families
Ontario Genealogical Society
February 2007
York in 1803; City of Toronto Art Collection, Culture Artist Unknown. Oil on canvas (50.8 x 30.5 cm)
In this Issue
The Clan MacLachlan
Genealogical Gems Found in Land Records
From Cornwall to Canada in 1841
Legal Matters Related to Genealogy: Part 1
Tribute to Ryan Taylor
Tasmanian Genealogy
What’s in a Middle Name?
Early Land Surveys in Southern Ontario
Recollections of an Indo-Guyanese in Guelph
How One Searcher Solved Two Knotty
Problems!
Doing the Numbers of One’s Pedigree”Pedigree Decay”
Families now offers
advertisers the opportunity
to print their ads
in full colour.
Roots and
Remembrance
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#JMM(MBETUPOF
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Table of Contents
families
John A. Becker, Editor
Volume 46 February 2007 Number 1
Editor’s Page........................................................................2
Articles
The Clan MacLachlan
Judy Gauthier................................................................. 3
Genealogical Gems Found in Land Records
Janice Nickerson.............................................................. 5
From Cornwall to Canada in 1841: including the
1903 narrative account of Samuel Pedlar
W. Wesley Johnston.......................................................... 7
Legal Matters Related to Genealogy
Part 1: Privacy and Personal Data
Protection for Genealogy
Dr. Margaret Ann Wilkinson.........................................14
Tribute to Ryan Taylor
Brenda Dougall Merriman, CG, CGL...........................17
Tasmanian Genealogy
John Becker...................................................................18
What’s in a Middle Name?
Stephen C. Young..........................................................20
Early Land Surveys in Southern Ontario
John Becker...................................................................28
Recollections of an Indo-Guyanese in Guelph
Jerome Teelucksingh.......................................................30
How One Searcher Solved Two Knotty Problems!
Elizabeth H. Stewart.....................................................33
Doing the Numbers on One’s Pedigree –
“Pedigree Decay”
John Becker...................................................................34
Guidelines to Authors Preparing Papers
for Families
John Becker...................................................................40
Departments
In Review – Norman Baker......................................... 35
The Name Game – Marilyn Cully................................ 37
Letters to the Editor..................................................... 38
Advertisements............................................................ 39
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FAMILIES
John A. Becker: Editor
Norm Baker: In Review Editor
Marilyn Cully: The Name Game Editor
Debby Schryer: Copy Editor
Grace Jewell: Layout Editor
Brian Grebow/BG Communications: Publication Design
Fraser Dunford: Executive Director, OGS
Thistle Printing, Printer
Families is published quarterly by the Ontario Genealogical Society
(OGS). The editor invites articles from all members of the Society and
from anyone having a serious interest in genealogical research. Families
prefers to receive manuscripts via email at familieseditor@ogs.on.ca.
Typewritten submissions or those on disk should be addressed to The
Editor, Families care of the Toronto office, see below.
The Name Game, our query department, is open to members of the
Society and members of the public wishing to further their research. See
the Name Game section for further information, conditions and fees if
applicable.
Copyright © 2007 Ontario Genealogical Society. All rights reserved.
Reproduction or use of the whole or any part of the contents without
permission is prohibited. Queries about permissions to reprint will be
dealt with speedily. ISSN 0030-2945.
Families is published with the financial assistance of the Government of
Ontario through the Ministry of Culture. It is indexed in the Canadian
Periodical Index (CPI) and the Periodical Source Index (PERSI).
Opinions expressed by contributors are not necessarily those of the
OGS, the Families editors or the Society’s officers.
Ontario Genealogical Society (OGS)
40 Orchard Park Blvd., Suite 102,
Toronto, ON Canada M4R 1B9
416-489-0734 fax 416-489-9803
Families: familieseditor@ogs.on.ca
Office: provoffice@ogs.on.ca
Website: www.ogs.on.ca
Publication Mail Registration No. 5971; published in February, May,
August and November each year. Return mail guaranteed. Change of
address notices and orders for subscriptions may be sent to the OGS
office. See above.
Families, USPS 013-026 is published quarterly in the USA by the
Ontario Genealogical Society. US office of publication: 2424 Niagara
Falls Blvd., Niagara Falls, NY, USA 14304-0357. Periodicals Postage
Paid at Niagara Falls, NY. US postmaster: send address changes to
Families, PO Box 1068, Niagara Falls, NY 14304.
February 2007 • Families • Editor’s Page
T
John A. Becker
his issue and the last have
contained letters commenting
on aspects of Families, both pro
and con. At the same time as our readers were dipping their pens in their ink
wells or turning on their computers to
send us messages suggesting improvements, the Society’s Executive Director,
the Board of Directors and your Editor
were also making changes to Families.
This is what your OGS team has
been doing:
Redesign and reformatting of Families.
You have evidence of this in your hands.
The large page format will permit the
use of more visuals, maps and photographs. The variety of column sizes will
make it more attractive and readable.
This issue, Vol. 46, No. 1, is the first
major change in format in 46 years.
Please view it as a “work in progress.”
Everyone in the production process is
learning new things about typesetting,
design and what makes a printed page
interesting and pleasant to look at.
We are confident that every subsequent issue will get better and better.
Special thanks to Fraser Dunford for
initiating and leading this process. We
have temporarily added the name of the
designer to the masthead so that you
will know he is Brian Grebow of BG
Communications, Toronto.
Financial Support. The Board has
agreed to a budget increase and for the
first time we have appointed people
with special, professional skills in different aspects of periodical production.
Two part-time appointments have been
made: a Layout Editor (Grace Jewell)
and a Copy Editor (Debby Schryer).
Just “baby steps” so far but there is
more to come.
Appointment of an Editorial Advisory
Board (EAB). A group of experienced volunteers has agreed to come together to
assist the new Editor, the Executive Director and the Board of Directors in resolving a number of administrative and
editorial issues which, when put right,
will move us toward our long term goal
of producing a journal of interest and
excellence. An example of one issue
before the EAB is designing a smooth
succession process for Families’ editors,
all volunteers.
Most important, it has been asked to
advise on all aspects of the content and
appearance of Families. This may be the
first OGS committee to meet exclusively
by email so we can enjoy the talent and
participation of members from all over
the continent. In addition to Fraser
Dunford and myself, the members of
the EAB are Des Gourley (Roseland,
Virginia, U.S.A.), Don Hinchley (Toronto), Elizabeth Kipp (Orleans), Blake
McIntyre (Niagara Falls) and Gwen Patterson (Penetang).
Despite the change in format, we
will continue to strive for a quarterly
that contains about 24,000 words of
editorial content plus the usual sections
devoted to “The Name Game” and
“Book Reviews.” The November 2006
issue and this issue are on target, but
it has not been easy. Reprints of high
quality papers (20 pages in the last issue
and another large reprint in this issue)
are welcomed by many readers. But the
Editor’s own by-line is appearing with
disturbing regularity. Unfortunately
both of these inclusions indicate “expedient” decisions resulting from the slow
arrival of new material.
So the challenge to our readers to
turn themselves into authors still stands.
The Ontario Genealogical Society
is seeking an
Associate Editor of Families
The person appointed to this voluntary position will assist the Editor primarily with the submitted articles and may
look forward to an appointment to the role of Editor when he steps down, not later than 31 December 2008 (perhaps
sooner). These posts do not have a fixed term but applicants should expect to serve a minimum of 24 months.
To obtain a fuller description of Families and this position, please email the address below.
Those interested should submit a covering letter and résumé that summarizes their experience in
editing, publishing and genealogy. Deadline for applications is 15 March 2007.
Email application to <familieseditor@ogs.on.ca>
By post to The Editor of Families,
John Becker, 75 Roselawn Avenue,
Toronto, ON M4R 1E7
• Families • February 2007
The Clan MacLachlan
Judy Gauthier
Judy Gauthier is an active OGS member and a stalwart in the
Clan MacLachlan. The Clan is always interested in attracting
new members. Judy may be reached at <jgauthi@attglobal.net>.
T
his is a full description of the history, current structure and services of Clan MacLachlan. This Clan is
based at Castle Lachlan, Strathlachlan, Scotland but
has three branches operating in Canada and also in the USA,
Australia, Britain and New Zealand.
The Clan MacLachlan has been a Scottish Highland clan
for over 800 years and since the late 12th century the family
has held, in an unbroken line, the lands of Strathlachlan on
Loch Fyne, Argyll, Scotland. The present Chief of the Clan is
Euan Maclachlan of Maclachlan, 25th of that ilk, who resides
at Castle Lachlan, Strathlachlan.
The symbols of the Clan are the remains of:
• Old Castle Lachlan (13th century)
• the medieval Kilmorie Church and Chapel
There has been a holy place at Kilmorie dating back to a
simple Celtic church recorded in the 8th century. In the 15th
century there was a dedication of a medieval church extending
west of Kilmorie Chapel, which has been the burying place
of the Clan Chiefs for at least 600 years. In honour of the late
Madam Marjorie, the 24th Chief, the Clan MacLachlan
Society mounted a major fundraising campaign for the preservation of the Chapel. The work was completed in June of
2006. A rededication by Bishop Murray of Argyll took place
during the Annual General Meeting on 3 June 2006.
As a major fundraising effort for Kilmorie Chapel, a Clan
CD was created for donations above US $30.00. This CD
developed into a treasure chest of genealogical information.
It is updated annually as new genealogical information becomes available. Members are encouraged to submit the story
of their families and each issue is collected by the National
Library of Scotland. The funds for the Kilmorie Chapel have
preserved a physical symbol and created a “living heritage” of
clan history and genealogical information.
What is the “Clan MacLachlan Society”?
This is a worldwide society with the Chief of the Clan
MacLachlan as President. It is an organization based in the
Scottish Highlands with autonomous units across the globe,
held together by a single constitution, common objectives
and a core of common services. Tom McLachlan (Member
#1), one of the founding members of the Society, is the current Clan Genealogist.
Emphasis is placed on the “home” of the Clan being in
Scotland with the Chief as head. Scotland’s Highland traditions are paramount.
There are nine branches: two in Australia, three in Canada,
three in the USA, one in Britain, and one in New Zealand.
The three Canadian branches include:
• Canadian Central & Western
Branch, which includes a heavy concentration of Ontario members
• Maritimes Branch on the east coast
• Pacific and North West Branch,
which includes a number of members in British Columbia
Clan Traditions
Kilmorie Chapel
Every Highland community and
clan had its Seanachaidh, Shenachie
or Sennachie, who is a professional
recorder and reciter of family history
and genealogy.
Proper respect for one’s genealogy and ancestors is important in
all dealings and in warfare between
Highlanders.
Because of his knowledge, in
earlier times the Sennachie played
the role of Herald at Arms. He never
bore arms and his person was sacred
on the battlefield.
February 2007 • Families • Tom McLachlan, as Sennachie, is producing a History of
the MacLachlans. This will contain:
• surveys of parishes and counties in the early to mid 19th
century
• histories of the families from these locations
• individual histories of MacLachlans in the professions
and trades, in the military, in medicine, as master mariners, etc.
• descriptions of the conditions of life prevailing at that
time
• history of the Chief ’s family
own records with information on their line, but inform them
of the existence of other branches of the same family “root.”
We are finding members living thousands of miles apart who
are directly related. This research is only available to Members of the Society.
Who are the MacLachlans?
In Scotland
The MacLachlans originate in Scotland from Cowal of
Argyllshire, which comprises the parishes of Strathlachlan
(wherein lies Castle Lachlan) – home of the Chief, Strachur,
MacLachlan Family Database
Kilfinan, Kilmodan, Inverchaolin, Dunoon and Kilmun. The
area is bounded on the east by Loch Long and the Firth of
For more than 30 years the Clan Genealogist has been collecting information on MacLachlans. Few, if any, clan organi- Clyde, on the south by the Kyles of Bute and on the west by
Loch Fyne.
zations can match the Clan MacLachlan Society’s depth of
The men of Argyll were always seamen by necessity. In
family records.
Our existing records cover almost 15,000 families, mostly fact, MacLachlans lived on both sides of Loch Fyne, including the parishes of Kilmichael-Glassary, the Knapdales and
from the 19th century. If particulars of a husband and wife
Kilmartin, all at the mainland end of the Kintyre. The waters
living in Scotland can be provided as clues, or a precise date
of birth from 1855 on is known (and the names of siblings), between the peninsulas and islands were less barriers to social
and commercial intercourse than were the hills. A look at a
usually a family can be found in the Clan records.
map of Scotland shows the high proportion of coastline to
Family Records
land mass in Argyll.
MacLachlans were also to be found 200 years ago in other
Recording
parts of Scotland. Migrating eastward they settled across into
Perthshire where the spelling is MacLauchlan (pronunciation
Our aim is to record for each Clan member whenever
the same). Many of the families in Stirlingshire were probably
possible:
associated with the MacLachlans of Auchintroig in the parish
• years and places of birth, marriage and death
of Drymen at the border of Stirlingshire with Dumbartonshire. • names of wives, parents, children, their spouses
Many dwelt on Mull, in Morvern and along the shores
• occupations, places of abode and military service
of Loch Linnhe. Merchants and sailors settled early in the
Sources
Clyde towns of Glasgow and Greenock. In the middle of the
last century many Irish immigrants settled on Clydeside and
The records of our Clan people are based on the following
in southwest of Scotland and many district registrars spelled
research and records:
surnames the Scottish way and so some McLaughlans became
• old Parish Registers of Scotland (pre 1855)
McLachlan or McLauchlan and were never altered back again.
• marriages and deaths of males in Scotland from 1855
• census records up to 1891
In Ireland
• indexes of births, deaths and marriages in England and
There was always a two-way movement between southwest
Wales
Scotland and northeast Ireland and it would be very dif• soundex of the US censuses for 1880, 1900, 1910 and
ficult to be certain whether or not the forebears of some
1920
immigrants from Ireland had gone in the reverse direction a
• county records of North Carolina
• births, deaths and marriages in Ontario from 1869 for as century or so before.
long as these are in the public domain
Spelling and Non-Scottish Membership
• 1871 census index
• county records, etc.
Spellings of the name are significant to only a limited extent.
Mac and Mc were used indiscriminately until the commenceCommunications
ment of compulsory registration in 1855 when most Argyll
All these projects will be published with the hope that all
registrars used “Mac,” while the Clydeside and inland parishes
MacLachlan-related families can know their forebears and
used “Mc.”
understand their traditions. As we add new members and
Those families higher up the social scale frequently insisttheir families, we are creating an “evolving data base.”
ed on being recorded as MacLachlans. The inclusion of the
More and more we can not only supplement members’
“u” indicates an east coast family or a possible Irish descent.
• Families • February 2007
When spelled with a “g” the name almost certainly is from
Ireland. Of course, many McLaughlans are more Scottish
than most, by series of marriages with old Scots families.
The Clan MacLachlan Society has used the spelling of the
chief ’s family when referring to the Clan except that the Society has used capital L as being the accepted usage for 99%
of the families. The spelling preferred by an individual family
is used in all our records.
The name is the same whether the Anglicization of the Gaelic
name starts Mac, Mc or M’, O’ or omits the prefix and continues with Lochlainn, Lachlan, Lachlin, Lauchlin, Lauchlan, etc.
The Irish spelling was frequently MacLaughlin,
Maclaughlan or MacLoughlin and in some areas MacGloughlin, McGlockling or McClothlan.
The septs of McEwen and Gilchrist are also included.
Further Information
Please go to the new website at <www.clanlachlan.ca> for
details on:
• origins of the Clan
• membership
• obtaining the Clan CD, which includes Clan History
and family articles
• online access to genealogical services § Genealogical Gems Found in Land Records
Janice Nickerson
only) for the Township of Delaware, Middlesex County,
Canada West (now Ontario) yielded the information that
“widow Davidson” owned 145 acres of land in the township
(no property description was provided).1 So we now knew
Janice Nickerson is a professional genealogist based in Toronto.
that Agnes’ husband died before 1842 but after 1838 (when
Her website is <www. uppercanadagenealogy.com>.
the youngest child was born).
I decided to search the Delaware Township land registry
and records are not among the top three sources North records more thoroughly. Looking for Davidsons, I scanned
American genealogists use to trace their ancestry – but the names in the abstract indexes (summaries of the history
they should be. Most of us have ancestors who were
of the properties, lot by lot) for the years 1833 to 1842 for
pioneer settlers, and for these people the land was, without
the entire township. I finally found a reference to a lot being
question, their most valuable possession and a symbol of their sold by John Johnston (who seemed to be the Davidsons’
new-found freedom and prosperity. If we want to understand next door neighbour in 1842 as he was listed just before
our ancestors’ lives, this reason alone should prompt us to
widow Davidson) to “Mary Davidson et al.” The sale took
search for land records for our ancestors’ properties. But it
place in 1853, but I checked it out anyway (by looking up
isn’t the only reason; land records can also provide valuable
the instrument itself ), and this is what I found:
genealogical information. Here are a few examples of the
Lot 11 on the Broken Front Concession, Delaware Twp.
“gems” I have found in land records.
was sold by John Johnstone to “Mary Davidson, Susan
Davidson and Margret Davidson and Jane Davidson only
Example #1: Agnes Patterson Davidson’s
surviving children of Christopher Davidson, late of the
Husband
Township of Delaware.”2
Women are usually harder to find than men, but this time
The next transaction pertaining to the property was the
it was different. We knew that Agnes Davidson, née Patterwill of Mary Davidson, spinster, “eldest daughter of the
son, was born in Scotland (we even knew where and when),
deceased Christopher Davidson,” in which she gave all her
that she had married there, and that she had two children be- property to “her mother Agnes Davidson, widow of the said
fore emigrating to Canada in the 1830s. Two more children
deceased Christopher Davidson,” in 1862.3
were born in Canada so we knew that her husband came
The mystery was solved: Agnes’s husband was Christopher
with her to Canada. What we didn’t know was his first name. Davidson.
Agnes Davidson was listed as a widow in the 1851 census
Example #2: Lorenzo White’s Parents
– the first census to include names of all family members.
The descendants of the family had all been tracked down but You would think that with a name like “Lorenzo,” he
none knew her husband’s first name.
wouldn’t be difficult to trace. You would be wrong. Lorenzo
Research in the 1842 census records (heads of households White was an illusive fellow. He and his wife and children
Reprinted with source notes added from Family Chronicle,
December 2003.
L
February 2007 • Families • had been located in the 18714 and 18815 censuses for Pickering Township, Ontario County, Ontario. In both cases he
was listed as “born in Ontario” about 1840–45. As Ontario
death records were open to the public up to the year 1930 (at
the time this research was conducted, now they are available
up to 1931), I had searched them from 1881 to 1930 without finding a record of Lorenzo’s death.
Working with the only information I was sure of, Lorenzo
White lived in Pickering Township between 1871 and 1881.
I tried checking the voters’ lists for this period to see if I
could find him (the voters’ list would tell me his address). I
found him listed as follows:
1878 tenant, Lot 2, Concession 2
1880 tenant, Lot 1 & 2, Concession 2
1883 tenant, Lot 13 & 14, Concession 7
1888 tenant, Lot 14, Concession 6
1892 owner, Lot 13, Concession 6
1900 owner, Lot 13, Concession 66
Aha! He must have purchased his property between 1888
and 1892. Armed with the lot and concession number of
the property Lorenzo White owned (Lot 13, Concession 6),
I went back to the land registry records and found the abstract index (a summary of its history) for the property. The
pages were difficult to read, but with some effort (and many
photocopies), I was able to decipher the entries pertaining to Lorenzo White. They showed that he had purchased
the property in 1890, mortgaged it several times, the last
of which was in 1930 to the “Trustees of St. John United
Church of Canada at Brougham,” and that in 1934 there was
a “notice” “re: Old Age Pension to Elizabeth White.”7
This told me that Lorenzo White was alive at least until
1930 but had likely died by October of 1934. This explains
why I could not locate his death registration in the indexes
up to 1930. I then proceeded to search the court records for
a will for Lorenzo (these were available up to 1960). This was
located8 and provided his date of death. I then used the will
to obtain his death certificate,9 which gave me, at last, his
parents’ names!
Whereas Mary Corbiere of the Township of Tiny in the
County of Simcoe is entitled to her dower or third on lot
number ninety nine in the first concession of the township of
Tiny in said County as widow of Louis Corbiere formerly of
the said township of Tiny deceased and is entitled to sue out
of her Majesties court of Queens bench at Toronto as writ of
assignment of dower by virtue of a judgement lately .... in said
court against one Frederick Fraser of said township of Tiny
and whereas the said Mary Corbiere has agreed to ... to said
Frederick Fraser her said dower or right of dower in said lands
for the sum of three hundred dollars and to release all acts or
actions at law or otherwise proceedings prosecuted or pending
in respect thereof now there present are to witness that the said
Mary Corbiere in consideration of the sum of three hundred
dollars of lawful money of Canada to her in hand paid by
Frederick Fraser above named....10
This document suggested that Louis Corbiere owned Lot
99, Concession 1 in Tiny Township, but that his widow,
Mary, was having difficulty getting paid for its sale.
