-wheat for the
settlers, sending agents down even into Vermont and the
Mohawk valley to obtain all that was to be had; he
declined, however, to supply stock for the farms, and
although eventually he obtained some cattle, there were
not nearly enough cows to go round. In many cases the
soldiers were allowed the loan of the military tents;
and everything was done to have saw-mills and grist-mills
erected in the most convenient places with the greatest
possible dispatch. In the meantime small portable
grist-mills, worked by hand, were distributed among the
settlers.
Among the papers relating to the Loyalists in the Canadian
Archives there is an abstract of the numbers of the
settlers in the five townships at Cataraqui and the eight
townships on the St Lawrence. There were altogether 1,568
men, 626 women, 1,492 children, and 90 servants, making
a total of 3,776 persons. These were, of course, only
the original settlers. As time went on others were added.
Many of the soldiers had left their families in the States
behind them, and these families now hastened to cross
the border. A proclamation had been issued by the British
government inviting those Loyalists who still remained
in the States to assemble at certain places along the
frontier, namely, at Isle aux Noix, at Sackett's Harbour,
at Oswego, and at Niagara. The favourite route was the
old trail from the Mohawk valley to Oswego, where was
stationed a detachment of the 34th regiment. From Oswego
these refugees crossed to Cataraqui. 'Loyalists,' wrote
an officer at Cataraqui in the summer of 1784, 'are coming
in daily across the lake.' To accommodate these new
settlers three more townships had to be mapped out at
the west end of the Bay of Quinte.
For the first few years the Cataraqui settlers had a
severe struggle for existence. Most of them arrived in
1784, too late to attempt to sow fall wheat; and it was
several seasons before their crops became nearly adequate
for food. The difficulties of transportation up the St
Lawrence rendered the arrival of supplies irregular and
uncertain. Cut off as they were from civilization by the
St Lawrence rapids, they were in a much less advantageous
position than the great majority of the Nova Scotia and
New Brunswick settlers, who were situated near the
sea-coast. They had no money, and as the government
refused to send them specie, they were compelled to fall
back on barter as a means of trade, with the result that
all trade was local and trivial. In the autumn of 1787
the crops failed, and in 1788 famine stalked through the
land. There are many legends about what was known as 'the
hungry year.' If we are to believe local tradition, some
of the settlers actually died of starvation. In the family
papers of one family is to be found a story about an old
couple who were saved from starvation only by the pigeons
which they were able to knock over. A member of another
family testifies: 'We had the luxury of a cow which the
family brought with them, and had it not been for this
domestic boon, all would have perished in the year of
scarcity.' Two hundred acre lots were sold for a few
pounds of flour. A valuable cow, in one case, was sold
for eight bushels of potatoes; a three-year-old horse
was exchanged for half a hundredweight of flour. Bran
was used for making cakes; and leeks, buds of trees, and
even leaves, were ground into food.
The summer of 1789, however, brought relief to the
settlers, and though, for many years, comforts and even
necessaries were scarce, yet after 1791, the year in
which the new settlements were erected into the province
of Upper Canada, it may be said that most of the settlers
had been placed on their feet. The soil was fruitful;
communication and transportation improved; and metallic
currency gradually found its way into the settlements.
When Mrs Simcoe, the wife of the lieutenant-governor,
passed through the country in 1792, she was struck by
the neatness of the farms of the Dutch and German settlers
from the Mohawk valley, and by the high quality of the
wheat. 'I observed on my way thither,' she says in her
diary, 'that the wheat appeared finer than any I have
seen in England, and totally free from weeds.' And a few
months later an anonymous English traveller, passing the
same way, wrote: 'In so infant a settlement, it would
have been irrational to expect that abundance which bursts
the granaries, and lows in the stalls of more cultivated
countries. There was, however, that kind of appearance
which indicated that with economy and industry, there
would be enough.'
