Glimpses Of The Past - free ebook by W. O. (William Odber) Raymond

GLIMPSES OF THE PAST.

BY Rev. W. O. RAYMOND, LL.D. ST. JOHN, N. B. 1905. SAMUEL DE CHAMPLAIN. Discoverer of the River St. John. The Father of New France. Born at Brouage in 1567. Died at Quebec, Dec. 25, 1635....

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PREFACE.

Born and reared upon the banks of the River Saint John, I have always loved it, and have found a charm in the study of everything that pertains to the history of those who have dwelt beside its waters. In connection with the ter-centenary of the discovery of the river by de Monts and Champlain, on the memorable 24th of June, 1604, the chapters which follow were contributed, from time to time, to the Saturday edition of the Saint John Daily Telegraph . With the exception of a few minor correction

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ERRATA.

Page 36 , line 8. After word “and,” the rest of the line should read—“beautiful islands below the mouth of.” Page 97 , line 31. The last half of this line is inverted....

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CHAPTER I.

The Indian period of our history possesses a charm peculiarly its own. When European explorers first visited our shores the Indian roamed at pleasure through his broad forest domain. Its wealth of attractions were as yet unknown to the hunter, the fisherman and the fur-trader. Rude as he was the red man could feel the charms of the wilderness in which he dwelt. The voice of nature was not meaningless to one who knew her haunts so well. The dark recesses of the forest, the sunny glades of the ope

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CHAPTER II.

There are yet to be found in New Brunswick forest clad regions, remote from the haunts of men, that serve to illustrate the general features of the country when it was discovered by European adventurers 300 years ago. Who these first adventurers were we cannot with certainty tell. They were not ambitious of distinction, they were not even animated by religious zeal, for in Acadia, as elsewhere, the trader was the forerunner of the priest. The Basque, Breton, and Norman, fishermen are believed to

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CHAPTER III.

Charles de Menou, Seigneur d’Aulnay Charnisay, came of a distinguished family of Touraine. He married Jeanne Motin, a daughter of the Seigneur de Courcelles. She came to Acadia with him in 1638. They resided at Port Royal where Charnisay in his log mansion reigned like a feudal lord. Charles St. Etienne de la Tour was probably of less conspicuous lineage than his rival, although in legal documents he is called “a gentleman of distinguished birth.” He married Frances Marie Jacquelins who, accordi

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CHAPTER IV.

After the capture of Fort la Tour by Sedgewick’s Massachusetts invaders in 1654, Acadia remained nominally in possession of the English for twelve years. Half a century had elapsed since the attempt of de Monts to establish his colony, yet little progress had been made in the settlement of the country and the valley of the St. John remained an almost unbroken wilderness. The first English trading post on the river, of which we have any knowledge was that established in 1659 by Sir Thomas Temple

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CHAPTER V.

There lived at Quebec in the latter part of the seventeenth century one Charles le Moyne, seigneur de Longueil, who is called by Charlevoix the Baron de Becancourt; he was of Norman extraction, but his sons were natives of New France. As was the custom with the French noblesse each son adopted a surname derived from some portion of the ancient family estate. At least five of Becancourt’s sons were prominent in the affairs of Acadia; they are known in history as Menneval, Portneuf, Villebon, d’Ib

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CHAPTER VI.

It was now proposed by the French authorities to re-establish the stronghold at the mouth of the St. John. The old fort of four bastions so far remained that it could readily be restored; the ditches needed to be deepened, the parapets to be raised and new palisades constructed. It was thought that 150 men would suffice to garrison the post as well as that at the Nashwaak. The fort was needed to protect French privateers and French commerce. Many English vessels were brought to Menagoueche at th

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CHAPTER VII.

Among the young adventurers who came to Acadia towards the close of the seventeenth century were four brothers, sons of Mathieu d’Amours [9] of Quebec. The father’s political influence as a member of the Supreme Council enabled him to obtain for each of his sons an extensive seigniory. That of Louis d’Amours, the eldest, included a tract of land of generous proportions at the Richibucto river; the grant was issued September 20, 1684, but the seignior had already built there a fort and two small

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CHAPTER VIII.

Twelve miles below the town of Woodstock there enters the River St. John, from the westward, a good sized tributary known as Eel River. It is a variable stream, flowing in the upper reaches with feeble current, over sandy shallows, with here and there deep pools, and at certain seasons almost lake-like expansions over adjoining swamps, but in the last twelve miles of its course it is transformed into a turbulent stream, broken by rapids and falls to such an extent that only at the freshet season

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CHAPTER IX.