Checking a listing of Crown land grants, I found that
Louis Corbiere had indeed been granted the patent to this
property, some 40 years previously.11
So now we had Louis Corbiere’s wife’s first name: Mary.
It didn’t sound very “Indian” but it was the first clue to her
identity.
Example #4: Mary Cudney Lawrence’s Father
This final case involves another female link. Research into
the history of the Lawrence family had identified the wife of
William Lawrence as Mary Cudney. A record of their marriage
had been found, but it did not provide her parents’ names. Her
death record could not be found, nor could her place of burial.
As the marriage had taken place in Niagara, I began
searching for families in the area with the surname “Cudney.”
Thankfully it was not a common name. In the index to the
land registry records for Lincoln County (in which Niagara is
situated), I found several documents for Cudneys including
one for the will of “Ezekiel Cudney, late of Niagara.”
Ezekiel Cudney’s will12 identified two of his heirs as
“daughters Mary Lawrence and Phoebe Cudney,” thus solvExample #3: Louis Corbiere’s Wife
ing the mystery of Mary Cudney Lawrence’s father’s identity.
One of the most common brick walls in genealogy is the
So the next time you’re wondering what to try next, conname of an ancestor’s wife. In this case, family tradition
sider exploring your ancestors’ property records. You’ll be
indicated that there was “Indian blood” in the family, but no documenting their most valuable possessions, and you may
one knew the details. The male line had been traced back to a unearth some genealogical “gems” in the process. §
fur trader named Louis Corbiere. This added credence to the
1
story, as many early fur traders married native women. But
Household of Widow Davidson, 1842 Census, Delaware
who was she?
Township, London District, Canada West.
2
Louis Corbiere settled in Tiny Township, Simcoe County,
Deed of Sale from John Johnston to Mary Davidson et al,
Ontario. Searching the index to the early land registry reMemorial #1122, Delaware Township, Middlesex County Land
cords for this township (not all Ontario Townships have such Registry Office Records.
3
Will of Mary Davidson, Memorial #1335, Delaware Township,
indexes, but many do), I found listings for three Corbieres:
Middlesex
County Land Registry Office Records.
Louis, David, and Mary.
4
Household
of Lorenzo White, Census of 1871, Canada,
The document for Mary Corbiere caught my eye. It read,
Ontario,
Ontario
County, Pickering Township, division 2, page 7.
in part:
• Families • February 2007
Household of Lorenzo White, Census of 1881, Canada,
Ontario, Ontario County, Pickering Township, division 3, page 41.
6
Voters’ List of the Township of Pickering for 1878; Voters’ List of
the Township of Pickering for 1880; Voters’ List of the Township of
Pickering for the year 1883; List of Voters of the Municipality of the
Township of Pickering for the year 1888, Pickering Public Library.
7
Abstract index to deeds, Lot 13, Concession 6, Pickering
Township, Ontario County Land Registry Office Records.
8
Lorenzo White estate file, #9778, Ontario County Surrogate
Court.
5
Death certificate of Lorenzo White, 11 April 1933, Registration #025569-1933, Registrar General of Ontario.
10
Mary Corbiere Dower Rights Release, Memorial #33830,
Deeds and Memorials, Volume 16, Tiny Township, Simcoe County
Land Registry Office Records.
11
Patent for Lot 99, 1st Concession West of the Penetanguishene
Road, Volume 1, Page 24.
12
Will of Ezekiel Cudney, Memorial #5750, Volume H, Lincoln
and Haldimand County Land Registry Office Records.
9
From Cornwall to Canada in 1841
including the 1903 narrative account of Samuel Pedlar
W. Wesley Johnston
W.Wesley Johnston was born in Illinois, is now retired in California. He holds degrees in mathematics and history. Fifty years ago
he started studying his Johnston ancestors who arrived in Pickering Township, Ontario by 1845. Over the years he supported the
Illinois State and the Sangamon County (Illinois) Genealogical
Societies by volunteering and authoring several articles. He also
published a genealogy on the Butson Family. His genealogical
travels span North America, England, Holland, Germany, and
Czechoslovakia. His web site publications include “Dad’s War:
Finding and Telling Your Father’s World War II Story”. He may
be reached via e-mail at <wwjohnston@aol.com>, but health
issues and the volume of email from his various interests should
temper your expectations of a speedy reply.
notes and notebooks, and the manuscript of a book on the
history of Oshawa.
Among the papers in the collection is the account “From
Cornwall3 to Canada in 1841.” It exists as a typed version of
eight pages and as a manuscript version of 16 pages. Though
the two versions are nearly identical, there are some differences, as noted below; thus the manuscript version, as the
original, can be taken as the more accurate one. The text in
this article is that of the manuscript version, with notations
of non-grammatical differences from the typed version.
The manuscript version appears to date from 1903, based
on the ages given for Samuel Pedlar in a scratched-out portion of the text: 8 at the time of the 1841 voyage and
70 (“three score and ten”) at the time the account was written. The typed version gives no author, but the manuscript is
n 1841, some 600 Cornish folk from St. Blazey, and
signed by Charles Henry Welbey (though the reading of the
nearby towns, embarked on four ships and made a long
written surname is uncertain), of Toronto. He makes it clear
journey to settle in and near Oshawa. They intermarthat he is preparing the text from the notes (which do not apried on both sides of the Atlantic, so that searching any of
the early Cornish settlers in Oshawa and nearby areas is very pear in the Pedlar Papers collection) that Samuel Pedlar gave
to him. It does not appear that Mr. Welbey himself was of
likely to involve the other families at some point. In the
1890s, Samuel Pedlar began gathering notes on the history of Cornish ancestry, since he refers to “our Cornish friends” in
the text. I have not found any information on him, so that it
this migration, and those notes led to a 1903 document by
is uncertain what his role was, other than as the author.
Charles Henry Welbey. That document is reproduced, as it
There are three errors (other than grammatical ones) in
was written, with an added introduction and annotations.
the typed document, all three of which are misreadings of the
The Documents
original manuscript:
1. The given name of Mr. Hoar, shown as Jacob in the
In 1841, some 600 Cornish people sailed to Canada on
manuscript, is typed as James.
four ships. They settled in the area in and around Oshawa,
Ontario (then Canada East), in what would become Ontario 2. A sentence about the Pedlar family being adopted as
citizens in June 1841 is omitted from the typed version.
County1 and Durham County2 and other nearby areas. One
3. The word “Mr” is misread as “The” in the description of
of those making the voyage was the eight-year-old Samuel
Mr. Pedlar’s on-board cooking.
Pedlar. The “Pedlar Papers” are now held at the Ontario
There are also several scratched out sections of the manuArchives and include correspondence, newspaper clippings,
I
February 2007 • Families • script, which were not transcribed. These are footnoted in the
following transcription. The most significant of these is the
reference to the age of Samuel Pedlar. There is one scratchedout reference to Henry Pedlar that may be of significance,
but the last words are unclear.
The document repeatedly refers to Ontario as being
Upper Canada at the time of the events. However, the Act
of Union, passed in 1840, took effect in February 1841 and
redesignated Upper Canada as Canada West and Lower
Canada as Canada East. So when the immigrants arrived,
they were actually arriving at Quebec in Canada East and
eventually at Oshawa4 in Canada West, no longer Lower and
Upper Canada.
Names of Participants
• No date - Sighting of St. John’s, Newfoundland; passage
of the Newfoundland Capes, the island of Anticosti, and
into the Gulf of St. Lawrence and the St. Lawrence River
• 21 May 1841 (35th day since sailing) - Landing at Quebec;
seeing the city as belongings are transferred to river steamer
• No date - The river steamer stopped at Three Rivers (TisRivières) and passed through Lake St. Peter and passed
Sorel.
• 24 May 1841 (38th day since sailing) - Arrival at Montreal, on Queen Victoria’s birthday
• No date - They walked around in Montreal, and Mr. and
Mrs. Pedlar were at the locks of the Lachine Canal at the
foot of McGill Street.
• No date - Durham boats took them through the Lachine
Canal to the village of Lachine, past Vaudreuil, up the
Ottawa River to Bytown (now Ottawa), where the travellers spent some time in the town while the locks lifted the
boats to the Rideau Canal.10 They had thus passed from
Canada East (now Quebec, formerly Lower Canada) to
Canada West (now Ontario, formerly Upper Canada).
• 31 May 1841 (45th day since sailing) - Arrival in Kingston; delay awaiting lake steamer
• 1 June 1841 (46th day since sailing) - Departure from
Kingston on a Lake Ontario steamer of the Royal Mail
Line
• 2 June 184111 (47th day since sailing) - Arrival in
Cobourg and then, at 4 a.m., in Port Hope, where many
of the voyagers debark for the final time and begin the
journey on land
• No date - Pedlars and Hoars travel along the old Kingston
Road from Port Hope to Oshawa (then known as “Skae’s
Corners”) and on to Lot 9 of Concession V of Whitby
Township, with three wagons
• June 1841 - The Pedlar family become citizens of Skae’s
Corners (now Oshawa).
The text has these names of immigrants of 1841:
• Henry and Nancey Pedlar, of St. Blazey, Cornwall, and
their family, including sons Samuel and George, who in
1903 operated the Oshawa Sheet Metal Works
• Jacob Hoar and family, who traveled on the voyage of
the “Clio” and the subsequent journey, including on land
from Port Hope to Oshawa and to the Richard Luke
Farm on Lot 9 of Concession V of Whitby Township.5
• Richard Luke, who was a relative of Jacob Hoar. He
already had a home and barn on Lot 9 of Concession V
of Whitby Township, where the Hoar and Pedlar families
stayed upon their arrival in June 1841
• Stephen Grose, a stonemason, who was another passenger
aboard the “Clio” and then settled at English Corners
(later known as Columbus6), which is just north of
Oshawa, and who, like the Pedlars, did well in the years
following
The text mentions these names of others of significance in
the journey:
• Captain Brown - Captain of the “Clio” on the April
1841 voyage from Padstow7 to Quebec
• J. B. Warren - The flour produced by his mill in Whitby Forms of Transportation
Township was seen by Mr. and Mrs. Pedlar in Montreal. The travellers took several forms of water-borne transportation:
The author seems to have thought that Mr. Warren may
• “Clio” - The “Clio” took them across the Atlantic from
have been from Devonshire.
Padstow to Quebec City. The “Clio” was a timber ship,
• Lord Sydenham - Governor of Canada West (called Upapparently carrying Canadian timber to Padstow and
per Canada in the document), who (either in person or
carrying emigrants on the return journeys (16 April to
through a representative) compensated the immigrants
21 May)
8
for the delay in their journey at Kingston
• River steamer - Took them from Quebec (21 May) to
• Charles Arkland - Owner of tavern at Oshawa
Montreal (24 May)
• Durham boats - These low-draft barges, attached toChronology of the Journey
gether like a train and pulled by a steam tug, took them
slowly from Montreal via the Ottawa River to Ottawa
The text gives the following dates of events and places along
and then via the Rideau Canal to Kingston (on or after
the journey:
24 May to 31 May).
• Spring 1841 - Departure of 600 Cornish emigrants to
• Lake steamer - A Royal Mail Steamer took them from
Canada, aboard the “Clio,” “Dewdrop,” “Springflower,”
Kingston to Port Hope (1 June to 2 June).
and “John and Mary”
• 5 April 1841 - Approximate date of sailing of the “Clio”
from Padstow. In fact, the “Clio” sailed on 16 April 1841.9
• Families • February 2007
Further Research
The passenger lists for the voyages of the four vessels (“Clio,”
“Dewdrop,” “Springflower,” and “John and Mary”) have
not yet been located. I have established a web page (<http://
members.aol.com/wwjohnston/pedlar1841.htm>) to focus
information about these voyages, as new information is
accumulated.
My motivation for the research arises from my own Butson
ancestors, Solomon and Jane (Keam), who made the journey from St. Blazey, Cornwall to eventually settle in English
Corners (Columbus), Ontario at or before this time. They are
buried in the St. Paul’s Anglican Church Cemetery, west of
Columbus. The first record in Canada yet found for them is
the marriage in the records of St. James Cathedral in Toronto
of their eldest child, Mary Keam Butson, to Joseph Hambley
on 19 July 1841. Their eldest son, Thomas Butson, died 11
December 1846 and is one of those in the cairn at the Oshawa Pioneer Memorial Garden, at 185 Bond Street in Oshawa.
FROM CORNWALL TO CANADA IN 1841
by Charles Henry Welbey12 - Toronto, Canada
he visit of Mr. Basil Tozer13 to Canada, for the purpose of writing a series of articles on the settlement in
this Dominion, of West-countrymen from Cornwall,
Devon and Somerset, cannot fail to be of great interest to
many of your Readers in the Old Land. Mr. Tozer’s Articles
are so excellent, so eminently readable, they have induced me
to endeavour, in a small way, to humbly follow his example,
and to take for my theme that great Cornish exodus, which
left for settlement in Canada in the year 1841. In the Spring
of that year, about six hundred Cornish people, men, women
and children, emigrated to Canada, taking passage in sailing vessels from14 Padstow, the old Cornish Sea-port. The
Henry Pedlar family of St. Blazey, took passage at Padstow,
in the Barque “Clio,” Captain Brown, sailing about April 5,
and Mr. Henry Pedlar’s son, Samuel,15 a bright lad with clear
brain and first-class memory, took such interest in the event,
that he stored each day’s doings in his mind, (never to be
effaced while his life lasts) and in due time committed them
to writing – and from the notes which he has handed to me,
this article is now compiled. Mr. Samuel Pedlar distinctly
remembers a visit to his father16 made by a gentleman from
Canada, and his glowing accounts of the Colony. He said,
that in Canada, “Bread was as white as a hound’s tooth, and
butter as yellow as a Sovereign.” The evening was quite late
when he departed. Before leaving the neighborhood, he
visited other families. His eulogies of Canada sank deep into
the ears of his listeners, and no doubt had much influence
in determining the ultimate departure from “Home and native land,” which subsequently followed. When the decision
had been formed, to emigrate, the seriousness of so bold an
undertaking became a disturbing feature. The Home, with17
T
its endearing ties, the friendships formed, the native land
and kindred, all to be parted with! Never, never before, had
the bitterness of “Farewell” come to each heart so closely, so
deeply! Then to the Pedlar, and many another family, came
the details of offering property and business for sale. In the
mean time, kindred and friends thronged the home from
morning till night, making all manner of enquiries, and all
appearing to regret the step to be taken. Throughout this
worry, there was considerable anxiety as to the ability to
provide the means necessary to traverse thousands of miles
of sea, lake, river and land, before the end of the journey
could be reached. The Pedlar family consisted of father,
mother, and five children, and their belongings represented a
huge pile of baggage. Providence kindly shaped the spirit of
the buying at the “Sale” of the Pedlar Estate. All the people
present appeared to be friends. The “sale” was richer in cash
results than expected. At the close of the day, all anxiety
about sufficiency of funds, had vanished and all felt as happy
as such circumstances would permit.
The four vessels selected for the transportation of these six
hundred Cornish emigrants, were the “Clio,” “Dew Drop,”
“Spring Flower,” and “John and Mary.” The “Clio” was
considered one of the largest vessels engaged in the timber
trade between Quebec (Canada) and Padstow. Her space
between decks, afforded better accommodation than other
ships calling at Padstow, which were much smaller. Of the
six hundred emigrants, two hundred fell to the share of the
“Clio.” The long wished for tide, and favourable breeze,
came at last. I am unable to give the date of sailing. On this
point the notes be silent. After hasty goodbyes, relatives and
friends went ashore, and sails were promptly set. Hearts that
were sorely wrenched in bidding farewell to those who, in
most cases would never again be met on Earth, were providentially made to feel less grief, in consequence of the bustle
and excitement of the moment. In a short time, the “Clio”
got out to sea, and quietness came to the sorrowing people.
The cessation of orders thundered forth by Captain Brown,
enabled those not otherwise employed (and they were few
in number,) to watch the distant fast receding shore, and to
indulge in sentimental thoughts of the old houses now left
behind. The Writer of the notes – Mr. Samuel Pedlar – well
remembers the scenes described. One hour after the “Clio”
got to sea, the two hundred or more souls on board, were in
sorry plight. Those who were fortunate enough to be able
to keep the deck for the weather was fair, watched the scene
with more or less pleasure. The ship was in full sail, the gulls
chasing her, apparently in high glee. The suffering below deck
was great; the majority of the people had never been to sea
before. The Pedlar family went to quarters pretty early, and
staid there for days, father being the last to yield to sickness,
having a heavy charge on his hands – a wife and five children
– he was required to bestow continuous attention, though
himself, no doubt, suffering keenly. It may well be imagined
that a journey across the Atlantic in 1841, in a “timber” ship,
February 2007 • Families • with accommodation and conveniences of the scantiest, and
the consequent suffering entailed, was altogether unlike the
pleasant trip on board of one of the “Ocean Greyhounds”
of the present day. The world moves, and in no direction
more swiftly, than in the improved methods provided for the
comforts of those, whose business or pleasure causes them to
traverse the great Waters. The “Clio’s” passengers had a long,
tedious voyage. The defective accommodation rendered the
more distressing by reason of the length and monotony of
this part of the journey, was increased by “calms” for days at
a time, preventing any progress Westward, while the “Swells”
made the ship roll incessantly. After being at sea a week or
two, everyone be in ordinary health, had passed through the
ordeal of sea sickness, and sharp appetites entailed quite a
task upon those having large families to provide for. These
old sailing ships did not adequately provide sufficient cooking apparatus, hence the “wait in turn” times very frequently
were anything but peaceable and brotherly. At other places
and on other occasions, women attended to the preparation
and cooking of food, but on board the rough and ready emigrant craft of 1841, men were compelled to attend to these
duties, to the loss, and probably disgust, of the little ones of
each family. Mr. Samuel Pedlar distinctly remembers his father’s first attempt to fry pan-cakes, a favourite dish on board
ship. First he poured the “batter” into the pan but failed to
grease the pan sufficiently. Observing the brown colour of the
cake, he supposed it was time to “turn” it. He attempted the
trick (easily done by those who have had a little experience
in such matters) of tossing the pancake two or three feet into
the air, and catching it on the turn over as it dropped into the
pan. Mr.18 Pedlar’s attempt was not a success; the cake stuck
to the pan too long, and when it did go up in the air, it became a shapeless mass, and on coming down, struck the edge
of the pan – a part of the cake went into the fire; the remainder was mixed with some fried potatoes, and formed a decidedly novel and curious combination. To please the Cook, all
partook of his “new dish” with great apparent relish, which
acted as a kind of encouragement to him. Mr. Pedlar “did”
most of the cooking – such as it was – and all his “dishes”
were remarkable for great originality. Acting on the advice of
friends who had made similar voyages in the “Clio,” the Pedlars took large supplies of delicacies on board, and these were
frequently supplied to the children, adding materially to their
comfort and health.
Captain Brown, of the “Clio,” was a short thick-set man,
with a voice that could be clearly heard above the stormy
winds, as he gave his orders to the sailors. Many a time his
voice, during heavy weather, when some faint hearted passengers were in fear, inspired the timid with confidence. He
seems to have been well fitted for his position. There were no
mishaps of a serious nature, except on one occasion. In one
of the series of prolonged calms, Captain Brown’s judgment
yielded to impatience. For several days, a vessel about six
miles to the left of the “Clio,” kept her company. Suddenly
10 • Families • February 2007
this vessel clapped on all sail, evidently catching wind at last.
Captain Brown observed this and, his voice, full of temper,
commanded his men to run aloft, and in a few minutes the
largest sails were ready for the coming breeze. They got it.
Like the sudden crash of thunder, the wind caught the old
“Clio’s” rigging with such force, that it snapped the mainmast; rigging, mast and arms, crashing upon the deck. After
so many days of “Calms” and monotonous stillness, this sudden incident, appalling at the time, but fortunately without
injury to anyone, created a great stir among the passengers,
for it was nothing less than a wreck upon a small scale. Of
course all soon realized that there was no danger of the vessel sinking; the chief loss was the crippled sailing ability, the
journey to Quebec being prolonged several days in consequence. The Captain at once had all wreckage cut away and
made the most of the masts left intact. The deck, for a week
or more, was turned into a ship-yard, large timber on board
being shaped to take the place of the broken mast.