Next in size to the settlements at Cataraqui and on the
Upper St Lawrence was the settlement at Niagara. During
the war Niagara had been a haven of refuge for the
Loyalists of Pennsylvania and the frontier districts,
just as Oswego and St Johns had been havens of refuge
for the Loyalists of northern and western New York. As
early as 1776 there arrived at Fort George, Niagara, in
a starving condition, five women and thirty-six children,
bearing names which are still to be found in the Niagara
peninsula. From that date until the end of the war refugees
continued to come in. Many of these refugees were the
families of the men and officers of the Loyalist troops
stationed at Niagara. On September 27, 1783, for instance,
the officer commanding at Niagara reports the arrival
from Schenectady of the wives of two officers of Butler's
Rangers, with a number of children. Some of these people
went down the lake to Montreal; but others remained at
the post, and 'squatted' on the land. In 1780 Colonel
Butler reports to Haldimand that four or five families
have settled and built houses, and he requests that they
be given seed early in the spring. In 1781 we know that
a Loyalist named Robert Land had squatted on Burlington
Bay, at the head of Lake Ontario. In 1783 Lieutenant
Tinling was sent to Niagara to survey lots, and Sergeant
Brass of the 84th was sent to build a saw-mill and a
grist-mill. At the same time Butler's Rangers, who were
stationed at the fort, were disbanded; and a number of
them were induced to take up land. They took up land on
the west side of the river, because, although, according
to the terms of peace, Fort George was not given up by
the British until 1796, the river was to constitute the
boundary between the two countries. A return of the rise
and progress of the settlement made in May 1784 shows a
total of forty-six settlers (that is, heads of families),
with forty-four houses and twenty barns. The return makes
it clear that cultivation had been going on for some
time. There were 713 acres cleared, 123 acres sown in
wheat, and 342 acres waiting to be sown; and the farms
were very well stocked, there being an average of about
three horses and four or five cows to each settler.
With regard to the settlement at Detroit, there is not
much evidence available. It was Haldimand's intention at
first to establish a large settlement there, but the
difficulties of communication doubtless proved to be
insuperable. In the event, however, some of Butler's
Rangers settled there. Captain Bird of the Rangers applied
for and received a grant of land on which he made a
settlement; and in the summer of 1784 we find Captain
Caldwell and some others applying for deeds for the land
and houses they occupied. In 1783 the commanding officer
at Detroit reported the arrival from Red Creek of two
men, 'one a Girty, the other McCarty,' who had come to
see what encouragement there was to settle under the
British government. They asserted that several hundred
more would be glad to come if sufficient inducements were
offered them, as they saw before them where they were
nothing but persecution. In 1784 Jehu Hay, the British
lieutenant-governor of Detroit, sent in lists of men
living near Fort Pitt who were anxious to settle under
the British government if they could get lands, most of
them being men who had served in the Highland and 60th
regiments. But it is safe to assume that no large number
of these ever settled near Detroit, for when Hay arrived
in Detroit in the summer of 1784, he found only one
Loyalist at the post itself. There had been for more than
a generation a settlement of French Canadians at Detroit;
but it was not until after 1791 that the English element
became at all considerable.
It has been estimated that in the country above Montreal
in 1783 there were ten thousand Loyalists, and that by
1791 this number had increased to twenty-five thousand.
These figures are certainly too large. Pitt's estimate
of the population of Upper Canada in 1791 was only ten
thousand. This is probably much nearer the mark. The
overwhelming majority of these people were of very humble
origin. Comparatively few of the half-pay officers settled
above Montreal before 1791; and most of these were, as
Haldimand said, 'mechanics, only removed from one situation
to practise their trade in another.' Major Van Alstine,
it appears, was a blacksmith before he came to Canada.