In course of time the ship was off the banks of Newfoundland, and soon, favourable winds brought the weary people
in sight of land. The Captain informed them that the coast
in sight was near St. John,19 the Capital of the Island, and the
principal port. Language fails to describe the feelings of the
travellers. The old, the feeble, the young, all who could get
there, found their way to the deck. Great rejoicing and mutual
congratulations were the order of that and of several hours
after. It dawned upon the wearied people, that the long wished
for end of their journey was soon to be reached, and that their
eyes were soon to behold the new land.
The “Clio” passed the Newfoundland Capes, and with
fair winds had got well up near the Island of Anticosti, in
the Gulf of St. Lawrence, when she encountered the most
dangerous storm of the whole passage: however, fair weather
again prevailed shortly. As may be supposed, the “Clio”
had more company in the St. Lawrence Waters, than when
crossing the Atlantic. Numerous sail were near her. Scores
of ships, in full sail, apparently crowding with all speed to
the common destination of them all – Quebec! The scene
improved as the ship ascended the great river. Peeps could
now and then be obtained of farm houses and gardens, and
the eye was delighted with the scene. As each day brought
them nearer Quebec, the beauties of the new land were more
clearly defined.
Soon the shining tin roofs and spires of the French
Churches became conspicuous in the distant view shorewards, the beauties of which, the slow progress of the old
time sailing-vessel afforded plenty of leisure for careful observation. This awakened impatience in the majority on board,
who were anxious to leave the ship.
May 21, 1841. Hurrah! Quebec at last! All who could
gain the deck, were there, eagerly scanning the outlines of the
Citadel City. The Island of Orleans passed, the view of the
City was very imposing. Hundreds of Vessels were in port,
being laden with cargoes of timber, grain, and other Canadian
products, for shipment to Great Britain and other countries.
When at last the “Clio” came to her anchorage, the passengers sent up a hearty wild cheer. It cannot be said, now, that
they did for Captain Brown; but one thing is sure; they were
thankful as could be for their safe sea voyage, and would always bear in their hearts a kindly regard for the old sailor.
It took a good part of a day for the passengers of the
“Clio” to get their belongings transferred to the steamer
which was to take them from Quebec to Montreal – nearly
two hundred miles further up the river. They were thankful to realize that their ocean travelling, which had occupied
about six weeks, was now a circumstance of the past, and that
the Steamer for Montreal would convey them more rapidly,
and with better accommodation in every way. Besides all this,
fresh meats, fresh bread, excellent butter, milk and other comestibles, were now being used with much gusto and delight,
after the long ocean voyage. Many of the people took advantage of the chance offered, to look the old City over. They
doubtless saw many things entirely new to them. Though the
place was under British rule, and the British flag, everywhere
fluttered in the Canadian breeze, yet the tongue heard on all
sides was foreign. Most of the inhabitants were foreign, in
appearance and movement. If the new comers did not know
they were in a country owning the sway of Great Britain,
they would have been justified in saying that they had landed
on the shores of old France.
In due time, the “Clio’s” passengers were on board the
steamer, bound up the river for Montreal. Views of bright
villages, on both sides, spread like a panorama. The period
occupied in this trip cannot be given, but every thing was in
striking contrast, as to comfort, with the cramped quarters so
recently vacated. The sailors on board the “Clio” were a different class of men from those on the river steamer, the latter
being mostly French-Canadians, possessed greater vivacity
than the old “sea-dogs” of the Atlantic, and in a great measure, seemed to interest the travellers, and to drive away dull
care. It was on this steamer, that the English people, for the
first time heard the famous Canadian boat songs. Also the
croaking of the Canadian “Nightingales”, as the bull-frogs are
called. These frogs swarm Canadian Waters, and in the early
summer evenings, make the air musical with their incessant
croakings and trillings. The boat touched at “Three Rivers,”
an important French Canadian town, but did not remain
there long. Again on the move, the Steamer’s course lay
through a thirty mile stretch of water called “Lake St. Peter”.
At that time, it must have been comparatively shallow, for the
Montreal Board of Harbour Commissioners have, since then,
expanded vast sums of money, dredging a channel for the passage of ocean shipping of deep draught, to reach Montreal.
“Sorel” an enterprising little town, was next passed, as well
as other points of more or less importance, and soon “The
Mountain” was sighted, at whose base spreads the magnificent
Commercial City of Montreal, whose harbour, in the year
1841, was crowded with shipping literally covered with every
description of “bunting,” mostly the “Union Jack,” in honour
of our late Queen, the good Victoria, of blessed memory,
whose birthday – the 24th May – was being celebrated as a
holiday. This was the sight which greeted the travellers, as the
steamer reached her landing in the City of Montreal.
This City of the “Mount Royal,” with a population somewhat more English that that of Quebec, appeared, at that
date, a smart enterprising Commercial City, giving much
promise of the future greatness it has since attained. Montreal
being the head of ocean navigation, and on the direct line of
communication with the vast Lakes, “Ontario,” “Erie,”
“Huron,” “Michigan,” and “Superior,” great inland fresh water seas, the St. Lawrence river being the outlet it required no
very great foresight to predict the future of a city so situated.
Its Railway, Banking, and great commercial interests generally,
will keep it in the forefront which it has now long enjoyed.
It will not be out of place to now refer to an incident,
which though apparently a trifle at the time, had much to do
in deciding the Pedlar family’s Canadian home. Mr. & Mrs.
Pedlar were strolling around the “locks” of the Lachine Canal at the foot of McGill Street20 when they observed a large
number of barrels of flour stored close by. With the
agricultural instincts strong within them, they turned aside
to examine these barrels more closely. They were from “Upper Canada,” as the now Province of Ontario was then called.
The end of one of the barrels was broken, and the flour exposed to view. The Pedlars were both good judges of flour,
they pronounced the quality to be of a high grade. The brand
was known as the “Plow brand,” a plough being stencilled
on the head of each barrel. This brand also set forth that
the flour was the product of a Mill owned by J. B. Warren
(Devonshire?) situated in the Township of Whitby, Upper
Canada, and in the settlement they proposed visiting, before
deciding to settle elsewhere. It has often been stated, that
after examining the flour, Mr. Pedlar remarked to his wife,
“Nancey, wherever that flour is produced, there’s the place for
us to live!” A proposition his “better half ” promptly
approved, there and then.
The emigrants were again to experience another novelty in
travelling. They had rolled and tossed as they crossed the
Atlantic. They had steamed up that stretch of the St. Lawrence between Quebec and Montreal. Now they were
transferred to the hold of a flat bottomed “Durham Boat,”
drawing only a few feet of water. These Durham boats had
no propulsion. No sails; No Engines. They were attached
(quite a number of them) to each other, by strong hawsers,
and drawn along by a steam-tug. This portion of their route
was via the Lachine Canal to the village of Lachine – say
about six miles. Thence, over the north edge of a Lake, up
past “Vaudreuil”, and through the Ottawa River to the City
of Ottawa, the Capital of the Dominion of Canada, but in
those days known as “By-town”, taking its name after Colonel By, its founder. The time occupied in this part of the
journey is not recorded. We may be sure the speed was not
February 2007 • Families • 11
“reckless.” The pace afforded ample opportunity for enjoying
the beauties of these waters and the enchanting little islands
frequently passed, by day while the evenings were rendered
musical by the songs of the boatmen, their rivals the bullfrogs, and the shrill cry of an occasional night-hawk. When
the extended line of “Durham boats” completed their journey
up the Ottawa river, and came to a halt just outside the eight
locks which had to lift them to the level of the Rideau Canal,
the Emigrants were told that some time would elapse before
this operation could be accomplished. Away scampered the
people, most of them to refill their baskets with the necessary articles of diet; a process repeated several times every day.
Others took in a view of the town, which at that date could
not have contained more than five thousand inhabitants. At
last the passengers were urged to return to the boats, by the
shrill whistle of the little steam tug, and again the journey
westward was resumed.
As the little fleet glided along the still waters of the Rideau
Canal, they often approached quite close to Farms under
good cultivation. At last, this mode of travelling came to a
close, the City of Kingston, seen in the distance, was to be
the end of it. On May 31st, 1841, Kingston was reached,
an apparently prosperous place; the then seat of Canadian
Government, Lord Sydenham being Governor General. The
emigrants who had already encountered so many trials, were
now dreadfully put out, by being told that the Lake Steamer
which was to have taken them to “Port Hope,”21 had left
Kingston for Toronto, with the Governor General and Staff,
upon urgent business. The trouble occasioned by this enforced stoppage, had to be made the best of. The delay was
made an opportunity for inspecting the town. Under French
occupation, it was a mere military post, named “Frontenac,”
after one of the early French Governors. Under British rule
(1789) the place was called Kingston, and was the seat of
Government until 1844, when the Seat of Government was
removed to Montreal, to the great injury of Kingston.
On hearing of the trouble he had caused, Lord Sydenham
lost no time in ascertaining that the emigrants were deeply
annoyed at the expense they had to suffer, as well as delay, by
his having caused them failure in making close connection
with the Lake Steamer. Either his Lordship addressed the
emigrants in person, or was represented by a member of his
Staff; ample reasons were given for appropriating the Lake
Steamer, and each emigrant was recouped for the individual
expense incurred by this regrettable incident. Mr. Pedlar’s
share amounted to ten dollars, with which he purchased a
Family Bible – a recognition of his gratitude to God, for the
mercies of a safe journey, besides being the means of remembrance of the nobleman’s generosity.
June 1st –The trim looking Steamer of the “Royal Mail
Line”, to which the travelers were now transferred, promised
to be a great improvement upon the dingy ill shaped “Durham Boats” with their “snail like pace.” There was an air of
business about this Royal Mail Steamer; the hissing steam, the
12 • Families • February 2007
bustle and commotion which produced a pleasant excitement
– and when the boat fairly got into the blue waters of Ontario, the wavelets danced merrily to the quicker movement. The
speed was something new and cheering, and proved to be the
most enjoyable part of the journey yet experienced.
After touching Cobourg harbour,22 the Steamer made for
Port Hope, the next port of Call. Here quite a number of
people left the Steamer, the Pedlar family and some of their
friends among them. Port Hope was reached at four o’clock
in the morning, and so the long, wearisome journey by Water
was at last accomplished.
There still lay before the Pedlar family and some of their
friends, Mr. Jacob23 Hoar & family, a land journey of about
forty miles to the home of a24 relative of the Hoars’, named
Richard Luke, who lived in the 5th concession, on Lot 9, of
the township of Whitby.25 Three26 strong wagons, drawn by
two horses, each, were contracted for, and without much delay, the travellers and their baggage, moved toward Whitby.
The Hoar family, small in number, made one Wagon suffice
for them and their belongings. The Pedlars being more numerous and hampered with much impedimenta, had two Wagons.
These three Wagons, with quite a party of sunburned English
faces, the owners of said faces perched on the top of sundry
chests, casks, trunks and all the miscellaneous English people
find it necessary to convey with them to their new homes,
must have presented quite a sight to the few inhabitants of
Port Hope, for at that time, the place was merely a village.
Reaching the outskirts, the party were soon on the old
Kingston Road, the stage-coach route between Kingston
and Toronto. Quite often, the children of the expedition
scrambled from the baggage to the ground, and ran off to farm
houses, or to way-side pumps, to get their drinking cups filled,
either with milk, or with cool water, and from the people, one
and all, a hearty response greeted the youthful rompers.
When the party reached the village now called Oshawa, it
was only a mere “four corners”, so to speak. The Institution
of the place, like other small Canadian Villages, was a Tavern.
“The Charles Arkland Tavern,” a long wooden white painted
building, stood quite a distance south of “King Street,” on
the “Lot” now the site of the “Central Hotel” – and directly
in front of the tavern, near the road, stood the village pump,
which in those days supplied the clearest, purest water, of which
all the travellers drank heartily.
On reaching Mr. Luke’s farm, all pretty well tired, he
received his welcome but unexpected visitors in the most
cordial manner, and the baggage was soon removed from the
wagons. After the drivers and their horse had been generally
refreshed, the wagons were soon out of the “Settlement,” on
their return journey to Port Hope, at a much quicker pace
than when they entered “Whitby Township.”
Perhaps the reader will wonder how the Luke family could
find room in their wilderness home – not a large one – for
their visitors. They could not. Fortunately they had just completed a large new “Barn.” This was handed over for the use
of their guests, who by this time had “roughed it” sufficiently
to appreciate the sweet smelling new wood of the barn, and
the ample space of their new quarters, which by comparison
with the “Clio” and other “experiences,” was a palace and a
Paradise27.
It took some days, before the party were fairly on the
“land legs.” The appearance of the country from Port Hope,
all the way to the Settlement, made a most favourable impression on the new comers. The roads were not as good as
those in England – it was not expected they would be. They
found the temperature much warmer: in short, they observed
a difference in many ways; but these were mere minor matters. The general opinion was – that they had found a good
country. All were pleased with it from the first – “Upper
Canada,” in the early days of June, presents an inviting appearance to the new comer. In 1841, the country was but
sparsely “cleared”; a very different condition from that seen at
the present day. The “bush” land looked charming; the heavy
foliage; the music of the birds; their gay plumage; the wild
flowers – all was new to the Strangers.
“Strangers” in name only! They were frequently entertained, and on such occasions, experienced the truth of the
Canadian gentleman’s assertion made in Cornwall – that “In
Canada the Bread is as white as a hound’s tooth, and the butter as yellow as a Sovereign.” They also discovered that while
everyone spoke well of the Country, they declared that hard
labour was the lot of all who intended to make a success. No
sluggard could achieve success.
During their stay at the Luke Farm, the Pedlars made up
their minds that the Village of “Skae’s Corners,” now the
town of “Oshawa,” would suit them. Steps were accordingly
taken, to purchase a “Lot” of land, on which temporary quarters were erected for a dwelling and a work-shop. In June,
1841, they became adopted “Citizens” of this village.28 This
family still flourishes at Oshawa. Henry Pedlar’s son George
carries on the “Oshawa Sheet Metal Works,” and is in prosperous circumstances, like his father before him. Nearly all
the Cornish people who sailed for Canada, in 1841, settled
in “Ontario” and “Durham” and neighbouring counties.
Another “Clio” passenger, Stephen Grose, a stonemason,
settled at “Columbus,” formerly known as “English Corners,”
a name which clearly indicates the nationality of its first settlers. He also did well, and proved himself a success.
A few words in conclusion. The writer of necessity, has
had to confine his remarks to a mere fraction of the six hundred and more emigrants who sailed for Canada in 1841. He
would like to remind his readers (if he is so fortunate as to
have any) that the experiences of those on board the “Dew
Drop,” “Spring Flower,” and “John and Mary,” would be very
similar to those of the “Clio,” but probably still more irksome, because those three ships were smaller than the “Clio,”
and their space and “accommodation” would be proportionately less.
Without entering into elaborate explanation, the writer
has endeavoured to display the marked contrast between
not only the modes of travelling, then and now, but also
the rapid progress of Canada, in such a comparatively short
period. Then, Canada was a mere struggling Colony: Now,
she is a vast Dominion, able to take no mean place among
the foremost nations. Contrast such craft as conveyed our
Cornish friends of 1841, with the splendid steel ships busily
crossing the Atlantic, on Canada’s business today! A business
which grows with tremendous leaps and bounds: remember
that Canada is rapidly becoming “The Granary of the British
Empire,” and it will take but little reflection, to show that she
is a Country embracing within her vast boundaries, every inducement for settlement, by those who are not afraid of work.
Be it also remembered that Canada can supply herself with
her own Professional and Commercial men, her Clerks and
mechanics. The material of which she is “short,” is Agricultural. She wants Farmers and Farm Labourers. Any number
of them. Such men, steady and industrious, with brains and
brawn, and a knowledge how to use both, will receive from
Canada a hearty welcome.
C. H. Welbey29 §
Ontario County lies inland and NE of Durham Co. stretching
up to Muskoka Co. in the north.
2
Durham County lies on the north shore of Lake Ontario with
Oshawa in the centre of its lake front.
3
Cornwall is the English county at the extreme SW corner of
England which terminates at Land’s End facing the Atlantic Ocean.
4
Oshawa, Ontario is a town about 30 miles east of downtown
Toronto on the north shore of Lake Ontario and a similar distance
west of the town of Port Hope in Northumberland Co. where the
travellers disembarked from the Lake Ontario steamer that brought
them from Kingston, Ontario.
5
Whitby Township is on the lake front, the second township
from the SW corner of Durham Co.
6
Columbus is a small town 6.5 miles north of downtown
Oshawa on County Road 2.
7
Padstow is a Cornwall town located about 43 miles NE of
Land’s End on the south shore of the Bristol Channel.
8
Kingston, a city located at the east end of Lake Ontario, north
shore and southern terminus of the Rideau Canal. It was the capital
of Canada West after February 1841.
9
Captain George A. Hogg, RN Rtd, National Maritime
Museum Cornwall, cited at <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clio_
(barque)> as being based on the “West Briton” newspaper’s list of
sailings
10
The Rideau Canal was completed in 1832 and permitted boat
traffic to avoid the St. Lawrence River rapids, which restricted river
traffic upstream from Montreal Island. It also permitted traffic to
sail clear of the United States territories, which occupy about 100
miles of the south bank of the St. Lawrence River from Cornwall,
Ontario on the east to Kingston, Ontario on the west.
11
Note that this date is not explicitly given. However, the time
of 4 a.m. is presumably the morning following the departure from
Kingston.
12
Could be “Wetberg” or “Welberg” or something else.
1
February 2007 • Families • 13
A British author of books and articles, who wrote on a wide
variety of subjects, e.g. “How to Buy a Gun” (1903), “The Horse in
History” (1908), “The Story of a Terrible Life: The Amazing Career of
a Notorious Procuress” (1929), “Confidence Crooks and Blackmailers:
Their Ways and Methods” (1930).
14
Here the words “Plymouth Town, and from” are scratched out.
15
Here the words “then about eight years old. (now ‘three score
years, and ten’)” are scratched out. This would date the document
as being written in 1903, 62 years after the events.
16
The inserted text “who was ???? ????” is scratched out, making
the last words unclear.
17
Here the word “all” is scratched out.
18
In the typed version, this word is typed as “The”.
19
He means St. John’s, Newfoundland.
20
While still in the city of Montreal.
21
Port Hope is another port town on the north shore of Lake
13
Ontario, 95 miles west of Kingston.
22
Cobourg is only about 6 miles east of Port Hope.
23
In the typed version, this name is typed as “James.”
24
The words “Mr. Jacob Hoar and family” are scratched out here
and inserted earlier in the sentence.
25
Whitby Twp. is further west, past Port Hope, closer to
Toronto.
26
The word “two” is scratched out here.
27
Here the words “by comparison” are scratched out.
28
This sentence is omitted from the typed text. Following this
sentence in the manuscript, the following words are scratched out:
“Mr. Henry Pedlar brought his ‘Anvil’ and ‘Bellows’ from Cornwall,
but soon found that he had been ‘carrying Coal to Newcastle.’”
29
As with the initial signature, this could be a misreading of the
surname.
Legal Matters Related to Genealogy
Part 1: Privacy and Personal Data Protection for Genealogy
Dr. Margaret Ann Wilkinson
Dr. Margaret Ann Wilkinson is a professor in the Faculty of Law
and the Faculty of Information and Media Studies at the
University of Western Ontario. Called to the Bar of Ontario in
1980, with a doctoral dissertation on personal data protection,
Dr. Wilkinson teaches and researches in the areas of intellectual
property, information law, privacy, and information policy. Her
current research in these areas is funded by the Social Sciences
and Humanities Council of Canada. The opinions expressed in
this article are not intended as legal advice.
by government bodies have increasingly become available to
genealogists requesting information.
On the other hand, there has been a parallel movement
to protect individual privacy by protecting information that
individuals provide about themselves to organizations.2 This
second movement is potentially frustrating for genealogists
because the information they seek is about other individuals. From the perspective of this area of the law, information
about you is your information and information about other
people is their information. Even information about other
members of your family is considered private. Therefore, if
his article is the first of a series of four: (1) Privacy
personal data protection law is in effect in a particular situand Personal Data Protection for Genealogy;
ation, you will not be able to access information about the
(2) Personal Data Protection for the Business of
Genealogy; (3) Cemeteries as Information Sources in Geneal- other members of your family,3 never mind information
about members of another family!
ogy; and (4) Copyright in Genealogy.
Why might a genealogist be interested in questions of
privacy and personal data protection? The answer to this lies Records Held by Government
in the changing environment in Canada, at least over the past Various government organizations have become regulated
quarter century, that has resulted in many of our jurisdictions by either access to information legislation, personal data
passing laws related to the protection of privacy and personal protection legislation (often called “privacy” legislation), or
both. Personal data protection with respect to information
data.1
held by bodies connected to the federal government was first
Privacy and Access to Information
legislated under Part IV of the federal Human Rights Act but
was later re-enacted as the Privacy Act in 1982. Indeed, in
Two different thrusts of legal activity have moved across
Canada since 1977 and both of these affect the activity of ge- an unusual move, Parliament enacted two separate acts, the
nealogical research. First, there has been a movement toward Privacy Act and the Access to Information Act, together as one
making government-held information available to those who bill. In Ontario, access and personal data protection have alrequest it. Access to information laws mean that records held ways been linked in legislation affecting government bodies:
T
14 • Families • February 2007
the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act was
passed in 1987 and the Municipal Freedom of Information and
Protection of Privacy Act in 1989.
Each of the provinces and territories has its own access
legislation governing the public sector and very soon all will
have companion personal data protection legislation in place
(Newfoundland has yet to proclaim this personal data protection into force4). Generally, however, it is clear in these laws
that records that were specifically created by governments
with the intention that they be made available to the public
(such as land registry records) will continue to be made available even when they contain personally identifiable information about people.5
Personal data protection legislation creates a whole regime for the treatment of information about identifiable
individuals from the moment that information is collected
by an organization to the moment records containing that
information are destroyed or deleted. This type of legislation
regulates how an organization can collect information about
individuals, how it should store it, how it must use it, how it
must disseminate it to others outside the organization, and
how it must dispose of it.
In the public sector where personal data protection is
linked to access legislation, if the records you seek are not
protected by a personal data protection regime or some other
validly enacted exception to access, the organization will be
required to make them available to you. However, not every
province and territory has decided to make every provincial
and municipal organization subject to access legislation. Even
the federal government lists the organizations subject to its
access and personal data protection legislation and does not
make every organization subject to it. Organizations that are
not subject to this legislation can choose whether or not to
make any information, including personal data, available to
you in your genealogical researches.
Each act dealing with personal data protection in Canada
has set a different length of protection on the personally
identifiable data held by organizations subject to it.6 In
Ontario, an organization subject to the Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act or the Municipal Freedom
of Information and Protection of Privacy Act must protect
information about individuals for 30 years after that person’s
death. In Alberta and Saskatchewan, it is 25 years; in
British Columbia, Prince Edward Island, Nova Scotia and
under the federal statutes, it is 20;7 in Manitoba it is 10 years.
After that, information about identifiable individuals held
by public sector organizations in these jurisdictions becomes
available to anyone requesting it, including genealogists.
On this reasoning, information held by the federal government from early census-takings would gradually become
available 20 years after the deaths of the individuals surveyed.
However, the federal census-taking itself is governed by law.
There is controversy about post-1911 census records because
in the taking of these later censuses, an undertaking that the
government would keep census information confidential was
articulated to those filling out the census. Because there was
no time limit placed upon this undertaking, it clashes with
the legislated time limits for personal data protection in the
public sector that was legislated by Parliament much later in
the twentieth century. The federal government’s solution has
been to add a question to the 2006 census this year which
asked members of households to consent to the release of
information about themselves 92 years after this census. As a
result, there are years of the census from the twentieth century
that will never be available to genealogists except in aggregate
form. Furthermore, genealogists working 92 years from now
will only be able to access the patchwork of records: records
for those individuals who gave their consent in this census
now.
Records Held in the Private Sector
Until 2004, personal data protection legislation in Canada
(except Quebec) affected only government bodies. However,
in 2004 the whole of a new piece of legislation which the
federal government passed in 2001 came into effect: the
Personal Information Protection and Electronic Documents Act
(PIPEDA). This statute has signaled a new era in Canada
– personal data protection will now be an obligation imposed
on private sector organizations as well as on public sector
ones. Indeed, because PIPEDA applies to all organizations
engaged in commercial activities, it is possible that we have a
greater scope for personal data protection now in the private
sector in Canada than in the public.8 In the case of information held in private sector organizations, however, there is
no corresponding access legislation. This means that while
private sector organizations are legally obliged to protection
information about identifiable individuals for their lifetimes
plus twenty years, there is no requirement even after the
expiry of that time period that they must make that information available to anyone. This will probably signal a general
tightening up for genealogists of information held by private
sector organizations.
Federally regulated businesses in Canada such as airlines
and the banking industry, as well as businesses in certain
provinces and territories (the Maritimes, Saskatchewan,
Manitoba and Ontario) must comply with PIPEDA.9 Because
the constitutional ability of our federal Parliament to pass
such a sweeping statute governing the whole business sector
in Canada is in some doubt, the federal government has left
room for the provinces to pass their own, similar,
legislation for the private sector. Quebec already had such legislation in place which is considered equivalent to PIPEDA.
British Columbia and Alberta have followed suit with their
own provincial personal data protection regimes for the private sector that the federal government has also declared to be
equivalent to PIPEDA.
February 2007 • Families • 15
Access, Privacy and Genealogical Research
If you are seeking to find out about someone and you know
that a number of public and private sector organizations
may hold information about this person (often one organization will hold a copy of correspondence sent to another, for
example), you can apply to any organization that you believe
might have records in which you are interested. It is common practice to apply to more than one organization. Since
personal data protection and access legislation differs in its
particulars from province to province and between territories
and federal legislation, what is not released to you from one
organization may be made available to you from another.
You may not get the original letter from the organization that
holds it, but you may get the copy from another. In most jurisdictions, if you are acting as agent for the legally appointed
personal representative or executor of a person who has died
and you are within the number of years that jurisdiction
protects personal data held by organizations, you can insist
that the personal information about that person be released
to you.10 You can also help a person to whom information
relates to apply to an organization governed by personal data
protection legislation for information about her or himself.
You cannot, however, represent yourself as agent for people
with whom you have no direct connection. For example, you
cannot represent yourself as acting as agent for a granddaughter in applying for information about her just because you are
working on a genealogy of your family that includes her.
Personal data protection regimes in the public sector in
Canada are largely complaint driven. That is, the person
whose information has been wrongly handled by the organization involved can complain under the statute. At the
federal level and in Ontario, there is a Commissioner to
whom the complaint is made. At the federal level, the Commissioner must investigate the complaint but then can only
make a recommendation. If the organization involved does
not comply with the Commissioner’s recommendation, the
Commissioner may take the matter to the courts. If the
courts find that a private sector organization has violated
PIPEDA, then the individual whose information was involved can go further and take the organization to court and
seek to recover money from the organization. With respect to
the Ontario public sector legislation, the Commissioner him
or herself has legally binding decision-making power – but
the individual involved will not receive direct compensation
for breaches of the statutes. Each province and territory has
set up its own mechanism to handle violations of its personal
data protection regime.
If you are working on genealogy as a private individual,11
you are not an organization covered by any personal data
protection regime in Canada and so you are quite entitled to
include information about any individuals, living or dead, in
your genealogy once you have it.12 Nothing in personal data
protection legislation stops you from publishing your person16 • Families • February 2007
ally created family histories,13 although there may be other
legal barriers if you used commercially created software in the
creation of the genealogy or include copies of documents created by other parties. These are issues that will be discussed in
one the future articles in this series. §
Vocabulary in this area is confusing. Many of the statutes, like
the federal Privacy Act, contain the word “privacy” in their titles for
legislation involving personal data protection – and many noted
authorities and spokespeople use that same word “privacy” in discussing personal data protection. However, there are, in five of our
provinces, other statutes that deal directly with privacy in terms of
being able to sue to force others to leave us alone in certain respects.
In four provinces, Newfoundland, Manitoba, Saskatchewan and
British Columbia, these are called Privacy Acts. In the fifth, Quebec,
the privacy protection is found in the provincial Charter of Rights
and Freedoms as well as under the Civil Code. For this reason,
among others, I will continue to refer to the laws with which we are
concerned in this article as personal data protection statutes.
2
“Organizations” will be used to refer to crown corporations
such as the Liquor Control Board of Ontario as well as to government departments, municipalities, or ministries. In the private sector, each company is considered an organization, as are businesses
run by individuals.
3
Exactly what information will be considered personal to an
individual is defined in each personal data protection law in Canada. For example, under the Personal Information Protection and
Electronic Documents Act [PIPEDA] of the federal government, in
the case of private sector businesses, personal information is defined
to mean any information about an identifiable individual but does
not include the name, title or business address or telephone number of any employee of any organization. In Ontario, the Public
Sector Salary Disclosure Act means that you can find the name,
organization and salary of any person working in the public sector
and making a salary of over $100,000 because organizations are
required to publish this list annually.
4
Even in Newfoundland there is an exception to the general
right of access to information held by government where information about an identifiable individual other than the requestor in
involved and that information will not be made available.
5
Although in Ontario this is phrased in general terms, in Quebec,
for example, the personal data protection legislation is specifically
stated not to apply to land registry, civil status or matrimonial regimes.
6
Due to the unusual construction of the access legislation in
New Brunswick, where every exception to the right to access the
information held by the New Brunswick public sector organizations covered is permissive but not mandatory, a government organization can refuse to release information about another person to a
requestor but is not required to do so.
7
PIPEDA actually has a formula for release of information
about individuals – the earlier of (i) one hundred years after the
record containing the information was created, and (ii) twenty
years after the death of the individual to whom the information
refers (s.7(3)(h)).
8
This anomalous situation will probably not persist for long. In
Ontario, for example, universities were not covered by either the
Freedom of Information and Privacy Act or the Municipal Freedom of Information and Protection of Privacy Act but the current
1
provincial government has brought them all under the Freedom of
Information and Protection of Privacy Act in 2006.
9
In Ontario, there is separate legislation under the Personal
Health Information Protection Act [PHIPA] approved by the federal government as equivalent to PIPEDA for the health sector.
In Alberta, there is a Health Information Act which has not been
deemed equivalent to PIPEDA at the federal level and some organizations affected must currently comply with both Alberta’s HIA
and PIPEDA. A similar situation currently exists for Manitoba’s
Personal Health Information Act [PHIA] and Saskatchewan’s
Health Information Protection Act [HIPA] which have both passed
but are not deemed equivalent. This legislation is relevant to those
genealogists who might be searching for hospital records. I have
been asked questions by people, for example, seeking to know
whether their relatives have spent time in the tuberculosis sanitariums in Ontario. In general, because of this legislation and older law
relating to medical records, such information is only available to
patients (and, in some cases, their legal representatives).
10
Curiously there is no provision for a deceased’s legal representative to act after their death in respect of information about them
under PIPEDA, so it would appear that during the 20 years follow-
ing an individual’s death that PIPEDA applies to them, organizations covered under PIPEDA will be unable to release information
about that individual to anyone at all. Under the federal public
sector Privacy Act, there is a specific provision providing for access
by the deceased’s legally appointed personal representative or executor – but only for purposes of administration of the estate, not for
genealogy.
11
PIPEDA does not apply to “any individual in respect of information that the individual collects, uses or discloses for personal
or domestic purposes and does not collect, use or disclose for any
other purpose.” (s. 4(2)(b)).
12
Assuming, of course, that you avoid libeling the living! It is
another paradox in our evolving law about information that you
cannot libel dead people but the dead have “privacy” rights under
personal data protection regimes in this country for a number of
years after death.
13
There is an exception in PIPEDA for “any organization in respect of personal information that the organization [which includes
persons, you will remember] collects, uses or discloses for journalistic, artistic or literary purposes and does not collect, use or disclose
for any other purpose.” (PIPEDA s.4(2)(c)).
Tribute to Ryan Taylor
18 June 1950–25 September 2006
R
yan was born Ronald Wilbert Taylor in Oshawa
to Charles Henry and Robena Velma (Woodward)
Taylor. He officially added the name Ryan as a young
man. For genealogists far and wide, he was a popular speaker,
mentor and educator. For the Taylor and Woodward families,
he was their family researcher, recorder and raconteur whose
40 years of gathering family tree information and anecdotes
is a cherished legacy. He was Ron to them – the generous and
kind son, brother, uncle and great-uncle. With a passionate
interest in family history since his teens, he graduated with
degrees from both Carleton University and the University of
Ottawa. His love of books led to his career as a librarian.
It was when he accepted employment with the Kitchener
Public Library in 1980 that Ryan was truly able to combine
his vocation and avocation. He initiated the oral history
program there and nurtured countless beginners in family history. He also reached into the wider community with
his local “Tracing Your Roots” newspaper column and nine
years of “Bookmark,” a radio broadcast. In 1994 he moved
to his “dream job” at the famed Allen County Public Library (ACPL) in Fort Wayne, Indiana. There, he co-hosted
“Branching Out,” a genealogical phone-in television show.
In 2000, he was program chair for the ACPL’s very successful
national Millennium Conference.
It’s impossible to do justice, in a few paragraphs, to a man
who gave so much to genealogy in Ontario and Canada.
From early days in Kitchener, he became a mainstay in the
Waterloo-Wellington Branch OGS. His support for the
Branch never ceased. Proceeds from his book Family Research
in Ontario’s Waterloo County are a lasting gift to the Branch. In
2004 he was tickled pink – as he would say – when they honoured him with “Ryan Taylor Day,” a true highlight in his life.
He was deeply involved with Families first as Review Editor,
and then as Editor from 1988 to 1997. A frequent speaker at
OGS Seminars and many other venues, he lectured knowledgeably on a variety of British and Ontario topics, delighting
audiences with his engaging style and commanding voice. In
turn, he fondly recalled the best events as “love fests.”
Meanwhile, Ryan was always writing. A bibliography of
his books stretches to more than 50 titles for family and the
public. Of the latter, most familiar are Routes to Roots, Books
You Need To Do Genealogy in Ontario, Canadian Genealogical
Sourcebook, and with Frances Hoffman, Much To Be Done:
Private Life in Ontario from Victorian Diaries and Across the
Waters: Ontario Immigrants’ Experiences. Dozens of his newspaper columns were made available online by The Global
Gazette and Interlink Bookshop. He was a regular contributor of articles and book reviews to many journals. Ryan excelled as an educator; the National Institute for Genealogical
Studies in the Faculty of Information Studies, University
February 2007 • Families • 17
of Toronto welcomed him as an instructor in 2000. Books
that developed from his courses are Researching Canadian
Newspaper Records, Researching Canadian Religious Records,
and Researching Canadian Archival Centres. Most recently it
was his great pleasure to be a panellist on History Television’s
“Ancestors in the Attic” series.
The grief at his unexpected passing echoed from coast
to coast as friends and relatives remembered their own special “Ryan moments.” Memorial services took place in Fort
Wayne on 4 November 2006 and in Toronto on 2 December
2006. His family and library colleagues and genealogy friends
shared bittersweet reminiscences, helping to mitigate a painful loss. Ryan never failed to amaze with his wide-ranging
intellect and eclectic interests.
Some of his happiest times were chasing and testing recipes. Others were baking for friends and choosing whimsical
gifts for them. Dining out was a great joy, especially accompanied by lively conversation. He always had an interesting
story to tell, punctuated with that spontaneous, infectious
boom of laughter. For years, fellow librarians would stop at
his office to share chuckles or indignation over his beloved
London Times. Travel was another enjoyment and he knew
England – dear to his heart – well. One of his greatest gifts
was his notable empathy. He endeared himself with his attentive listening to the stories and troubles of others; he rarely
failed to inquire later how things were going.
Although gone much too soon, Ryan leaves us lasting
contributions and a splendid, esteemed role model. Both
ACPL and the National Institute have established Funds in
his name for different purposes.
The Society wishes to thank Brenda Dougall Merriman, CG,
CGL for preparing this notice for publication in Families.
She is the author of Genealogy in Ontario, Searching the
Records, About Genealogical Standards of Evidence, and United
Empire Loyalists: A Guide to Researching Loyalist Ancestors in
Upper Canada. She is also Canadian Department Director,
National Institute for Genealogical Studies
<www.genealogicalstudies.com>.
Tasmanian Genealogy
John Becker
A précis of a book review written by Australian Chloe Hooper on
In Tasmania by Nicholas Shakespeare. This review appeared in
the London Review of Books, 18 August 2005 issue. Selected
sections prepared by John Becker of Toronto are reprinted here
with permission.
way through a hefty inheritance, set sail for Tasmania where
thanks to family connections and thuggish self-interest he
eventually reinvented himself as an aristocrat. The first archivist to whom Shakespeare reveals his ancestry warns him: “If
I was you, I would not go around divulging that information. … He’s a man of whom I’ve heard not one good word.”
asmania has long been a convenient receptacle for
Kemp was venal, pompous, ruthless and manipulative.
Australia’s gothic fantasies and projections. This
The first British settlement was established in Tasmania in
is in part because of the island’s relative isolation
1803. The colonists considered the original inhabitants “the
and because convicts continued to be “sent down” to Van
most peaceable creatures in the universe,” but by the 1820s,
Diemen’s Land (Tasmania) longer than to other colonies. But Aboriginal hunting grounds were being seized by settlers, leadthe concentration on Tasmania helped those on the mainland ing to a decade of violence – the Black War. The Aborigines
forget their own unsavoury past. However, if you’re wearing
formed raiding parties who lit decoy fires, stole from food
your gothic glasses, the Tasmanian cognoscenti resemble a
stores, and occasionally attacked bystanders with their spears.
close-knit family with codes, dark silences and rules about
The colonists campaigned loudly for action.
who is allowed to speak.
In 1830 the infamous Black Line was thought up by
One of the strengths of Nicholas Shakespeare’s In Tasma- George Arthur, the lieutenant-governor. This very theatrical
nia is that he comes from an island far away. He can play the event was, however, a real historical event. The white populapart of a baffled British visitor, asking awkward questions
tion of male free settlers and convicts, equipped with 1,000
that land him right at the heart of the most sensitive issues.
muskets, 30,000 rounds of ammunition and 300 pairs of
His outsider status is, however, challenged at every turn.
handcuffs, formed a human chain in an attempt to drive the
By the end of this genealogical odyssey it’s as if he’s been
remaining Aboriginal population down a narrow isthmus to
restored to the bosom of his family. …Shakespeare gets the
the Tasman Peninsula. “Every white man in Van Diemen’s
metaphorical knock on the door, discovering his great-great- Land,” Governor Arthur reported to London, joined the line
great-great-uncle to be the “father of Tasmania” – Anthony
“with the most zealous and cheerful alacrity.” The operation
Fenn Kemp … [who] in 1793, at age 20, having worked his was a failure. The Aborigines, with their superior knowledge
T
18 • Families • February 2007
of the bush, easily evaded their pursuers, and only two people
were caught. The line did, however, force already demoralized
tribes from their territories, and as word spread others were
suitably frightened. “Plenty of horseman, plenty of soldiers,
plenty of big fires on the hills,” one Aboriginal woman lamented. Four years later, all the original inhabitants, apart
from one small family, had left.
In Australia the links between genealogy and shame have
long been understood. But now that having a convict ancestor no longer represents a “stain,” there is a whole new terrain
for white Australians to feel ashamed and uncomfortable
about. To complicate matters further, about 15,000 people
now identify themselves as Tasmanian Aborigines, probably
four or five times the number when Kemp arrived in 1803.
They have little detailed knowledge of their ancestors’ languages, spiritual beliefs or cultural practices, other than via
the imperfect records of the colonists. All the same, many
Aboriginal descendants have made a decision to ignore their
predominantly white ancestry. Shakespeare points out that a
“society that accepts its mixed identity is not so likely to be
troubled by this contradiction.” Accepting that one’s lineage
is comprised of the invaded and the invaders isn’t easy,
however.
The Tasmanian Aboriginal community is plagued with
infighting, especially around the question – again – of legitimacy. The most prominent leaders often accuse each other
of not being Aboriginal, that is, of not having a traceable
ancestor. This can lead to much bitterness and absurdity. For
example, a ruling in September 2002 by the Independent
Indigenous Advisory Committee rejected a woman’s claim for
Aboriginality, but upheld the claim of her brother.
A failure to understand events from the Aboriginal perspective is evident in virtually the whole of Australian history. Yet it is difficult for most Australians to respond to all
this without bafflement or cynicism. As the historian Henry
Reynolds, who himself has Tasmanian Aboriginal ancestry,
admits, “If you say you’re a Tasmanian Aboriginal you are
saying that you’re something you don’t know how to be.
You don’t know how to live it.” But who’s to say, in the end,
which is stranger: a blue-eyed, born-again Tasmanian Aboriginal renaming herself an Aboriginal word meaning “by the
sea,” or someone of European origin endlessly sifting through
birth and death certificates? What is genealogy if not a form
of ancestor worship?