That many of the Loyalists were illiterate is evident
from the testimony of the Rev. William Smart, a Presbyterian
clergyman who came to Upper Canada in 1811: 'There were
but few of the U. E. Loyalists who possessed a complete
education. He was personally acquainted with many,
especially along the St Lawrence and Bay of Quinte, and
by no means were all educated, or men of judgment; even
the half-pay officers, many of them, had but a limited
education.' The aristocrats of the 'Family Compact' party
did not come to Canada with the Loyalists of 1783; they
came, in most cases, after 1791, some of them from Britain,
such as Bishop Strachan, and some of them from New
Brunswick and Nova Scotia, such as the Jarvises and the
Robinsons. This fact is one which serves to explain a
great deal in Upper Canadian history.
CHAPTER XI
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.
CHAPTER XII
THE AMERICAN MIGRATION
From the first the problem of governing the settlements
above Montreal perplexed the authorities. It was very
early proposed to erect them into a separate province,
as New Brunswick had been erected into a separate province.
But Lord Dorchester was opposed to any such arrangement.
'It appears to me,' he wrote to Lord Sydney, 'that the
western settlements are as yet unprepared for any
organization superior to that of a county.' In 1787,
therefore, the country west of Montreal was divided into
four districts, for a time named Lunenburg, Mecklenburg,
Nassau, and Hesse. Lunenburg stretched from the western
boundary of the province of Quebec to the Gananoqui;
Mecklenburg, from the Gananoqui to the Trent, flowing
into the Bay of Quinte; Nassau, from the Trent to a line
drawn due north from Long Point on Lake Erie; and Hesse,
from this line to Detroit. We do not know who was
responsible for inflicting these names on a new and
unoffending country. Perhaps they were thought a compliment
to the Hanoverian ruler of England. Fortunately they were
soon dropped, and the names Eastern, Midland, Home, and
Western were substituted.
This division of the settlements proved only temporary.
It left the Loyalists under the arbitrary system of
government set up in Quebec by the Quebec Act of 1774,
under which they enjoyed no representative institutions
whatever. It was not long before petitions began to pour
in from them asking that they should be granted a
representative assembly. Undoubtedly Lord Dorchester had
underestimated the desire among them for representative
institutions. In 1791, therefore, the country west of
the Ottawa river, with the exception of a triangle of
land at the junction of the Ottawa and the St Lawrence,
was erected by the Constitutional Act into a separate
province, with the name of Upper Canada; and this province
was granted a representative assembly of fifteen members.
The lieutenant-governor appointed for the new province
was Colonel John Graves Simcoe. During the war Colonel
Simcoe had been the commanding officer of the Queen's
Rangers, which had been largely composed of Loyalists,
and he was therefore not unfitted to govern the new
province. He was theoretically under the control of Lord
Dorchester at Quebec; but his relations with Dorchester
were somewhat strained, and he succeeded in making himself
virtually independent in his western jurisdiction. Though
he seemed phlegmatic, he possessed a vigorous and
enterprising disposition, and he planned great things
for Upper Canada. He explored the country in search of
the best site for a capital; and it is interesting to
know that he had such faith in the future of Upper Canada
that he actually contemplated placing the capital in what
was then the virgin wilderness about the river Thames.
He inaugurated a policy of building roads and improving
communications which showed great foresight; and he
entered upon an immigration propaganda, by means of
proclamations advertising free land grants, which brought
a great increase of population to the province.
Simcoe believed that there were still in the United States
after 1791 many people who had remained loyal at heart
to Great Britain, and who were profoundly dissatisfied
with their lot under the new American government. It was
his object to attract these people to Upper Canada by
means of his proclamations; and there is no doubt that
he was partly successful. But he also attracted many who
had no other motive in coming to Canada than their desire
to obtain free land grants, and whose attachment to the
British crown was of the most recent origin. These people
were freely branded by the original settlers as 'Americans';
and there is no doubt that in many cases the name expressed
their real sympathies.