[Shakespeare’s own Tasmanian family includes] two
extraordinary cousins, Maud and Ivy, spinster sisters who
have lived all their lives in the same house, with a “silverframed photograph of Lady Diana” and “ranks of bridal
dolls”. Ivy gives Shakespeare a diary of the most important
events of her life: Cow shed started, 6 June 1940; Maude got
her false teeth, 22 September 1941; We had electric light put
through, 9 July 1943; Uncle Joe passed away, 17 December
1969.
“It seems to me,” Shakespeare writes, “that these sisters
achieved serenity by narrowing everything in, by not going
beyond the front gate.” For Ivy, an amateur genealogist who
has been away from home only once on a day trip nearly sixty
years ago, her hobby was a form of travel. Maud and Ivy, it
turns out, are related to one of the early Aboriginal leaders.
They are also related by marriage to the Tasmanian branch of
the Shakespeares. Tasmania emerges as an island of genealogists
– genealogists who are all related. §
CONSANGUINITY
Consanguinity is the quality of being descended from the
same ancestor as another person.
The degree of relative consanguinity can be illustrated
with a consanguinity table, in which each level of lineal
consanguinity (i.e., generation) appears as a row, and
individuals with a collaterally-consanguinious relationship
share the same row.
The connotations of degree of consanguinity varies by
context (e.g., Canon law, Roman law, et al.). Most cultures
define a degree of consanguinity below which sexual interrelationships are regarded as incestuous (the “prohibited
degree of kinship”). In the Roman Catholic Church, unwittingly marrying a closely-consanguinious blood relative is
grounds for an annulment, but dispensations were granted,
actually almost routinely (the Catholic Church’s ban on
marriage within the fourth degree of relationship (third
cousins) lasted from 1550 to 1917; before that, the prohibition was to marriages between as much as seventh degree
of kinship). Adoption may or may not be considered at law
to create such a bond; in most Western societies, adoptive
relationships are considered blood relationships for these
purposes, but in others, including both Japan and ancient
Rome, it was common for a couple with only daughters
to adopt a son-in-law, making the marriage one between
adoptive siblings.
Historically, some European nobles cited a close degree
of consanguinity when they required convenient grounds
for divorce, especially in contexts where religious doctrine
forbade the voluntary dissolution of an unhappy or childless marriage. Conversely, the consanguinity law of succession requires the next monarch to be of the same blood
of the previous one; allowing, for example, illegitimate
children to inherit.
Rates of consanguinity in Europe and the Americas in
recent times are low; significantly higher rates have been
reported in Asia and the Middle East, reportedly as high as
78% of marriages are between first and second cousins in
some tribes, and nationally as much as 50% in Iraq.
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopaedia
February 2007 • Families • 19
What’s in a Middle Name?
Stephen C. Young
Stephen Young was born and raised in London, Ontario and
moved to Utah to attend Brigham Young University in 1979.
He received a BA in Family and Local History in 1985, and
subsequently earned an MA in History from Bowling Green
State University in Ohio in 1990. He has worked with the Family History Library since 1988, with four years (1992-1996)
in England supervising the British 1881 Census Project for the
Family History Library.
Key words: in England: Augthon, East Riding, Yorkshire; St. Peters, Leeds; Catton;
Newton-upon-Derwent in Wilberfoss parish, Hackney; Bromley, St. Leonards. Canadian place names: Port Credit, Canada West, Toronto Twp., in Peel County, West
Wawanosh Twp. in Huron County; Goderich, Regina; Teeswater in Ontario, Darlington, Orangeville, Saskatoon, Hibbert Twp. in Perth County; London, Port Alberni,
Nanaimo. Other place names: Bernères at Juno Beach, Calais, Boulogne, Kiska Island in the Aleutians, Leubringhen, St. Inglevert.
O
ne of the fascinating and enjoyable consequences of
conducting genealogical research is the discovery and
tracing of family names repeated through successive
generations, sometimes for centuries. Repetitive naming patterns can provide grief to researchers if their family remained
in a specific locale for 100 years or more, resulting in a confusing proliferation of near and distant cousins bearing identical
forenames and surnames to sort through. As most genealogists
know, the continuous christenings, marriages and burials of
John, Mary, William, Elizabeth, Thomas, and Ann can leave
one with toes curled in frustration and bewilderment when
individual identities can’t be unravelled in the local records.
On the other hand, we want to bless the ancestor who, with
some verve and imagination, bestowed on one or more of their
progeny a name of uncommon distinction.
Such is the case in my own family with the three male
christenings of “Henlock” Young appearing in the International Genealogical Index (IGI) (1752, 1780, and 1810),
each descended from George Young and Ann Henlock who
married in East Yorkshire in 1708. This given name is unique
enough that when a Henlock Young showed up in an Ontario, Canada 1851 census record, I felt confident and, I must
admit a touch smug, that I had the origins of this emigrant
pegged immediately. But that’s another story.
My purpose here is to focus on the repeated use of a specific middle name employed by different branches of my ancestral family during the past two centuries. Fortunately for
all of us, the practice of using multiple forenames gained in
popularity during the 18th and early 19th century, the exceptional eventually becoming general practice so that by 1900
most children, especially males, were endowed with two given names. Following the example of the landed classes, some
families introduced maiden surnames as first and second
names for their children. In this article I want to illustrate
this naming pattern in my family while demonstrating some
20 • Families • February 2007
familiar research strategies and obstacles in the process. Secondly, I hope to contribute to the realization that the stories
of ordinary lives, when inserted into the context of local and
national history, assume greater significance and interest to
others. You be the judge.
My first introduction to the name “Sherwood” in my own
family history came from a small page of scribbled notes my
mother wrote in the early 1960s at the time she interviewed
my great-grandmother, Mary Margaret Clara Young (née
Young). Thankfully my mother, Audrey Jeanne Morrish,1
who died in 1967 at the age of 37, left evidence of this visit
with my father’s grandmother years before I felt the magnetic
pull of genealogical research, providing me with information and clues that
would have been lost
forever. I remember
my great-grandmother clearly. She
died at age 99 in
December 1969
just after my 14th
birthday, a much
loved matriarch to
the three subsequent
generations of her
family. Like that of
many genealogists,
my earliest research
focused on discovering more about my
surname lineage.
In the past 25 years
I’ve successfully
Mary Margaret Clara Young (1870-1969)
traced the Youngs
through family, civil
and church records in Ontario, Canada back ten generations
and eastward across the Atlantic to a 1683 christening in
the rural parish of Aughton in the East Riding of Yorkshire.
My great-grandmother married her second cousin, Charles
Young (1861-1922) in 1897, so the interview notes just referred to included leads on his, as well as her own, branch of
the Young family. Included is a tantalizing reference to the
“White Swan,” a public house at York, which her husband’s
grandfather purportedly managed before emigrating to Canada in the early 1830s. Research eventually corroborated the
name of the pub, but it is in Bubwith, a small village about
15 miles southeast of York and just a mile south of Aughton. Despite this inaccuracy, I learned long ago that family
folklore passed down through generations, while perhaps not
absolutely accurate, usually contain some truth.
I refer the reader to the Young genealogical chart printed
on page 26 in order to understand the bewildering tangle
of names that results from my descent from three Young
brothers five generations back. My great-grandmother
was the fourth of eight children born to Matthew Young
(1835-1913) and Margaret Smylie (1841-1900), both children of emigrants from England and Ireland respectively.
My mother’s interview notes include the intriguing word
“uncle” inserted near the names of my great-grandmother’s
grandparents, Samuel Young (1795-1855) and Mary Young2
(1811-1905). Their identical surnames suggested a close degree of consanguinity but at this early stage of my research I
hesitated to accept that an uncle and niece would or could
legally marry in England, or anywhere else for that matter.
Although I lack definitive proof, circumstantial evidence and
an 1834 marriage record at St. Peters, Leeds, seem to confirm
the unappealing conclusion that Samuel did marry an older
brother’s daughter. It is probably this fact that precipitated an
anonymous marriage in the urban sprawl of Leeds followed
by immediate emigration from Yorkshire to Canada, carrying them even further from disapproval and scandal at home.
Another brother, John Young (1785-1865), and his wife
Mercy Brown (1794-1845), with their five children, possibly
emigrated to Toronto at the same time.3
Perhaps akin to the athlete’s nervous wait for a contest
to begin is the double-edged anxiety felt by the genealogist simultaneously anticipating and fearing the facts to be
presented on a civil registration certificate ordered from the
General Register Office. Will the purchase be justified with
the satisfaction of confirming family relationships and providing fresh clues? Or will the evidence prove that money
was wasted? The certificate I ordered was definitely encouraging but, as in many such cases, not definitive. The “Rank or
Profession” of the groom was listed as “carpenter,” the trade
commonly employed by many of the Youngs in Yorkshire.
Even more promising was that the father’s name matched
what I knew, but this still didn’t prove I was looking at a record of my third great-grandmother’s brother.
Years ago, in the IGI, I found the instance of the christening of Robert Sherwood Young at Hunmanby, Yorkshire on
13 February 1874, son of Thomas and Mary Anne. Research
into this family suggests only a coincidence of name and no
relationship to my own family further south in the county.
So the happenstance of another Thomas Sherwood Young
with a father by the name of Thomas in densely populated
London might also prove coincidental. However, the marriage certificate did supply one important clue that could
determine if I had the right man.
The Thomas Sherwood Young on my new certificate married a widow named Ann Hipple (née Rayner); both were
living on John Street in Hackney at the time of their nuptials.
Thomas Sherwood Young (1817-1877)
Could they still be living on the same Street five years later at
As already indicated, I am descended through three brothers: the time of the 1851 census? It was certainly worth the effort
to quickly consult the 1851 census street indexes produced by
John (1785-1865) and Samuel (1795-1855), the emigrants
the LDS Family History Library to find which roll of film and
just mentioned, and Thomas (1780-1830), the father of
Samuel’s wife, Mary. They all appear in the second row of the which folios contained enumerations on John Street. I found
the correct entry of the not-so-newlyweds almost immedichart. Thomas, the oldest of the three, married Jane Sherwood (1787-1821) at the parish church in Catton, Yorkshire ately. My satisfaction culminated in reading the final column
of the census, “Where Born: Newton-upon-Derwent, Yorkin 1810. The use of Sherwood as a middle name was origishire.”4 Additional searches of the census indexes provided by
nally applied when their oldest son was christened at NewAncestry.com pinpointed Thomas and Ann at 24 Havelock
ton-upon-Derwent, a township in the parish of Wilberfoss,
Road, Hackney in 1861, and at 10 Swayton Road, Bromley,
on 27 May 1817. Until a couple of years ago I knew nothSt. Leonards in 1871.5 Searches in the 1881 census index
ing else (beyond his christening) about Thomas Sherwood
Young (1817-1877), a nephew of the two emigrant brothers proved fruitless.
Now it wouldn’t be fair or accurate to continue a descripmention above. There are few records detailing the lives of
tion of my investigations of this distant uncle as a descriptive
children in the early 19th century, especially in small rural
series of uninterrupted, providential and cheery excursions
parishes. Both parents died by his 13th birthday so I can
through 19th century English records. Alas, no. Any geneaonly assume one of his numerous aunts and uncles finished
raising him and his three siblings. Or perhaps he was appren- logical sleuth who’s been at the game for even a short time
will already be smirking at the inevitable. Yes, I did find
ticed to a trade, but I haven’t yet found such evidence. For
Thomas’ death registration in London, but it took some time
many years I wondered what happened to Thomas, so I was
surprised when his name popped up on my computer screen wading through the four indexes per year until I finally pinpointed him in the March quarter of 1877, now in Camberwhile I was randomly searching the indexes on FreeBMD:
Thomas Sherwood Young, married in the December quarter well on the other side of the Thames. Today at this writing I
can easily resurrect his death registration in FreeBMD, but it
of 1846, Hackney, District of Greater London, vol. 3, page
was not there three years ago. Neither were the Ancestry.com
154. This registration is a long way from the East Riding of
Yorkshire, but I was intrigued enough to immediately order a census indexes (recently made available), so I spent quite a
few fruitless hours hoping to find Thomas and Ann on John
certificate anyway.
February 2007 • Families • 21
Street in Hackney after 1851. To date I haven’t
yet discovered whether Thomas Sherwood Young
fathered any children of his own, but, interestingly enough, later census records reveal that his
stepdaughter did name one of her children Sherwood (Forsey).
George Sherwood Young (1845-1891)
It was Thomas’ (1780-1830) older sister, Mary
(1811-1905), and uncle Samuel (1795-1955) in
Canada, who next applied the name when their
third son, George Sherwood Young, was born on
2 November 1845 at Port Credit, a small village
on the shores of Lake Ontario 15 miles west of
downtown Toronto. Originally named Upper
Canada in 1791, the province was renamed Canada West from 1841 to 1867, and then Ontario
since Confederation in 1867. Although census
enumerations were conducted in Canada on the
British pattern every ten years, some of these
earliest records are now missing. Such is the case
for the 1851 census of Port Credit and Toronto
Township, Peel County, where Samuel and Mary
Young settled. Isn’t it true that seasoned researchers lament only half-amusedly about “Murphy’s
Law” as it applies to genealogy: the seemingly
random disappearance of historical records
relating to one’s own ancestors, yet surviving in
abundance to detail or clarify the existence for
almost everyone else. It’s a feeling something like
searching for a tree with a particular name carved
on it in the middle of a forest, only to find that
that specific tree was chopped down years ago and Mary Young (1811-1905)
you’re left “stumped.”
Once again I learned the lesson that a good researcher
Despite the absence of local civil records, family records
must always try to corroborate secondary sources with the
reveal emigrant Samuel’s death in early 1855 at the age of
primary document when possible. As helpful as extracted
59, leaving his wife and six children to fend for themselves.
sources are, they can include a measure of inadvertent human
This included the oldest, Matthew, my great-grandmother’s
error. Civil registration was not initiated in Ontario until 1
father. Living memory can stretch back almost 200 years.
July 1869 so there is no death record. The absence of a headWhen my mother interviewed my great-grandmother in the stone in the churchyard, or the lack of a newspaper obituary
early 1960s, she was talking to a woman who doubtless had
to corroborate the death date is fortunately unnecessary due
heard her own father recount his childhood and the death of to the agreement of the church burial record and undertaker’s
her grandfather. The family record in my possession which
receipt.
survived over 125 years is the undertaker’s receipt, dated
Mary Young, née Young (1811-1905), now a widow of
26 April 1855, detailing payment of £3.13.1 “for Coffin &
44, moved her brood further west to the backwoods fronTrimmings, with Shell & plate lettering.” Armed with this
tier of the developing province, to farm in West Wawanosh
knowledge, 20 years ago I checked a published burial index
Township in Huron County about 110 miles NW of Port
for one of the local cemeteries, but to no avail. It did include Credit. The closest town of any size was Goderich, which is
a Samuel Young buried near Port Credit at St. Peter’s Anglion the shore of Lake Huron. This is where my great-grandcan Church on 29 March 1855, but this man was aged 89,
mother (Mary Margaret Clara Young, née Young) was born,
not 59. On a visit to Ontario two years ago I went to St.
and where her uncle, George Sherwood Young (1845-1891),
Peter’s, consulted the original burial entry and confirmed my spent the rest of his life. Subsequent census enumerations
suspicion: the transcriber had misread the entry; the age was (1871 and 1881) record George as an aging bachelor, living
recorded as “59.”
with his mother in his oldest brother’s household. I expected
22 • Families • February 2007
he had died a bachelor until I consulted the 1891 census
15 years ago. I was surprised to find him, now a shoemaker,
living in his own home nearby in the village of Dungannon, with a new wife, Charlotte (1860-1944), and an infant
daughter, Agnes (1888-1973).
Beginning in 1992 the Ontario civil registration records
and their indexes were filmed by The Church of Jesus Christ
of Latter-day Saints and made freely accessible for research
on microfilm (births 1869-1906; marriages 1869-1921;
deaths 1869-19316). In January 2006 these indexed records
appeared on <www.Ancestry.ca>. Despite searching the
registration indexes I could not find George’s marriage to
Charlotte Harriet Brown, although his daughter, Agnes Mary
Young does appear in the birth registrations index in 1888 in
West Wawanosh Township. After my census discovery, in reexamining the marriage indexes I did find George Sherwood
“Younge”; the extra vowel on his surname relegated his entry
in the indexes to the end of all the other Youngs married in
1887. The lesson here is obvious: check for variant spellings
of names in the indexes! George and Charlotte weren’t married for long. He died of typhoid just two days before Christmas in 1891, at only 46 years of age, and perhaps not long
after this family photo was taken.
fact that Matthew and Margaret Young were living 150 miles
away from the farm between the two census years.
I’ve done little research on this great-uncle, William Sherwood Young (1878-1955), but I do know that William’s
place in his nation’s history was to join thousands of other
second and third generation Canadians, with more recent
immigrants, in the settling of the West. By the end of the
19th century new farmland in Ontario was both scarce and
expensive, a condition obliging many to pioneer in Manitoba, Saskatchewan, Alberta and British Columbia. Four
of William’s siblings found their way to Saskatchewan and
raised families there. William married Renetta Pauhl in Regina on 2 December 1916 and likewise raised three sons and a
daughter on a farm in Findlater.7 William died 13 December
1955, just nine days after my own birth.
Matthew Sherwood Young (1879- ?)
During the last decades of the 19th century the publication
of local histories evolved into a profitable market. Especially
prolific in the United States, publishing houses canvassed
private citizens for biographical information of local “luminaries” for inclusion in their proposed book, which naturally
included subscription fees. Politically prominent and commercially successful men, but rarely women, were generally
William Sherwood Young (1878-1955)
keen to pay for inclusion of their own story. An extra fee
Despite owning farm property outside the small village of
ensured inclusion of a photographic portrait. Vanity aside,
Dungannon in West Wawanosh Township, the Young family these local city, county or township histories have proved
spent a few years during the 1870s in the provincial capital of invaluable to modern genealogical researchers.
Toronto. My great-grandmother’s father, Matthew, and two
Knowing the humbler origins of my own family, I was
of his brothers worked for the railroad there. Three of her
genuinely surprised to find the following entry in a comsiblings and some cousins were born in the city, including
memorative volume of Toronto notables. Not only did it
her brother, William Sherwood Young on 28 March 1878 at reveal new facts about another branch of my family, but also
460 King Street West. Except for this registration, the fact
mercifully confirmed some of my research thus far.
of his birth in Toronto would be invisible now because both
JAMES WILLIAM YOUNG, who passed away at Teeswater,
the 1871 and 1881 censuses show his parent’s family living
Ont., in July, 1889, was one of the well-known railway men of
comfortably on
that section of Ontario, and highly esteemed and popular with
the farm in Huron
the traveling public. Mr. Young was born in Port Credit, Ont.,
County near the
in 1848, son of Samuel and Mary (Young) Young, the foundshores of Lake Huers of the family in Canada.
ron. I could easily
James William Young was educated at Wawanosh, and afhave assumed that
terwards served his time to the carpentering business, which he
he was born on
followed for some years. He then became associated with the
the farm like some
Grand Trunk Railway Company as brakeman, and was soon
older and younger
promoted to the position of conductor. From that company he
siblings, a tempwent into the employ of the Canadian Pacific Railroad Comtation to which
pany, in whose employ he remained, running between Toronto
and Teeswater, until the time of his death.
many genealogists
In 1878 Mr. Young was married to Miss Isabelle Woods,
might succumb in
born
at Darlington, daughter of George and Jane (Byrd)
the absence of local
Woods,
and to this union there were born the following
records. Fortunatechildren:
Samuel, of Toronto Junction; Sherwood, of Saskaly the civil registratoon,
who
married May Anderson, and has one son, James;
tion indexes are
Thomas, of Toronto Junction; Georgina; and Della, of Toronto
province-wide and
Junction. Mr. Young was a member of the English Church, to
William Sherwood Young (1878-1955)
neatly exposed the
February 2007 • Families • 23
which faith his widow also adheres. In politics he was a Conservative, and he was fraternally connected with the Railway
Conductors’ Union.
Mr. and Mrs. Young were the first settlers on Gordon
Street,8 Toronto, and built the second structure on that thoroughfare, at No. 11. There they resided for some time before
going to Teeswater. After her husband’s death Mrs. Young
returned to her former home in Toronto, but she sold it in
1905 and purchased the one in which she now resides, at No.
36 Mary Street in the Toronto Junction.9
I confirmed the birth of Matthew Sherwood Young on
19 October 1879. Due to his own or his family’s preference,
Matthew answered to his second name, as indicated in the
article above. Further research discovered the birth registrations of only one of his brothers and two sisters. This biographical entry reveals a common snare for the genealogist.
Although very helpful with some historical detail, there is
one important fact ignored – the birth and death of a third
daughter in this family is not even mentioned. Fortunately
the 1881 census index of Canada, found on FamilySearch.
org, records Edith Annie Young, born in January of that year
in Orangeville, Peel Co.10 Civil registrations confirm this
birth as well as an early demise almost 13 months later. The
lesson learned is that infant births and deaths sometimes
are ignored in family records, possibly due to the grief such
memories evoke.
Still another caution inherent in using civil registration
records is the fact that many parents did not feel compelled
to comply with registration laws at the birth of their children,
especially when a fee was attached. One brother and the other two of Matthew’s sisters are missing from the indexes.
What happened to Matthew Sherwood Young was one of
the most frustrating enigmas of my family history research
until last year. The 1908 edition of Henderson’s Directory of
Saskatoon lists “S. Young & Co., Sherwood Young, Manager,
Family Grocers,” situated on Ave. C. Subsequent volumes
omit any reference to the Youngs or their grocery business.
After almost 20 years of frustrated searching, in March 2006
I was able to consult the 1911 census of Canada, with its
complete indexing by Ancestry.com,11 and I finally discovered Sherwood, Mary and James Young living clear across
Canada, now on the west coast in New Westminster, (part
of Vancouver) British Columbia. Like his father before him,
Sherwood was working for the Canadian Pacific Railroad. To
date I haven’t yet found clues of his death or burial beyond
reference on what I believe to be his wife’s gravestone back
in Turnberry Township,12 Huron County, Ontario: “At Rest;
Mary Nora; Beloved Wife of; Sherwood Young; Born April 5,
1875; Died July 5, 1924.” Likely he is buried at her side, but
with no marker.
George Sherwood Young (1913-1944)
With the example of an uncle, brother and cousin, my greatgrandmother continued the family tradition by naming her
24 • Families • February 2007
third and last son, George Sherwood Young. He was born 13
April 1913 on the farm in Hibbert Township,13 Perth County, Ontario. He was 14 years of age when his father, Charles,
passed away and the family moved to nearby Stratford, where
George finished his schooling.
George Sherwood Young (1913-1944) with Marnie and Sherwood
In the mid 1930s George moved to London, Ontario14
where some of his older brothers and sisters lived. He found
employment as a waiter in a restaurant. In May 1942 he married Margaret (Marnie) Davidson and just two months later
reported for service with the Canadian Fusiliers (City of London Regiment). After completing basic training at Vernon,
British Columbia, and based on his past vocation, George
soon found himself assigned duty as a steward in the officer’s
mess. In October of that same year Private G. S. Young was
promoted to Acting Lance Corporal, stationed at Seaforth
Camp in Vancouver. The Fusiliers received additional “special
advanced training in amphibious operations” at Port Alberni
and Nanaimo on Vancouver Island before being sent to Kiska,15 one of the Aleutian Islands off the coast of Alaska. Their
arrival there in August 1943 answered the threat of a reported Japanese landing. The report was accurate but George informed his family that all the Fusiliers ever found were empty
sáke bottles. Even so, the regiment remained until January
back in London, Ontario.
1944 after which George received a month’s furlough to visit
A letter dated 6 December 1944 to Marnie from Andrew
his wife and new 11-month-old son, named Sherwood James Mowatt, regimental chaplain of the Queen’s Own Rifles, exYoung.
plained the circumstances:
After his return to British Columbia, and a short stint at
Dear Mrs. Young,
the Vernon Military Hospital, George’s regiment prepared for
You must be anxiously awaiting further news of your
assignment in Europe. Embarkation leave was granted, allowhusband’s
death in action with our regiment. I am so sorry to
ing more time to be spent at home with his family. Sherwood
have
kept
you
waiting so long. We have been in action or on
was growing and Marnie was pregnant again. George left for
the move so much of the time since then that I got behind in
England in late May, arriving there 2 June 1944, just four
my letter writing. I am writing this from a hospital bed where
days before D-Day. One of the first across the English ChanI have been sent for a rest – so please excuse the writing. On
nel that memorable morning was George’s nephew, Charles
September 16th, I visited all our lads in their areas and had
Mitchell Young (my father), serving as a gunner on the Canaa fine chat with them. They seemed really in good spirits as
dian minesweeper HMCS Milltown. Within weeks George’s
they prepared all their weapons, equipment, and so on for
regiment, the Canadian Fusiliers, was disbanded and its
the next day’s attack on the strong German held positions in
troops divided up to reinforce other infantry regiments fightand around the port of Boulogne in France. Next morning we
moved forward at dawn under cover of a smoke screen and
ing in France. George was assigned to the Queen’s Own Riheavy artillery fire. We moved up to a wooded hill about two
fles of Canada. His new regiment had sustained severe losses
miles north east of the city and waited for a heavy air attack
in the taking of Bernières-sur-Mer at Juno Beach on D-Day
to soften up the enemy strong points. We didn’t have long
and were then in the process of driving German forces into
to wait. In the bright sunshine of a very beautiful day a large
Calais and Boulogne.
number of our heavy bombers hit their targets perfectly. Before
Some of George’s letters from the front survive. Like all
the bombing was over, I watched all our boys march forward
soldiers, his thoughts were of home and family. On 16 Auto take up their positions ready for the attack. Almost before
gust 1944 he wrote to his mother, “By the way do you know
the last bomb fell our men attacked. I was not able to learn
it was a year ago today that we made the landing on Kiska. It
exactly when your husband was killed, as in the excitement
hardly seems to be that long ago. Certainly have seen an awof battle time seems to mean very little. It was however, a few
ful lot of the world since then. Well I certainly hope I can see
hours after the attack started. I understand that he was killed
Canada again real soon. Then I think I will stay home and
instantly.
be a respectable married man.” On 2 September he gives a
Your husband’s body was brought back by his comrades to
me at our forward first aid post. Two days later on September
glimpse of conditions in France during that time,
The weather here is good and that is always a break for us. I
just finished a letter to Marnie and Sherwood now so when
this is finished that will be all for today. I haven’t had any mail
for a few days now but some will catch up to us one of these
fine days. We get along fine with the French people and they
are real good to us on (sic) usual. Have had quite a few fresh
eggs the last couple of days and believe me they certainly taste
good. However our food is good even if it is field ration. The
only thing is I never seem to be able to have enough to eat. I
certainly have developed an appetite since I arrived here but
I sure don’t put on any weight. Maybe when I get home and
settle down for good I will gain some tho. Guess I am like
Charlie, because all I want to do is come home to London and
never roam again. A fellow certainly does get lonely for home
and familiar places. However it shouldn’t be so awfully long
now before we all can come home for good.”
Again on 6 September he wrote about “when I come
home. Hope that day isn’t far away either. I imagine the news
sounds pretty good to you people these days.” By September
1944 the Allied forces were successfully pushing German
troops out of France but at a costly toll. Eleven days after
writing this last letter, on 17 September, Rifleman G. S.
Young (A/115593) was killed in action. He was 31 years old.
Twelve days after his death Marnie delivered his second son
19th I buried him
in our park-like
Queen’s Own plot
near a big school on
Beaurepaire Street
in the north east
section of Boulogne.
His grave is number
8 in Row ‘A’ and is
well marked with
a white cross on
which is painted in
black his regimental number, rank,
name, unit, and date
of death.
After the war,
Mrs. Young, all our
Canadian dead will
be moved to a great
new permanent
cemetery over here
somewhere. I have already seen the last war ones at Ypres and
Vimy so I know this war’s one will be lovely too.
I must close now but do hope that things go well with you.
God be with you.
February 2007 • Families • 25
The chaplain’s prediction proved accurate of course. Shortly after the war George’s body was exhumed from the local
cemetery in Boulogne and reburied with 717 others at the
Calais Canadian War Cemetery, Leubringhen, outside the
small village of St. Inglevert: plot 6, row B, grave 1.
Genealogists researching family members killed in the
World Wars can find death and burial listings at The Commonwealth War Graves Commission website found at
<www.cwgc.org>. In 1993, in company with my wife and
brother, I watched the sun rise over this hallowed site.
George Sherwood Young’s decorations include the 19391945 Star, France and Germany Star, Canadian Volunteer
Service Medal with Clasp, and 1939-1945 War Medal. His
name is included with Canadian war casualties in the World
War II Book of Remembrance kept in the Parliament Buildings Memorial Chapel in Ottawa. A page is turned each day
and his name is displayed for public viewing each 16 October
on page 485. Families of Canadians killed in the First and
Second World Wars can add photos, letters, postcards, diary
entries, citations, etc. to the Virtual War Memorial sponsored
by Veterans Affairs Canada, check online at <www.vac-acc.
gc.ca/remembers/sub.cfm?source=collections/virtualmem>.
My contributions to the memory of George Sherwood Young
(1913-1944) can be found there.
Matthew Sherwood Young (1995 -)
With the birth of my
second son in 1995 I
perpetuated the family tradition by naming
him Matthew Sherwood
Young. Born at Solihull
in the West Midlands,16
England, his birth
completes a full circle of
Sherwoods from England
to Canada, and back to
England. By committing
her memories to paper
40 years ago, my greatgrandmother ensured
the continuance of a
naming pattern in her
family, which will extend Matthew Sherwood Young (1995- )
over 200 years. Her own
grandmother’s brother, an uncle, a brother, a cousin, a son,
and now a great-great-grandson all carry a name commemorating the 1810 union of their ancestors, Thomas Young
and Jane Sherwood. Perhaps the tradition will continue for
another 200 years. §
26 • Families • February 2007
My mother was born and raised in Bexleyheath, Kent; she
emigrated with her mother, Hilda (née Noakes), and stepfather,
Wilbert Durnin, to Canada in June 1947.
2
Mary Young is the ‘covergirl’ featured on the cover of Canadian
Genealogist, Vol. 8, No. 4, 1986; as well as the November 1996
(Vol. 13, No. 1) issue of Family Tree Magazine, published in
England.
3
John and Mercy Young’s sixth child, a son christened George
Reeves Young, identified his birth in 1835 in the state of New
York; likewise the oldest son of Samuel and Mary Young was born
at DeWitt, Onondaga Co., New York (now part of Syracuse) on 6
October 1835.
4
HO 107/1506, folio 187, page 32; GSU film no. 87840.
5
1861 census: RG9/163, folio 95, page 6; GSU film no.
542584. 1871 census: RG10/571, folio 100, page 35; GSU film
no. 823320.
6
Another year of birth, marriage and death registrations is released on microfilm annually, compliant with Canadian federal
privacy laws.
7
Regina, the capital of the Province of Saskatchewan, is 100
miles north of the US border and about 160 miles west of the
Manitoba border. Findlater is about 40 miles NW of Regina.
8
Gordon Street runs west off Dufferin Street just north of
Queen St. W. and just east of the CNR/CPR tracks.
9
Commemorative Biographical Record of the County of York, Ontario (Toronto: J. H. Beers & Co., 1907) p. 427.
10
Orangeville is a town located about 40 miles NW of downtown Toronto.
11
The 1911 census is being indexed by Automated Genealogy by
online volunteers; the 1901 census index is essentially complete.
12
Turnberry Twp. is on the northern edge of Huron County and
contains the town of Wingham.
13
Hibbert Twp. is the westerly township in Perth County about
16 miles from Lake Huron and almost surrounded by Huron
County.
14
London is the principal city in Middlesex County about 100
miles from both Windsor on Lake St. Clair and Toronto on Lake
Ontario.
15
Kiska Island in the Aleutian Islands is at longitude 177º W,
close to the western extremity of that range of islands.
16
He was born during the time I was employed with the
Genealogical Society of Utah in managing the British 1881 Census
Project.
1
Family Tree for
“What’s in a Middle Name?” by Stephen C. Young
Young Family Settlement Locations
in Southern Ontario
February 2007 • Families • 27
Early Land Surveys in Southern Ontario
John Becker
Information abstracted from Monograph No. 8, Cartographica
1973 by L. Gentilcore & K. Donkin. A reprint from Families,
May 1999. Prepared in 1999 by John Becker.
I
have prepared this summary to help genealogists who are
trying to decipher 18th and 19th century documents dealing with land grants and property titles. Perhaps we all
are confused by the measures that are quoted and need some
conversion tables to help us put quantities in understandable
terms. And for those who like stories of the Royal Navy and
the Napoleonic Wars, I include some conversion tables for
nautical terms.
Linear Measures on Land
Equivalency Table
1 hand
1/3 ft.
4 inches
1 foot or ft.
3 hands
12 inches
1 link
1/100 chain
0.66 ft.
1 chain or ch.
66 ft.
road allowance width
1 rod, 1 pole, 1 perch (see
below for perch as area)
¼ chain
16.5 ft.
1 yard or yd.
3 ft.
1 chain/22
1 furlong
10 chains
660 ft.
1 mile or mi.
8 furlongs
80 chains
1 pace
1 mile/1000
5.28 ft.
1 league
3 miles
24 furlongs
15,840 ft.
1 concession depth
100 chains
6,600 ft.
normally
1.25 miles
Nautical Measures
Equivalency Table
1 fathom
2 yds
1 nautical mail
6,86.44 ft.
1/1000 of a nautical mile
6.09 ft.
1 cable nautical mile/10
608.44 ft.
1cable/s length
120 fathoms
5,280 ft.
6 ft.
720 ft.
alternatively 730.37 ft.
Square Measures
Equivalency Table
1 square chain
66 ft. x 66 ft.
4,356 sq. ft.
1/10 of an acre
1 acre or ac.
10 sq. chains
43,560 sq. ft.
4 roods
1 rood
10,890 sq. ft.
¼ acre
2.5 sq. chains
1 perch (area)
16.5 ft2
272.25 sq. ft
1/160 of an acre
1 sq. mile
640 acres
1 section
1 yard of land
30 acres
1 hide of land
100 acres
1 barony of land
40 hides
28 • Families • February 2007
4,000 acres
The descriptions that follow assume townships that lie
on the north shore of either the St. Lawrence River or of
Lakes Ontario and Erie where the base or concession lines
run (more or less) EW and the cross roads run NS. “The
Base Line,” the “first concession” and “the Front” were often synonymous. “The Front” was commonly on water, the
transportation system of the day. Described below are the
common surveying systems used in Southern Ontario.
For 100 acre lots two systems were employed:
1. Front & Rear System 1787-1813: Lots 50 chains [front
to back] x 20 chains [wide] = 1,000 sq. chains with
cross roads (normally NS) of 1 chain width (66 ft.)
separating every second lot. Concession lines (EW) ran
every 50 chains, i.e. 1 lot deep. This configuration produced a 200 acre section if all of the roads were put in
– a rather small “section” compared to the alternatives
outlined below. The word “concession” is a New France
term and refers to a row of lots.
2. 1,000 Acre Section System 1835-1906: Lots as above
(50 x 20 ch.) but the cross roads did not run every 40
chains but every 100 chains, i.e. separating every fifth
lot. Concession lines (EW) ran every 100 chains, i.e. 2
lots deep. This configuration produced a 1,000 acre section if all of the roads were put in. This placed concession roads 100 chains or 1.25 miles apart.
There were three systems utilizing 200 acre lots:
1. 2400 Acre Section System 1829-1851: 200 acre lots
66.67 chains [front to back] x 30 chains [wide] = 2,000
sq. chains with cross roads (normally NS) of 1 chain
separating every third lot. Concession lines (EW) ran
every 133.34 chains, i.e. 2 lots deep. Because only every
other cross road was surveyed in the beginning, this was
known as a 2,400 acre section. (After the intermediate
cross roads were opened, only 1,200 acres were enclosed
in a section uninterrupted by roads.)
2. 1000 Acre Section Single Front System 1783-1815:
The back of the lot did not front on a road. This was
a system where 200 acre lots measured 105.27 chains
x 19 chains with a concession line every lot and cross
roads every sixth lot. This enclosed a 1,000 acre section
uninterrupted by roads. This was the dominant system
used all along the north shore of the St. Lawrence and
Lake Ontario in Upper Canada.
3. 1200 Acre Section Double Front System 1815-1829:
The front and the back of the lot both fronted on concession roads. This was another variation with lots of the
same dimensions but the concession roads ran between
each lot, i.e. were 66.67 chains apart and the cross roads
were spaced out with one every sixth lot, i.e. 180 chains
apart. This was the system used on the north shore of
Lake Erie when the Single Front system was not used.
This enclosed a 1,200 acre section uninterrupted by
roads.
It is interesting that none of these systems followed
Governor Haldimand’s initial instructions in 1783, which
stipulated nominal 120 acre lots measuring 63.25 chains by
19 chains or 1,202 sq. chains. The early surveyors seemed to
favour the even numbers produced by the other systems.
In summary, the dimensions in chains of the lots were:
Acres
Depth
(chains)
1 - Front & Rear
100
50
2 - 1,000 Acre
Section
100
1 - 2,400 Acre
Section
Width
(chains)
Section
acreage
Roads
20
200
both ends
50
20
1000
front only
200
66.67
30
2400
front only
1 - 2,400 Acre
Section
200
105.27
19
1000
both ends
3 - Double
Front, 1200
Acre Section
200
66.67
30
1200
front only
Haldimand’s
System
120
63.25
19
not
specified
front only
1000 acre Section Simple Front System
1783-1815
100 acre lots
200 acre lots
1200 acre Section Double
Front System 1815-1829
Front & Rear System 1787-1813
2400 acre Section System 1829-1851
1000 acre Section System 1835-1906
February 2007 • Families • 29
Recollections of an
Indo-Guyanese in Guelph
Jerome Teelucksingh
Jerome Teelucksingh has contributed a number of papers to
Families about immigration from the West Indies to Canada.
He teaches at the University of the West Indies, St. Augustine,
Trinidad and may be reached at <j_teelucksingh@yahoo.com>.
of the post office. He earned a salary of $76.00 per month
but saw it as a “boring job” and a “dead end job.” Hector
recalled, “I had wanted to do something that was interesting,
challenging and with a better future.”
Hector decided to pursue studies in GCE Ordinary Level
Chemistry, Biology and Physics (equivalent to Grade 12 in
ector Lachmansingh has spent more than three
Canada). Upon successful completion, he applied to the
decades in Canada. He is married to Lucella
University of Guelph in Ontario, Canada and was accepted
Lachmansingh. Hector belongs to the generation
by the prestigious Ontario Agricultural College (OAC). In
of West Indian students who arrived in Canada during the
September 1958, at the age of 22, Hector resigned his civil
1950s and 1960s to pursue a university education.
service job and departed for Canada. At that time, there were
Hector’s paternal great-grandparents arrived in British
1
no tertiary institutions in Guyana so studying abroad seemed
Guiana (present day Guyana ) from Lucknow in Uttar
the only option. In 1958 there were three colleges at Guelph:
Pradesh, India between 1860 and 1863. His paternal greatthe OAC, the Ontario Veterinary College (OVC) and the
grandfather was Pariag Singh, and his paternal great-grandMacDonald Institute for Home Economics.
mother was Akagee. Both paternal great-grand-parents were
In 1958, annual tuition for Canadian and Commonemployed as indentured labourers on the Bath sugar plantawealth students was $100 and the total cost (including
tion on the west coast of Berbice, Guyana. Additionally,
books, rooms and lodging) was $515 per year. Hector stayed
Hector’s maternal great-grandfather, Babu Ramlagan Singh,
was born in Bihar, married in India, and he later emigrated to at Johnson Hall while at OAC. His roommate was a Jamaican – Linton Murray. Hector’s friends at the residence
Guyana where he remarried.
Hector’s grandfather, John Babu Lachmansingh, was born included Francis Leonce, Percy Chen, Fred Hayles, Paul
Dolbear, Francis Buckmire and Wayne Stinson. He met
at the Bath settlement in Guyana. John had two brothers
– Ramdhan and Kawall and two sisters – Laganee and Mary three friendly foreign students: Tony Van Dreumel (from
Holland), Joe Ocran (from Ghana) and Charlie Csiza (from
Subachan. Hector’s maternal grandfather was Sewsankar
Hungary). Interestingly, Csiza had participated in the historic
Singh, and his maternal grandmother was Ramdei, both
Hungarian Revolution of 1956 in which his parents were
born in Guyana. Hector’s paternal grandmother, Mahadei
Lachmansingh emigrated from Calcutta on the ship Ganges killed.
Hector took his meals at Creelman Hall and usually
in 1871. Unfortunately information on her parents is not
known. Hector’s parents were Elijah Dadhibal Lachmansingh purchased coffee and doughnuts in the basement of Massey
Hall. During the initiation activities for freshmen, Hector
and Ellen Bhagmat Lachmansingh.
took a brush cut, wore a frosh hat and had to carry two large
Hector spent his early childhood in the village of Bush
Lot, Berbice, 56 miles east of Georgetown, the capital. Most cardboard name tags around his neck.