The War of the Revolution had hardly been brought to a
conclusion when some of the Americans showed a tendency
to migrate into Canada. In 1783, when the American Colonel
Willet was attempting an attack on the British garrison
at Oswego, American traders, with an impudence which was
superb, were arriving at Niagara. In 1784 some rebels
who had attempted to pose as Loyalists were ejected from
the settlements at Cataraqui. And after Simcoe began to
advertise free land grants to all who would take the oath
of allegiance to King George, hundreds of Americans
flocked across the border. The Duc de la Rochefoucauld,
a French _emigre_ who travelled through Upper Canada in
1795, and who has given us the best account of the province
at that time, asserted that there were in Upper Canada
many who falsely profess an attachment to the British
monarch and curse the Government of the Union for the
mere purpose of getting possession of the lands.' 'We
met in this excursion,' says La Rochefoucauld in another
place, 'an American family who, with some oxen, cows,
and sheep, were emigrating to Canada. "We come," said
they, "to the governor," whom they did not know, "to see
whether he will give us land." "Aye, aye," the governor
replied, "you are tired of the federal government; you
like not any longer to have so many kings; you wish again
for your old father" (it is thus the governor calls the
British monarch when he speaks with Americans); "you are
perfectly right; come along, we love such good Royalists
as you are; we will give you land."'
Other testimony is not lacking. Writing in 1799 Richard
Cartwright said, 'It has so happened that a great portion
of the population of that part of the province which
extends from the head of the Bay of Kenty upwards is
composed of persons who have evidently no claim to the
appellation of Loyalists.' In some districts it was a
cause of grievance that persons from the States entered
the province, petitioned for lands, took the necessary
oaths, and, having obtained possession of the land, resold
it, pocketed the money, and returned to build up the
American Union. As late as 1816 a letter appeared in the
Kingston _Gazette_ in which the complaint is made that
'people who have come into the country from the States,
marry into a family, and obtain a lot of wild land, get
John Ryder to move the landmarks, and instead of a wild
lot, take by force a fine house and barn and orchard,
and a well-cultivated farm, and turn the old Tory (as he
is called) out of his house, and all his labor for thirty
years.'
Never at any other time perhaps have conditions been so
favourable in Canada for land-grabbing and land-speculation
as they were then. Owing to the large amount of land
granted to absentee owners, and to the policy of free
land grants announced by Simcoe, land was sold at a very
low price. In some cases two hundred acre lots were sold
for a gallon of rum. In 1791 Sir William Pullency, an
English speculator, bought 1,500,000 acres of land in
Upper Canada at one shilling an acre, and sold 700,000
acres later for an average of eight shillings an acre.
Under these circumstances it was not surprising that many
Americans, with their shrewd business instincts, flocked
into the country.
It is clear, then, that a large part of the immigration
which took place under Simcoe was not Loyalist in its
character. From this, it must not be understood that the
new-comers were not good settlers. Even Richard Cartwright
confessed that they had 'resources in themselves which
other people are usually strangers to.' They compared
very favourably with the Loyalists who came from England
and the Maritime Provinces, who were described by Cartwright
as 'idle and profligate.' The great majority of the
American settlers became loyal subjects of the British
crown; and it was only when the American army invaded
Canada in 1812, and when William Lyon Mackenzie made a
push for independence in 1837, that the non-Loyalist
character of some of the early immigration became apparent.
CHAPTER XIII
THE LOYALIST IN HIS NEW HOME
The social history of the United Empire Loyalists was
not greatly different from that of other pioneer settlers
in the Canadian forest. Their homes were such as could
have been seen until recently in many of the outlying
parts of the country. In Nova Scotia and New Brunswick
some of the better class of settlers were able to put
up large and comfortable wooden houses, some of which
are still standing. But even there most of them had to
be content with primitive quarters. Edward Winslow was
not a poor man, as poverty was reckoned in those days.
Yet he lived in rather meagre style. He described his
house at Granville, opposite Annapolis, as being 'almost
as large as my log house, divided into two rooms, where
we are snug as pokers.' Two years later, after he had
made additions to it, he proposed advertising it for sale
in the following terms: 'That elegant House now occupied
by the Honourable E. W., one of His Majesty's Council
for the Province of New Brunswick, consisting of four
beautiful Rooms on the first Floor, highly finished. Also
two spacious lodging chambers in the second story--a
capacious dry cellar with arches &c. &c. &c.' In Upper
Canada, owing to the difficulty of obtaining building
materials, the houses of the half-pay officers were even
less pretentious. A traveller passing through the country
about Johnstown in 1792 described Sir John Johnson's
house as 'a small country lodge, neat, but as the grounds
are only beginning to be cleared, there was nothing of
interest.'
The home of the average Loyalist was a log-cabin. Sometimes
the cabin contained one room, sometimes two. Its dimensions
were as a rule no more than fourteen feet by eighteen
feet, and sometimes ten by fifteen. The roofs were
constructed of bark or small hollowed basswood logs,
overlapping one another like tiles. The windows were as
often as not covered not with glass, but with oiled paper.
The chimneys were built of sticks and clay, or rough
unmortared stones, since bricks were not procurable;
sometimes there was no chimney, and the smoke was allowed
to find its way out through a hole in the bark roof.
Where it was impossible to obtain lumber, the doors were
made of pieces of timber split into rough boards; and in
some cases the hinges and latches were made of wood.
These old log cabins, with the chinks between the logs
filled in with clay and moss, were still to be seen
standing in many parts of the country as late as fifty
years ago. Though primitive, they seem to have been not
uncomfortable; and many of the old settlers clung to them
long after they could have afforded to build better. This
was doubtless partly due to the fact that log-houses were
exempt from the taxation laid on frame, brick, and stone
structures.
A few of the Loyalists succeeded in bringing with them
to Canada some sticks of furniture or some family heirlooms.
Here and there a family would possess an ancient spindle,
a pair of curiously-wrought fire-dogs, or a quaint pair
of hand-bellows. But these relics of a former life merely
served to accentuate the rudeness of the greater part of
the furniture of the settlers. Chairs, benches, tables,
beds, chests, were fashioned by hand from the rough wood.
The descendant of one family has described how the family
dinner-table was a large stump, hewn flat on top, standing
in the middle of the floor. The cooking was done at the
open fireplace; it was not until well on in the nineteenth
century that stoves came into common use in Canada.
The clothing of the settlers was of the most varied
description. Here and there was one who had brought with
him the tight knee-breeches and silver-buckled shoes of
polite society. But many had arrived with only what was
on their backs; and these soon found their garments, no
matter how carefully darned and patched, succumb to the
effects of time and labour. It was not long before the
settlers learnt from the Indians the art of making clothing
out of deer-skin. Trousers made of this material were
found both comfortable and durable. 'A gentleman who
recently died in Sophiasburg at an advanced age, remembered
to have worn a pair for twelve years, being repaired
occasionally, and at the end they were sold for two
dollars and a half.' Petticoats for women were also made
of deer-skin. 'My grandmother,' says one descendant,
'made all sorts of useful dresses with these skins, which
were most comfortable for a country life, and for going
through the bush [since they] could not be torn by the
branches.' There were of course, some articles of clothing
which could not readily be made of leather; and very
early the settlers commenced growing flax and raising
sheep for their wool. Home-made linen and clothing of
linsey-woolsey were used in the settlements by high and
low alike. It was not until the close of the eighteenth
century that articles of apparel, other than those made
at home of flax and wool, were easily obtainable. A calico
dress was a great luxury. Few daughters expected to have
one until it was bought for their wedding-dress. Great
efforts were always made to array the bride in fitting
costume; and sometimes a dress, worn by the mother in
other days, amid other scenes, was brought forth, yellow
and discoloured with the lapse of time.