As a member of the West Indian Students’ Club, Hector
of the 1,500 residents were East Indians, descendants of
met most of the Caribbean students on campus. Most these
indentured labourers who came from India about 100 to
students were Jamaicans. He also attended the West Indian
150 years ago to work on the sugar plantations at Bath. In
Hector’s youth most of these residents farmed rice, bananas, student dances where he met new friends such as Sam Johnson, a Barbadian who still lives in Guelph. Johnson worked
tomatoes, coconuts and cassava.
Because of annual heavy rains with the attendant flooding, as an X-ray technician at the Guelph General Hospital. He
homes in Hector’s village were built on stilts. The walls were also grew to know Guyanese undergraduate students Cecil
Narine, Chris Narayan, Clifford Harricharan, Tom Ashby,
made of wood and the roof of wood shingles or zinc sheets.
The fireplace was built of bricks covered with cow dung and Bal Samaroo and Azim Khan.
By 1964 Hector, a diligent West Indian, had obtained two
clay. An oven was attached to the fireplace and the fire was
degrees
from the University of Guelph: a Bachelor of Science
started by blowing through an iron pipe.
in Agriculture (BSA) 1962 and Master of Science in AgriculWhen he finished his high school education in Guyana,
ture (MSA) 1964.
Hector obtained a civil service job in the telephone section
H
30 • Families • February 2007
Family Tree of the Lachmansingh Family
(paternal great-grandparents; one of two)
(maternal great-grandparents; one of two)
Pariag Singh
b. Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh, India
m. Akagee
emigrated to Bath sugar plantation
at Berbice, Guyana, c.1860-1863
Had issue: John Babu (see below)
Ramdhan
Kawall
Laganee
Mary Subachan
Babu Ramlagan Singh
b. Bihar, India
1st m. in India
2nd m. after emigration to Guyana
(paternal grandparents)
(maternal grandparents)
John Babu Lachmansingh
m. Mahadei to Guyana from Calcutta
on ship Ganges in 1871
Sewsankar Singh
b. in Guyana
m. Ramdie b. in Guyana
(parents)
Elijah Dadhibal Lachmansingh
m. Ellen Bhagmat Lachmansingh
Hector Lachmansingh
b. 1936 in Guyana
emigrated to Guelph, Ontario in 1958
earned BSA from OAC in 1962
and MSA from OAC in 1964
hired as High School science teacher in 1968
retired 1995
m. Lucella
b. in Guyana
______________________________
(son)
(daughter)
Ramon
b. 1969 in Guelph
BSc, Waterloo 1993
NWRC. Ottawa
m. Rupa
Sandya
b. 1971 in Guelph
BA, Guelph 1994
teacher, Guelph
One of Hector’s good friends, whom he met at lectures,
was Robert Clarke who had completed two years at the Nova
Scotia Agricultural College in Truro, Nova Scotia. In April
1962, after final exams, Hector visited Robert’s home in
Annapolis Valley in Nova Scotia.
Hector still remembers lecturers who taught him at the
University of Guelph. These included Dr. Stan Slinger
(Nutrition), Professor John Walker (Poultry Management),
Dr. Fred Jerome (Genetics), Chuck Wignet (Plant Physiology) and Gerry Friars (Turkey Management).
In May 1959 while searching for a summer job, Hector
met Gerry Nipshagen (originally from Holland) who promised him summer clerical work in the shipping office of Frost
Steel and Wire Company. Hector’s second summer job was
at the Dominion Glass Company in Hamilton in 1960. At
this job Hector met John Peeres who was originally from
Pomeroon in Guyana. During his summer jobs of 1961 and
1962, Hector worked with the Poultry Department at OAC.
Among his friends at this department were Walter Stewart,
Lloyd Osburn, Art Stovel and Cletus Kupferschimdt.
When in Hamilton, Hector played with the Hamilton
Cricket Club at Churchill Park and when in Guelph he
played with the University Cricket Club. In 1970, He played
on the University of Guelph team in the match versus
Victoria Park Cricket Club in Toronto for the Ontario Cricket Championship, and the Guelph team won. In 1984, he
February 2007 • Families • 31
was still a member of the University of Guelph Cricket Club,
which played against the Mississauga Ramblers in the Division B cricket final.
In May 1968 Hector was hired as a teacher by Norman
Finnie, Principal of the Erin District High School. At that
time the school’s population comprised 350 students and
19 teachers. During his teaching career, Hector served under
such diligent principals as Peter Durksen, Paul Knox, Bud
Fauteux, Bill Blackie and Bob McEachern. During 19771978, Hector’s students in the Grade 13 Biology class won
prizes in the Waterloo-Wellington Science and Engineering
Fair and the All Canada Science Fair. In November 1995,
due to deteriorating physical health, Hector decided to retire
from teaching.
Hector has two children. His son, Ramon Lachmansingh
(37), is a computer programmer employed at the National
Wildlife Research Centre, Government of Canada, Ottawa,
Ontario. Ramon graduated from the University of Waterloo
with a BSc degree in 1993. He is married to Rupa and they
have no children. Hector’s daughter, Sandya Lachmansingh
(35) is a teacher employed by Upper Grand District Board of
Education in Guelph, Ontario. She graduated from the University of Guelph with a BA degree in 1994.
Some of Hector’s early Canadian experiences have been
shared by other immigrants. These include driving on the
right side of the road instead of the left and the honour system for buying newspapers (newspapers were sold from kiosks
in Guyana). He was also surprised to witness self-service in
stores, coin-operated washing machines and shorter daylight
hours during the winter. Undoubtedly, the first few months
were a difficult adjustment and he recalled, “My problem was
that I was homesick…. At times I wondered whether I had
made the right decision to leave my job in Guyana. The more
I thought about it the more I realized that I could not quit
and return home. I would be too embarrassed.”
This is a brief reflection on the life of a Caribbean immigrant whose friendliness, warmth and personality won him
many friends both in Guelph and Guyana. Not surprisingly,
Hector considers Canada as his home but he still maintains
close ties with his Caribbean homeland. §
A 17th century Dutch colony, by 1815 Guyana had become
a British possession. It borders on Venezuela to the west, Brazil to
the south and Suriname to the east. The abolition of slavery led to
black settlement of urban areas and the importation of indentured
servants from India to work the sugar plantations. This ethnocultural divide has persisted. It achieved independence from the UK
in 1966. It is the third-smallest country in South America after
Suriname, its neighbour to the east and Uruguay. Its land area
is 196,000 sq. km, about two and a half times larger than New
Brunswick.
Current population is about 767,000 divided ethnically into
50% East Indian, 36% black, 7% Amerindian, 7% white, Chinese,
and mixed races. Religions are Christian 50%, Hindu 35%, and
1
32 • Families • February 2007
Muslim 10%. Languages used are English, Amerindian dialects,
Creole, Hindi, and Urdu
Primary industries are currently bauxite mining, sugar, rice milling, timber, textiles, gold mining. Trading partners now are Canada
and the US each with 18.9% of exports, UK 11.7%, Portugal
8.1%, Jamaica 5.3%, Trinidad and Tobago 4.2%
Suriname is the eastern neighbour of Guyana. Spain explored
Suriname in 1593, but by 1602 the Dutch began to settle the land,
followed by the English who in turn transferred sovereignty to the
Dutch in 1667 in exchange for New Amsterdam (New York). African slaves furnished the labor for the coffee and sugarcane plantations. Escaped African slaves fled into the interior of Suriname and
reconstituted their western African culture. After 1870, East Indian
laborers were imported from British India and Javanese from the
Dutch East Indies.
Previously known as Dutch Guiana, it was integrated into the
kingdom of the Netherlands in 1948. Two years later it was granted
home rule, except for foreign affairs and defense. Free elections
were held on May 25, 1991, depriving the military of much of its
political power. In 1992 a peace treaty was signed between the government and several guerrilla groups. Internal government has been
turbulent since that time.
PEDIGREE
As defined by the 1913 Webster Dictionary – page 1057
Ped”i*gree (?), n. [Of unknown origin; possibly fr. F. par
degrés by degrees, – for a pedigree is properly a genealogical table which records the relationship of families by
degrees; or, perh., fr. F. pied de grue crane’s foot, from the
shape of the heraldic genealogical trees.]
1. A line of ancestors; descent; lineage; genealogy; a
register or record of a line of ancestors.
Alterations of surnames … have obscured the truth of
our pedigrees. Camden.
His vanity laboured to contrive us a pedigree.
Milton.
I am no herald to inquire of men’s pedigrees.
Sir P. Sidney.
The Jews preserved the pedigrees of their tribes.
Atterbury.
2. (Stock Breeding) A record of the lineage or strain of an
animal, as of a horse.
How One Searcher
Solved Two Knotty Problems!
Elizabeth H. Stewart
Elizabeth Stewart has published extensive genealogies on
Alexander Stewart, 1813-1904, Pioneer Pastor and Mary Ann
St. Leger McGinn Stewart, 1845-1914 both of which are in the
OGS collection in Toronto. She lives in Rochester, New York and
may be reached at <libbess@frontiernet.net>.
Bible or letters from parents had come down to us. Where
else could I find the name of Alexander’s mother?
Alexander had married in 1842 but his parents’ names
were not asked for or recorded in parish records then. He
had subsequently been widowed. A cryptic remark by a
grandson years later that he “had a good wife” led me to try
y husband had a paternal great-grandfather named to track down this second marriage. I found he was remarried in 1872 in Ontario. By that time in Ontario parents’
Alexander Stewart who immigrated to Ontario
names were being recorded. This time I was successful. There
from Scotland without his parents in 1832 and
who led a dedicated and strenuous life as a home missionary, was the name of his mother, Ann McDonald who had never
come to Ontario, 59 years after her son’s birth in another
walking miles through Ontario’s forests and cedar swamps
country!
ministering to frontier settlers and the First Nations.
Much information about his life had come down to his
Alexander Stewart’s Birth Date
great-grandchildren, including my husband but I wanted to
The second discovery was Alexander’s birth date. Family tralearn more. I used two new sources which readers may find
dition said the year was 1813. A family friend interviewed by
useful.
the local news paper after Alexander’s death said the month
Alexander Stewart’s Mother’s Name
was May. Could I confirm those dates, even without a birth
and baptismal record?
The first was to learn Alexander’s mother’s name. I hoped to
Several years ago the Canada Census of 1901 was opened
find this in the Church of Scotland’s parish register of his
to view and for the first time this Census had asked for and
birth where the baptismal record would give both parents’
retained complete birth dates. Alexander lived until 1904,
names. We learned his father’s name from family tradition
so perhaps I could find him? I did, and there was his birth
and that Alexander was born in 1813 in Mortlach parish,
date: 20 May 1813 – recorded 88 years after his birth and in
Banffshire, Scotland. Alas, Alexander’s birth was not regisanother country! §
tered. His father was poor and perhaps he couldn’t pay the
fee. This was before government civil registration. No family
M
SOME KITH AND KIN DEFINITIONS & EXPLANATIONS
HALF - Means you share only one parent. Example: halfbrothers may have the same father but different mothers,
etc.
and your spouse are considered “one”. Also your brotherin-law is your brother because your parents are also his
parents, in “law” (Mother-in-law, Father-in-law, etc.).
STEP - Not blood kin, but a close legal relationship due to
re-marriage of a parent, such as step-mother, step-brother,
step-son, etc.
KITH and KIN - “Kith” are close friends and acquaintances
whereas “Kin” are blood relatives or someone treated as
such, in law.
DOUBLE FIRST COUSINS - Are first cousins twice, once on
your Father’s side and once on your Mother’s side, since
your Father’s sibling married your Mother’s sibling.
DEGREES - It used to be that kinship was measured in
degrees. Your siblings were first degree. First cousins were
2nd degree, second cousins were 3rd degree, and so on. A
degree is 1 more than a cousin.
IN-LAW - They are not really blood kin but are treated
as such because they married blood kin. Example: Your
Mother-in-law is not really your Mother but is treated as
such because you married her daughter/son. In law, you
Thanks to john.rootsweb.com/Longstreet/consangu.html
for these definitions.
February 2007 • Families • 33
Doing the Numbers on One’s
Pedigree–“Pedigree Decay”
John Becker
W
e all have a biological “family”: one mother and
one father each. And they each have one mother
and one father. The family tree expands geometrically back in time – one linked to two; two linked to four;
four linked to eight, eight linked to sixteen and so on. The
numbers become staggeringly large in a few centuries, and
this is both the fascination and the challenge for the genealogist.
For instance, assuming 30 years per generation, a child
born in 1990 has a total of 62 progenitors born since 1840,
with the largest single generation in the earliest generation:
32 individuals (16 men and 16 women) all in the eighth
generation back and all born around 1840. Another group of
30 individuals descend from that group of 16 couples who
produce a single member of the child’s pedigree in the following decreasing numbers each generation: 16, 8, 4 and 2,
for a total of 30.
The number increases to 254 progenitors born since 1780.
The 128 born in the earliest generation would be contemporaries of Napoleon and the Duke of Wellington. Turning to
Shakespeare’s day, this same 1990 baby had 16,384 progenitors in the earliest generation, born in the mid to late 1500s
or a total of 32,766 progenitors. In 1066 when William
the Conqueror was beating up on King Harold at Hastings
in England, somewhere in the world there were 4.3 billion
people in that single generation who were carrying genes that
ultimately would lead to this same 1990 baby.
But in AD 1066 this number exceeds the total population of the globe! So how can this be? How can a person who
clearly has two parents, four grandparents, eight great-grandparents and so on not have 4.3 billion ancestors in a single
generation around 1066? Well, the answer is that cousins
married cousins, thereby reducing the number of separate
progenitors for this baby.
An example will show how this works. If first cousins
marry (something that is not common but not illegal), each
have the same grandparents. Under normal circumstances
this couple’s children require four grandparents, but because
one set of grandparents appears twice in their family tree,
only two separate individuals fill the progenitorial function of
four. And what’s more, this “hole” appears in all earlier generations. In this case each earlier generation is halved in total
number of individuals. Instead of 32 great-great-great-grandparents, there are only 16 – 50% of the normal number. And
so on down through the generations.
No one has a pedigree that is not “reduced” by cousinly
marriages. Some genealogists have called this “pedigree
decay.” The amount of decay depends on the frequency of
cousinly marriages, which differs from person to person. But
one’s “decay” is not necessarily unique. An individual may
have the same number of progenitors as someone else. But in
the whole population of the world there is much variation in
this number.
I wonder if anyone has studied this and determined any
patterns related to, for instance, location, ethnicity, faith or
living densities? I suspect that one of the best predictors is
population density – low density communities have a larger
proportion of close relatives living nearby and correspondingly fewer non-relatives to spice up the gene pool.
Availability of faster and easier transportation modes also
helped expand the gene pool. Historians have noted that the
advent of the bicycle in 19th century Britain permitted a young
swain to court a heart-throb miles away from home. This
altered marriage patterns and probably reduced the number of
marriages with “the girl next door” or one’s first cousin! §
METES
BOUNDS
Measurements of distance in feet, rods, poles, chains, etc.;
pertains to measuring direction and distance.
Pertaining to measuring natural or man-made features on
the land.
Surveyors still use the phrase “metes and bounds” when
referring to the description of a parcel of land.
34 • Families • February 2007
In Review
Patrick and Judy Wohler, The Early
Commercial Photographers of Lanark
& Renfrew Counties, Ontario, 18501925. Arnprior, ON: Arnprior and
District Archives, 2005. 57 p. ISBN:
0973034947. Cerlox binding. $20.00.
< www.adarchives.org>
The authors provide a list of commercial
photographers by town within the two
counties of Lanark and Renfrew, giving
their known years of activity. The book
is a useful tool to help date and place
photographs that bear a photographer’s
imprint. The authors present biographical and historical notes of the photographers, including sources. There are
over 90 examples of imprints from more
than 50 photographers.
Patrick is the author of eight books
and numerous articles on history and
genealogy. He writes the popular column “The Family Historian” in local
newspapers within the Ottawa Valley.
If you have a photograph that may
be from Renfrew or Lanark County, this
book may be a great help in identifying
the time and the place of the photograph.
This is an excellent book that will be
of interest to those researching in
Lanark County and/or Renfrew County
in eastern Ontario.
Barbara B. Aitken CG
Kingston ON
David Dobson, Ships from Ireland to
Early America, 1623-1850, Volume II.
Baltimore, MD: Printed for Clearfield
Company by Genealogical Publishing
Co., 2004. 145 p. ISBN: 0806352523.
$18.50 US. <www.genealogical.com>
This is the second volume by David
Dobson to identify vessels that travelled
from Ireland to North America before
1850 and were known to carry passengers. He has done extensive research
in contemporary sources, especially
newspapers on both sides of the Atlantic, some government records, and a
few published works. Mr. Dobson has
identified an additional 1,500 ships that
were involved in transporting immigrants to the U.S. or Canada. For those
of us who are searching for passenger
lists for the time period before 1850,
this is a fine resource. If you can establish that an immigrant ancestor lived in
or near a certain port of entry at a
particular time, you may be able to
tap into the records of the vessels that
brought the immigrant passengers
to our shores and even the port from
which the ship sailed.
For each vessel cited in this new
book, one learns the dates and ports
of embarkation and arrival, the source
of the information, and frequently the
number of passengers and the name of
the ship’s captain.
Here is a representative entry:
“Hannah, Captain Cumming, a
schooner, from Cork on 12 June 1834
with 41 passengers, arrived at Grosse
Isle on 5 August 1834 and at Quebec
on 6 August 1834 [Montreal Gazette].”
The sources are coded and itemized
at the end of the book. This is an excellent book that will be of interest to
libraries with genealogy collections.
genealogy. Ryan has outlined the likeliest sites where the librarian can find the
answers or use to refer the patron to the
best sources to answer those difficult
questions.
There is an introductory section for
Canada and then a separate section for
each province and territory. You can
find listings of the handbooks, archives,
societies, directories, census indexes,
unpublished indexes, church records,
and other suggestions. There is a fine
section on ethnic groups with references
to relevant books, periodical articles and
web sites.
This handbook will be invaluable
as a resource tool not only for reference librarians but also for genealogists
searching their roots in various locations throughout Canada. Ryan Taylor
worked as a librarian for over 30 years
and as a genealogist for 40 years until
his sudden death in September 2006.
This was one of his finest books.
It is recommended for public libraries, university library collections and
for archival collections. Do recommend
this book to your local library.
Barbara B. Aitken CG
Kingston ON
John Grenham, Tracing Your Irish
Barbara B. Aitken CG Ancestors. Third Edition. Baltimore,
Kingston ON MD: Genealogical Publishing Co.,
2006. 526 p. illus., maps. ISBN:
080631768X. $24.95 US.
Ryan Taylor, The Canadian Genea<www.genealogical.com>.
logical Sourcebook. Ottawa: Canadian
Library Association, 2004. 158 p.
This is the latest edition of a standard
ISBN: 088802309X. Paperback.
work on Irish genealogy. Mr. Grenham
$54.95. <www.cla.ca/marketplace/clais a professional genealogist. He was
books.htm>
formerly attached to the Genealogical Office in Dublin and later he was a
The Canadian Genealogical Sourcebook
project manager with the Irish Geneaprovides an excellent quick-reference
logical Project. Now he is developing
guide to Canadian genealogy books,
and marketing his own genealogical
web sites and addresses for reference
software packages internationally. One
librarians who are not specialists in
of these is Grenham’s Irish Surnames.
February 2007 • Families • 35
Tracing your Irish Ancestors in its
third edition has kept the three-part
structure of the earlier editions. (The
second edition was issued in 1998.)
Grenham provides step-by-step instructions in the location and use of genealogical records, civil records of BMDs,
land records and wills. Comprising a
third of the book are the county by
county source lists. These are comprehensive listings of genealogical record
sources, including census returns and
substitutes, Internet sources, local his-
tory publications, local journals, gravestone inscriptions, estate records, and
place names. There is a subsection on
Internet sources in each list.
The final section is an extensive list
of copies of all known Roman Catholic records that can be found in the
National Library of Ireland, the Public
Record Office of Northern Ireland, the
LDS Family History Library, and in
local Irish Heritage Centres. Countyby-county and parish by parish this list
gives the dates, locations, and formats
AHNENTAFEL
of all existing copies of baptism, marriage, and burial records. These are
keyed to parish and county maps.
This book may be the most comprehensive book on Irish genealogy. It is
highly recommended for purchase by
those searching for their Irish
ancestors.
Barbara B. Aitken CG
Kingston ON
AHNENTAFEL NUMBER
Ancestor table: tabulates the ancestry of one individual by
generation in text rather than pedigree chart format. A
comprehensive ahnentafel gives more than the individual’s name, date and place of birth, christening, marriage,
death and burial. It should give biographical and historical
commentary for each person listed, as well as footnotes
citing the source documents used to prove what is stated.
The unique number assigned to each position in an ancestor table is called an ahnentafel number. Number one
designates the person in the first generation. Numbers
two and three designate the parents of number one and
the second generation. Numbers four through seven designate the grandparents of person number one and the
third generation. As the ahnentafel extends by generation, the number of persons doubles.
The Ontario Genealogical Society (OGS) was founded to collect genealogical and historical data, to assist members in their genealogical research,
and to issue genealogical publications, especially relating to Ontario. It was organized in 1961, and received its Ontario Charter in 1967.
Membership is based on the calendar year. There is no initiation fee. Annual dues are $45.00 plus $7.00 for each additional member of a family in
any household. This provides one copy of each of the four issues of Families and Newsleaf to each household, and one notice of all general meetings and
seminars.
HONORARY PATRON The Honourable Lorna Milne, Senator
Past President Ronald L. Walsh
President
Robert M. Crawford Vice President Donald Hinchley Vice President - Finance
Steve Kressler Secretary
Patrick Ross
Executive Director
Fraser Dunford
REGIONAL DIRECTORS
Carolynn Bart Riedstra
Catherine Blackburn
Alan Campbell
Janis Higgins
Dennis Mulligan
Bob Murphy
OGS BRANCHES
Brant County
Bruce & Grey
Durham Region
Elgin County
Essex County
Haldimand
Halton-Peel
Hamilton
Huron
Kawartha
Mary Rossiter
Nancy Trimble
Norine Wolfe
Kent County
Kingston
Lambton County
Leeds & Grenville
London & Middlesex County
FOUNDING MEMBERS
Marion Christena Keffer
Elaine Victoria Reaman
George Elmore Reaman
Niagara Peninsula
Nipissing District
Norfolk County
Ottawa
Oxford County
Albert Phillips Silcox
Robert Edward Wynne
Perth County
Quinte
Sault Ste. Marie & District
Simcoe County
Sudbury District
Thunder Bay District
Toronto
Waterloo Region
Wellington County
York Region
Annual General Meeting is held during the Seminar. Seminar ‘07 is scheduled for 1-3 June 2007, Ottawa, Ontario.
Telephone: (416) 489 0734
Fax: (416) 489 9803
Email Address: provoffice@ogs.on.ca
th
OGS Website: http://www.ogs.on.ca
OGS Reference Library is located in the Canadiana Collection, North York Public Library, North York Centre, 6 Floor, 5120 Yonge Street, North York,
Ontario M2N 5N9. Telephone 416-395-5623. Open Monday 12:30-8:30, Tuesday-Thursday 9:00-8:30, Friday 9:00-5:30, Saturday 9:00-5:00, Sunday
1:30-5:00 (mid-September to mid-June, except statutory holiday weekends.
36 • Families • February 2007
The Name Game
The Name Game is a service provided
by the OGS to its members and the
public to aid their genealogical searches.
Four queries per year are accepted from
members up to a maximum of 50 words
– not counting the submitter’s name and
address. Non-members (or members submitting the fifth or more queries in one
year) may submit entries on payment in
advance of a $10.00 fee per entry payable
to the OGS.
All entries are subject to editing.
Type (double space) or write legibly on
regular-sized letter paper. Be brief but
include some first names, at least one
place and a date (approximate will do)
for each surname. Write out all words in
full, try to avoid ambiguities and clearly
specify what information you are seeking.
Queries are printed in the order received
insofar as possible. Please allow up to six
months after submission of the query
for inclusion in this column. Direct submissions to the Name Game Editor of
Families, OGS, 40 Orchard Park Blvd.,
Ste 102, Toronto, ON M4R 1B9. Members should include your OGS number.
Alternatively, you may email your entry
to <provoffice@ogs.on.ca> with “Name
Game” in the subject line.
Readers responding to these queries
are asked to write the italicized addressees.
In addition to publishing your submission in Families, it will be posted
to the Ontario Genealogical Society Provincial Index (OGSPI) on our website
<www.ogs,on.ca>. OGS cannot accept
responsibility for direct or indirect uses
by others that may subsequently be made
of the published queries.
ADAMS: Seek desc/o John Vanburen
ADAMS b.c.1851 Scarborough ON s/o
Elijah & Bulah He m.1884 in Toronto wid
Hannah NICHOLS nee DARLINGTON
Hannah b. Manchester ENG & hd Richard
b.1874 & John b.1877 by prev mar. Robert
Darlington 1820 Merida Place Victoria BC
V8N 5C9 <robadar@telus.net>
BREHM: Robert Almon s/o Dr Robert
Almon BREHM 1870-1942 & Alice
Carey BREHM d.1971; grson/o Robert
Almon BREHM 1837-1922 & Emma
Marilyn Cully
Theresa d.1893. First nmd Robert poss lvd
Timagami ON 1971. Grpa to NL 1879 to
operate 1st butterine factory. Pa 1st public
health officer in St John’s Suzanne Sexty
92 Old Topsail Rd. St John’s NL A1E 2A8
<ssexty@mun.ca>
DECKER: Isaac Smith DECKER b.1811
Beverly Twp ON Wf Sarah HUNT lvd
Beverly; Waterloo & Bosanquet twp.
Worked as farmer & sawmill owner. d.1874
Stratford bur Beechwood Cem Forest. Who
were his prnts & where did they come
from? Marilyn Gomme <marigomme@
cogeco.ca>
DUNMEAD: In 1891 cens Jane
DUNMEAD livng Amigara Fort Erie area.
What & where is Amigara? I can’t find
anyone who has heard of it or where I can
find out anything about it. The OGS in
the area knows nothing about it. Ewart W
Blackmore 7 Robinson St South Grimsby
ON L3M 3C5 <othello7@sympatico.ca>
GURDEN: Seek info Patricia b.c.1929
& bro Gordon Wm GURDEN d.1942
Dieppe. Pa Wm GURDEN b.1894
London ENG d.1938 Hamilton ON &
ma Catharine/Kate LORD They m.1915.
Wm s/o John James GURDEN 1866-1901
& Ann Catherine (LOCKYER) GURDEN
1866-1938. S Godkin 318 Elmwood St.
Kingston ON K7M 2Y8 <s-s.godkin@
sympatico.ca>
HOLLIDAY: NEWTON: Seek info John
HOLLIDAY & Elizabeth NEWTON who
came to Kitley from Stoneferry ENG c1820
“Ann HOLLIDAY; Thomas BOOTH; &
Elizabeth POLLOCK” Ms Annette T Willis
379 N Peters Ave #G6 Fond du Lac WI
54935
LAWRENCE: PHILLIPS: Wm Charles
LAWRENCE m.c.1863 Eliza Ann
PHILLIPS poss in Bothwell or Welland
They are in 1871 cens Welland;1881 cens
Dresden; 1884 cens Almont MI When
did they m? Who are their prnts? Jackie
Ryan Patterson 493 -1 Angus Campbell Dr.
Pembroke ON K8A 8K7 <jjpat@nrtco.net>
LOCKYER: Seek info Ann Catherine
LOCKYER b.1866 d. Kingston ON poss
Welsh desc m. John James GURDEN
1866-1901 d. London ENG Offsp all
b. ENG Ann Catherine b.1892 d.1966
Hamilton ON; Wm b.1893 d.1938
Hamilton ON; Maud(e) b.1899 d.1964
Hamilton ON & Alice b.1901 d.1987
Kingston ON 2nd husb poss George
CULHINE S Godkin 318 Elmwood St.
Kingston ON K7M 2Y8
<s-s.godkin@sympatico.ca>
MILLAR: Recently obtained genealogical
history compiled in 1966 by Roderick
MILLAR s/o Melville MILLAR; s/o
Melville MILLAR 1st mayor of Orillia;
s/o Alexander MILLAR. Refers to pics,
documents & relicts “in family hands” Seek
copies Desc incl MILLAR; CAMERON;
DUFOUR; FREED & (next generation)
SELIS; DUNBAR; RUSSELL; HARRIS
& STRACHAN etc Susan J Rabick 11370
Greenwich Drive Sparta MI USA 49345
<RabickGNS@AOL.com>
PHELPS/PHILLIPS: Manuel aka Samuel;
Emanuel; Immanuel m.1832 Mrs Nancy
Ann EASTMAN Trafalgar He d. when?
Is the Nancy Ann PHILLIPS a wid lvng
Niagara area 1860s+ his wid? She d.
when? Jackie Ryan Patterson 493-1 Angus
Campbell Dr. Pembroke ON K8A 8K7
<jjpat@nrtco.net>
ROONEY/RONEY: Researching my pa’s
Wallace Clark ROONEY/RONEY b.1907
fam. His pa Robert Major RONEY b.1854
was s/o John & Christina RONEY. Lvng
Garafaxa when Robt b. Robt m.1882
Agnes Amelia SCARROW dau/o Henry
& Ellen Nelson SCARROW. Robt &
Ellen’s offsp b1885-1904 in Parry Sound
4 more b. Treherne MB Marlene Madarash
<madarash@hotmail.com>
SENEY: JAMISON: Seek desc/o Eliza
SENEY b.1841 & Robert JAMISON
b.1840 IRE m.1859 Darlington twp
Durham Co mvd to Howick twp Huron
Co by 1871 Offsp: Margaret m.Alexander
FINLEY; Ann; Eliza; Mary; Robert; Wm;
Jamina; Alberta; Hubert; Blanche. Write V.
Rows 7 Lantana Circle St Catharines ON
L2M 7M5 <veron@computan.on.ca>
CORRECTIONS: Corrected email address
CALDER: Wm b.1828 SCOT m.1853
London ON to Joanna Isabelle
CAMPBELL. He was keeper /o Barton
Reservoir Hamilton ON until he d.
1895. Seek desc. George Calder 7518
Culpepper Court Westland MI 48185
<genealogygeorge@yahoo.com>
February 2007 • Families • 37
Letters to the Editor
Dear Families Editor:
Regarding one of the letters in the
last issue, constructive criticism is a
good thing when it is fair, but not when
it applauds one former editor at the
expense of another. Recent editors have
clearly pointed out the need for more
submissions so they are not “driven by
expediency.” As members, we all have a
stake in the future of this journal. I believe the August issue set an example for
experienced, high quality editing. I too
can say I am not alone in that view.
My opinion about the journal is
clear; it should live up to its name:
Families. In each issue it should strive
to present some interesting research
articles in the well-documented fashion
most of us would like to emulate when
producing our own family histories.
Variety definitely has a place too—not
only the research, problem-solving or
ancestral stories, but also interesting
sources, historical events with an application to a particular community, little
known resources and so on.
OGS can’t compete with the resources of glossy commercial magazines
but Families can and should provide
OGS members with a journal that
speaks to excellence in genealogical and
writing standards. A good editor seeks
and encourages new writers, assisting
them with their material, if need be, to
meet journal standards. Unless we set
that goal with a dedicated editor who is
willing to spend the time coaxing and
coaching, we might as well consign it to
being a catch-all of publishing anything
that comes in “as is.” We can do better
if we all want it.
Brenda Dougall Merriman, CG, CGL
Dear Families Editor,
My opinion of the August 2006 issue
of Families (Alison Hare, Editor) is the
exact opposite of the one expressed
in the Benjafield letter. (See pg 249,
November 2006 issue.) I think that the
August issue of Families was the best
genealogy journal or newsletter issue
that I have ever read. In my opinion,
the articles in the August issue were
interesting, insightful, touching, well
written and well edited. When I got the
issue, I sat down and read it from cover
to cover at one sitting and was wishing
there was more when I finished. It was
so good! This is the kind of genealogy
journal that I want to read – chock full
of delightful genealogy tales with many
insights for own research. I was really
looking forward to more issues like the
August issue.
I don’t think anyone has any idea
how much work goes into producing an
issue of Families. It is a tremendous effort and the editors should be congratulated and thanked profusely for doing
this for our enjoyment.
Jane Down
Dear Families Editor,
I read the November 2006 edition of
Families and enjoyed it very much. The
format and content this year are much
more interesting and informative. Since
my first look at the magazine in 1980, it
seemed that Families never had any content that interested me. As a result of
the new 2006 look, we have come back
to Families.
In your paper on the DeMilles (See
November 2006 issue, pg. 210) I noticed your intention to leave your family
research papers to the Quinte Branch.
On behalf of the Quinte Branch and
our many visitors, we are delighted to
accept any material that you would be
willing to donate.
Rod Green, Quinte Branch
Note to Readers: All letters are subject to
editing for length and focus.
BOND
BOUNTY LAND
A written, binding agreement to perform as specified.
Many types of bonds have existed for centuries and
appear in marriage, land and court records of used by genealogists. Historically, laws required administrators and
executors of estates, alone or with others, and guardians
of minors to post bonds. It is not unusual to discover that
a bondsman was related to someone involved in the action before the court. If a bondsman failed to perform, the
court may have demanded payment of a specified sum as
a penalty.
Land promised as an inducement for enlistment or payment for military services. In the 13 Colonies a central government did not exist when the Revolutionary War began,
nor did a treasury. Land, the greatest asset the colonies
possessed, was used to induce enlistment and as payment
for military services. Those authorized to bounty land
received a Bounty Land Warrant from the newly formed
republican government after the 1783 peace.
38 • Families • February 2007
Advertisements
The Society, in accepting advertisments from researchers for Families, in no way endorses the competency or accuracy of work carried out by such
researchers. The Society reserves the right to refuse any advertisements at its discretion. There is no liability for non-insertion. For rates and further
information contact The Ontario Genealogical Society, 102 – 40 Orchard View Boulevard, Toronto, Ontario M4R 1B9; Phone 416-489-0734;
Fax: 416-489-9803; Email <provoffice@ogs.on.ca>.
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and is a Lecturer/Instructor with the
National Institute of Genealogical Studies.
www.genealogicalstudies.com
3 King St. W., Suite 201, Cobourg, On, K9A 2L8
www.timelinesresearch.com
sharon@timelinesresearch.com
Phone: 905-377-0880 Fax: 905-377-8548
1-877-377-0880
We make house calls
ONTARIO RESEARCH
Experienced researcher with easy access to
Toronto repositories. Send request to Lee
Dickson, 29 McCaul St. #403, Toronto Ontario
M5T 1V7 or Fax: 416-977-3392.
email: lee.dickson@sympatico.ca
****
TRACE YOUR IRISH ANCESTORS
Have you traced your Ancestors to Ireland? Joan
and Jennifer will be pleased to help you continue
your research. For a personal, professional and
prompt service write to Joan Phillipson BA (Hons),
Jennifer Irwin BA (Hons), HISTORICAL RESEARCH
ASSOCIATES, 40 Carrickburn Road, Carrickfergus,
Co. Antrim, BT38 7ND N. Ireland or Glen Cottage,
Glenmachan Road, Belfast, BT4 2NP N. Ireland.
For an initial evaluation please enclose $15.00.
<enquiry-jennifer@historicalresearchassociates.com>
Website: www.historicalresearchassociates.com
ROOTS 2007
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
Ontario & Dutch Researcher
Susanna de Groot
Windmill Genealogy Services
212-433 Jarvis St.
Toronto, ON M4Y 2G9
(416) 413-1253
http://www.windmillgenealogy.com
info@windmillgenealogy.com
Opening the window to your family’s history
Book production at reasonable rates by tradetrained craftspeople with a good reputation
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17 Sir Constantine Drive, Markham ON L3P 2X3
Tel: 905-294-4389
robert@stewartbooks.com
www.stewartbooks.com
Brian W. Hutchison
Genealogical Scholarship
$500 Awarded Annually
All Canadian Residents Eligible
Deadline for Applications 31 December
Alberta Families Histories Society
712 16th Avenue, NW
Calgary, AB T2M 0J8
www.afhs.ab.ca/scholarship
****
Ontario Research By
The Ancestor Investigator
Contact Tammy Tipler-Priolo $20/hr
16 Killare Street NORTH BAY ON P1A 4J2
Phone 1-705-495-3261 Fax: 1-705-474-2911
info@ancestorinvestigator.com
www.ancestorinvestigator.com
“May All Your Genealogical Dreams Come True!!”
Your ad could go here.
Reach thousands of family
history researchers.
See information at the top
of the page.
February 2007 • Families • 39
Guidance to Authors Preparing Papers
for Families
John Becker
We are most anxious to receive articles from our readers.
Here are some guidelines to help you prepare papers for publication. We will help you through any steps which you don’t
understand. Write us at familieseditor@ogs.on.ca
Preparing your Paper
All papers should be between 600 and 3,500 words although
sometimes longer pieces are considered.
- a 50-word list of key words which tells us all of the
major surnames mentioned, place names, countries,
etc.
- a 60-word biographical sketch of yourself telling us
your background experience in genealogy, the names
of your genealogical publications, if any, where you
live and your travels in search of family history data.
Include your telephone number and/or email address
so that readers may follow-up with you.
• Use Canadian English spelling e.g. honour, colour, counVisuals are Important and
cillor, etc. Dates should be written out as 6 December
Attractive Additions to Your Paper
2005.
• Provide all the detail you have on those you write about
• Maps, charts, photographs and other graphics are helpincluding given, maiden and surnames, etc.
ful but should NOT be formatted into the main text
• Whenever possible, state the relationship, like great great
file. Make reference to them in the text file so that we
grandfather or alternatively 2xgreat grandfather.
will understand where we should place them relative to
• When using place names provide a context, such as town
the text. Send all visuals in separate files with covering
in a county or township. If you can say it is located so
emails. Any material you wish returned to you (original
many miles NE of a larger place. Line drawing maps
photos, handwritten documents, etc.) must be accomhelp with understanding.
panied by a stamped, self-addressed envelope. Do not
• Use short sentences and paragraphs and headings and
forward valuable originals.
subheadings for easier reading and understanding by our
• Photocopies of photographs and out-of-focus photoreaders.
graphs do not reproduce well. Send us a high quality
• MOST IMPORTANT. Read your paper aloud to yourreproduction or a high resolution copy (scanned at 300
self, or to others to ensure that the sentences and words
dpi minimum) on a CD. Please consider sending us one
are clear. Let your skilled friends be your “editors” to
or two colour photos. We may use your colour photo on
ensure that your story is logical and clear. Remember you
the front cover.
will be edited by Families staff or volunteers. You will
• Black and white line ink drawings of maps reproduce
receive recommendations for changes.
well.
• While we would rather not receive original positive
Sending Your Paper
photographs from you, if you must send them in write
• We prefer to receive papers that have been keyed into a
the caption for the photo and your name on the back of
standard word processing program on a computer. Send
any you send. This way, the caption and the photo will
us an electronic file in say, Word .doc, with a covering
not get separated and mixed up with others. List people
email message to <familieseditor@ogs.on.ca.>
in left to right order, front row first.
• If you can’t prepare your final paper on a computer, send
Communications
copy that is typewritten and double spaced.
• Just before you send off your paper, insert the follow
• Make sure that we know how to get in touch with you.
items on the first page:
Please include your address, phone number and email
- a title that tells the reader the focus of the paper. A
address when submitting a paper. We much prefer email
title like “My 30 Year Search for My Grandparents”
communications.
is dramatic but it does not tell us that the story is
• We will keep you informed about the time of publication.
about a search for the “Jones” family of Montreal in
the 1920s. Specifics in the title are appreciated by
potential readers.
40 • Families • February 2007
The first in a series of basic
tools for learning genealogy
The Beginner’s Guide to Genealogy
Fraser Dunford
Genealogy is the study of ancestors, who they were, where they were, what
they did, and why. This book, designed for the beginner, sets out in basic
terms what you need to know to get started in this fascinating hobby.
This handbook contains these fundamentals:
• How to do the basics from family trees to vital statistics.
• Where to find maps, censuses, religious and land records.
• An orderly process ties the first two parts together.
• The next steps lists what you’ll need to study next from computer
programs to copyright.
Finally, a brief glossary summarizes many of the terms necessary for a
beginner.
2006 32p glossary illustrations 0-7779-2157-X $5.00
Your ad could have
been
right here!
For rates and further
information, contact:
Ontario Genealogical Society
102 - 40 Orchard View Blvd
Toronto, Ontario, M4R 1B9
Phone: 416-489-0734
Fax: 416-489-9803
E-mail: provoffice@ogs.on.ca
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Canadian forms for recording
your Canadian data
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