There was little money in the settlements. What little
there was came in pay to the soldiers or the half-pay
officers. Among the greater part of the population,
business was carried on by barter. In Upper Canada the
lack of specie was partly overcome by the use of a kind
of paper money. 'This money consists of small squares of
card or paper, on which are printed promissory notes for
various sums. These notes are made payable once a year,
generally about the latter end of September at Montreal.
The name of the merchant or firm is subscribed.' This
was merely an extension of the system of credit still in
use with country merchants, but it provided the settlers
with a very convenient substitute for cash. The merchants
did not suffer, as frequently this paper money was lost,
and never presented; and cases were known of its use by
Indians as wadding for their flint-locks.
Social instincts among the settlers were strongly marked.
Whenever a family was erecting a house or barn, the
neighbours as a rule lent a helping hand. While the men
were raising barn-timbers and roof-trees, the women
gathered about the quilting-frames or the spinning-wheels.
After the work was done, it was usual to have a festival.
The young men wrestled and showed their prowess at trials
of strength; the rest looked on and applauded. In the
evening there was a dance, at which the local musician
scraped out tuneless tunes on an ancient fiddle; and
there was of course hearty eating and, it is to be feared,
heavy drinking.
Schools and churches were few and far between. A number
of Loyalist clergy settled both in Nova Scotia and in
Upper Canada, and these held services and taught school
in the chief centres of population. The Rev. John Stuart
was, for instance, appointed chaplain in 1784 at Cataraqui;
and in 1786 he opened an academy there, for which he
received government aid. In time other schools sprang
up, taught by retired soldiers or farmers who were
incapacitated for other work. The tuition given in these
schools was of the most elementary sort. La Rochefoucauld,
writing of Cataraqui in 1795, says: 'In this district
are some schools, but they are few in number. The children
are instructed in reading and writing, and pay each a
dollar a month. One of the masters, superior to the rest
in point of knowledge, taught Latin; but he has left the
school, without being succeeded by another instructor of
the same learning.' 'At seven years of age,' writes the
son of a Loyalist family, 'I was one of those who patronized
Mrs Cranahan, who opened a Sylvan Seminary for the young
idea in Adolphustown; from thence, I went to Jonathan
Clark's, and then tried Thomas Morden, lastly William
Faulkiner, a relative of the Hagermans. You may suppose
that these graduations to Parnassus was [sic] carried
into effect, because a large amount of knowledge could
be obtained. Not so; for Dilworth's Spelling Book, and
the New Testament, were the only books possessed by these
academies.'
The lack of a clergy was even more marked. When Bishop
Mountain visited Upper Canada in 1794, he found only one
Lutheran chapel and two Presbyterian churches between
Montreal and Kingston. At Kingston he found 'a small but
decent church,' and about the Bay of Quinte there were
three or four log huts which were used by the Church of
England missionary in the neighbourhood. At Niagara there
was a clergyman, but no church; the services were held
in the Freemasons' Hall. This lack of a regularly-ordained
clergy was partly remedied by a number of itinerant
Methodist preachers or 'exhorters.' These men were
described by Bishop Mountain as 'a set of ignorant
enthusiasts, whose preaching is calculated only to perplex
the understanding, to corrupt the morals, to relax the
nerves of industry, and dissolve the bands of society.'
But they gained a very strong hold on the Loyalist
population; and for a long time they were familiar figures
upon the country roads.
For many years communications both in New Brunswick and
in Upper Canada were mainly by water. The roads between
the settlements were little more than forest paths. When
Colonel Simcoe went to Upper Canada he planned to build
a road running across the province from Montreal to the
river Thames, to be called Dundas Street. He was recalled,
however, before the road was completed; and the project
was allowed to fall through. In 1793 an act was passed
by the legislature of Upper Canada 'to regulate the laying
out, amending, and keeping in repair, the public highways
and roads.' This threw on the individual settler the
obligation of keeping the road across his lot in good
repair; but the large amount of crown lands and clergy
reserves and land held by speculators throughout the
province made this act of little avail. It was not until
1798 that a road was run from the Bay of Quinte to the
head of Lake Ontario, by an American surveyor named Asa
Danforth. But even this government road was at times
impassable; and there is evidence that some travellers
preferred to follow the shore of the lake.
It will be seen from these notes on social history that
the Loyalists had no primrose path. But after the first
grumblings and discontents, poured into the ears of
Governor Haldimand and Governor Parr, they seem to have
settled down contentedly to their lot; and their life
appears to have been on the whole happy. Especially in
the winter, when they had some leisure, they seem to have
known how to enjoy themselves.
In the winter season, nothing is more ardently wished
for, by young persons of both sexes, in Upper Canada,
than the setting in of frost, accompanied by a fall
of snow. Then it is, that pleasure commences her reign.
The sleighs are drawn out. Visits are paid, and
returned, in all directions. Neither cold, distance,
or badness of roads prove any impediment. The sleighs
glide over all obstacles. It would excite surprise in
a stranger to view the open before the Governor's
House on a levee morning, filled with these carriages.
A sleigh would not probably make any great figure in
Bond street, whose silken sons and daughters would
probably mistake it for a turnip cart, but in the
Canadas, it is the means of pleasure, and glowing
healthful exercise. An overturn is nothing. It
contributes subject matter for conversation at the
next house that is visited, when a pleasant raillery
often arises on the derangement of dress, which the
ladies have sustained, and the more than usual display
of graces, which the tumble has occasioned.
This picture, drawn in 1793 by a nameless traveller, is
an evidence of the courage and buoyancy of heart with
which the United Empire Loyalists faced the toils and
privations of life in their new home.
Not drooping like poor fugitives they came
In exodus to our Canadian wilds,
But full of heart and hope, with heads erect
And fearless eyes victorious in defeat.
BIBLIOGRAPHICAL NOTE
It is astonishing how little documentary evidence the
Loyalists left behind them with regard to their migration.
Among those who fled to England there were a few who kept
diaries and journals, or wrote memoirs, which have found
their way into print; and some contemporary records have
been published with regard to the settlements of Nova
Scotia and New Brunswick. But of the Loyalists who settled
in Upper and Lower Canada there is hardly one who left
behind him a written account of his experiences. The
reason for this is that many of them were illiterate,
and those who were literate were so occupied with carving
a home for themselves out of the wilderness that they
had neither time nor inclination for literary labours.
Were it not for the state papers preserved in England,
and for a collection of papers made by Sir Frederick
Haldimand, the Swiss soldier of fortune who was governor
of Quebec at the time of the migration, and who had a
passion for filing documents away, our knowledge of the
settlements in the Canadas would be of the most sketchy
character.
It would serve no good purpose to attempt here an exhaustive
account of the printed sources relating to the United
Empire Loyalists. All that can be done is to indicate
some of the more important. The only general history of
the Loyalists is Egerton Ryerson, _The Loyalists of
America and Their Times_ (2 vols., 1880); it is diffuse
and antiquated, and is written in a spirit of
undiscriminating admiration of the Loyalists, but it
contains much good material. Lorenzo Sabine, _Biographical
Sketches of Loyalists of the American Revolution_ (2
vols., 1864), is an old book, but it is a storehouse of
information about individual Loyalists, and it contains
a suggestive introductory essay. Some admirable work on
the Loyalists has been done by recent American historians.
Claude H. Van Tyne, _The Loyalists in the American
Revolution_ (1902), is a readable and scholarly study,
based on extensive researches into documentary and
newspaper sources. The Loyalist point of view will be
found admirably set forth in M. C. Tyler, _The Literary
History of the American Revolution_ (2 vols., 1897), and
_The Party of the Loyalists in the American Revolution_
(American Historical Review, I, 24). Of special studies
in a limited field the most valuable and important is A.
C. Flick, _Loyalism in New York_ (1901); it is the result
of exhaustive researches, and contains an excellent
bibliography of printed and manuscript sources. Other
studies in a limited field are James H. Stark, _The
Loyalists of Massachusetts and the Other Side of the
American Revolution_ (1910), and G. A. Gilbert, _The
Connecticut Loyalists_ (American Historical Review, IV,
273).
For the settlements of Nova Scotia and New Brunswick,
the most important source is _The Winslow Papers_ (edited
by W. O. Raymond, 1901), an admirably annotated collection
of private letters written by and to Colonel Edward
Winslow. Some of the official correspondence relating to
the migration is calendared in the Historical Manuscript
Commission's _Report on American Manuscripts in the Royal
Institution of Great Britain_ (1909), Much material will
be found in the provincial histories of Nova Scotia and
New Brunswick, such as Beamish Murdoch, _A History of
Nova Scotia or Acadie_ (3 vols., 1867), and James Hannay,
_History of New Brunswick_ (2 vols., 1909), and also in
the local and county histories. The story of the Loyalists
of Prince Edward Island is contained in W. H. Siebert
and Florence E. Gilliam, _The Loyalists in Prince Edward
Island_ (Proceedings and Transactions of the Royal Society
of Canada, 3rd series, IV, ii, 109). An account of the
Shelburne colony will be found in T. Watson Smith, _The
Loyalists at Shelburne_ (Collections of the Nova Scotia
Historical Society, VI, 53).
For the settlements in Upper and Lower Canada, the most
important source is the Haldimand Papers, which are fully
calendared in the Reports of the Canadian Archives from
1884 to 1889. J. McIlwraith, _Sir Frederick Haldimand_
(1904), contains a chapter on 'The Loyalists' which is
based upon these papers. The most important secondary
source is William Canniff, _History of the Settlement of
Upper Canada_ (1869), a book the value of which is
seriously diminished by lack of reference to authorities,
and by a slipshod style, but which contains a vast amount
of material preserved nowhere else. Among local histories
reference may be made to C. M. Day, _Pioneers of the
Eastern Townships_ (1863), James Croil, _Dundas_ (1861),
and J. F. Pringle, _Lunenburgh or the Old Eastern District_
(1891). An interesting essay in local history is L. H.
Tasker, _The United Empire Loyalist Settlement at Long
Point, Lake Erie_ (Ontario Historical Society, Papers
and Records, II). For the later immigration reference
should be made to D. C. Scott, _John Graves Simcoe_
(1905), and Ernest Cruikshank, _Immigration from the
United States into Upper Canada, 1784-1812_ (Proceedings
of the Thirty-ninth Convention of the Ontario Educational
Association, 263).
An authoritative account of the proceedings of the
commissioners appointed to inquire into the losses of
the Loyalists is to be found in J. E. Wilmot, _Historical
View of the Commission for Inquiry into the Losses,
Services, and Claims of the American Loyalists_ (1815).
For the social history of the Loyalist settlements a
useful book is A 'Canuck' (M. G. Scherk), _Pen Pictures
of Early Pioneer Life in Upper Canada_ (1905). Many
interesting notes on social history will be found also
in accounts of travels such as the Duc de la
Rochefoucauld-Liancourt, _Travels through the United
States of North America, the Country of the Iroquois,
and Upper Canada_ (1799), _The Diary of Mrs John Graves
Simcoe_ (edited by J. Ross Robertson, 1911), and _Canadian
Letters: Description of a Tour thro' the Provinces of
Lower and Upper Canada in the Course of the Years 1792
and '93_ (The Canadian Antiquarian and Numismatic Journal,
IX, 3 and 4).
An excellent index to unprinted materials relating to
the Loyalists is Wilfred Campbell, _Report on Manuscript
Lists Relating to the United Empire Loyalists, with
Reference to Other Sources_ (1909).
See also in this Series: _The Father of British Canada_;
_The War Chief of the Six Nations_.
END
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