After a long interval of peace from the time of the treaty of Utrecht in 1713, war was declared between France and England in 1744. The Indians of the St. John river, who had been fairly quiet for some years, took the warpath with great alacrity. The war that ensued is known as “King George’s,” or the “Five Years” war. At its commencement the Maliseets played rather a sharp trick upon the English which Paul Mascarene and Shirley, the governor of Massachusetts, remembered against them when peace

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CHAPTER X.

The St. John river region may be said to have been in dispute from the moment the treaty of Utrecht was signed in 1713 until the taking of Quebec in 1759. By the treaty of Utrecht all Nova Scotia, or Acadia, comprehended within its ancient boundaries, was ceded to Great Britain, and the English at once claimed possession of the territory bordering on the St. John. To this the French offered strong objection, claiming that Nova Scotia, or Acadia, comprised merely the peninsula south of the Bay of

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CHAPTER XI.

The situation on the St. John had now become a matter of international interest in view of the boundary dispute. The deliberations of the French and English commissioners began in 1750 and lasted four years. In preparing the French case the Marquis de la Galissonniere summoned to his aid the Abbes de L’Isle-Dieu and Le Loutre, who were both well informed as to the situation of Acadia and also filled with intense zeal for the national cause. We learn from letters of the Abbe de L’Isle-Dieu, writt

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CHAPTER XII.

As time went on the Acadians became impatient at the delay in settling the limits of Acadia. In vain they were annually told the boundaries would soon be determined, all negotiation proved fruitless. Those who had crossed the isthmus into what is now the County of Westmorland found themselves undecided as to their future course. Their inclination—a very natural one—seems to have been to return to the fields they had abandoned, but the Abbe Le Loutre urged them to remain under French rule as the

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CHAPTER XIII.

The territory north of the Bay of Fundy, which now forms the Province of New Brunswick, was for nearly half a century a bone of contention between the French and their English rivals. It might indeed be said that from the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713 to the Treaty of Paris in 1763 the controversy continued to disturb the peace of Europe. Sometimes the points at issue were warmly debated at the council board, where the representatives of either nation vainly tried to settle the limits of Acadia, and

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CHAPTER XIV.

On the west bank of the St. John, about six miles above the City of Fredericton, is the site of the old Indian village of Aukpaque. It looks out upon a charming panorama of interval and islands, amidst which the river creeps lazily with many windings. In the background across the river there rises the steep slope of Currie’s Mountain, volcanic in its origin. Weird legends connected with this mountain have been handed down from ancient days, which the Indian guides will sometimes rehearse when th

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CHAPTER XV.

The erection of Fort Frederick, in the autumn of 1758, gave the English a permanent foothold on the River St. John, which possibly was rendered a little more secure by the destruction of the Acadian settlements at Grimross and St. Annes, and the subsequent removal by Colonel Arbuthnot of a large number of the French inhabitants. Shortly after the Acadian expulsion, the Lords of Trade and Plantations urged Governor Lawrence to re-people the lands vacated by the French with settlers from New Engla

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CHAPTER XVI.

The township of Maugerville, as described in the grant of October 31, 1765, began “at a Pine Tree on a point of land a little below the Island called Mauger’s Island,” extending 12½ miles up the river with a depth of nearly 11 miles. It embraced the principal part of the parishes of Maugerville and Sheffield, including Oromocto Island and “the Island lying off Wind-mill Point called Middle Island.” In the grant the “Rights” or “Shares” were fixed at 500 acres but the surveyor-general of Nova Sco

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CHAPTER XVII.

When the attention of James Simonds, was directed to the River St. John, by the proclamation oaf Governor Lawrence inviting the inhabitants of New England to settle on the vacant lands in Nova Scotia, he was a young man of twenty-four years of age. His father had died at Haverhill; August 15th, 1757. The next year he went with his uncle, Capt. Hazen, to the assault of Ticonderoga, in the capacity of a subaltern officer in the Provincial troops, and shortly after the close of the campaign proceed

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CHAPTER XVIII.

The circumstances under which the trading company of Blodget, Simonds, Hazen, Peaslie, White and Richard Simonds was organized in 1764 have been already described. The original contract is yet in existence and in a very excellent state of preservation. It is endorsed “Contract for St. Johns &amp; Passamaquodi.” [70] A fac-simile of the signatures appended to it is here given. Signatures A short account may be given of each member of the partnership. Samuel Blodget was a Boston man, somewhat

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CHAPTER XIX.

A great impetus was given to the settlement of the wilderness parts of Nova Scotia by the proclamations issued by Governor Lawrence in 1758 and 1759 offering free grants of lands to those who would become settlers. In consequence of these proclamations attention was directed to the St. John river. The fertile lands along its borders greatly pleased the men of Massachusetts who explored it, and led to their founding the Township of Maugerville, while, almost simultaneously, Messrs. Simonds and Wh

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CHAPTER XX.

Since the preceding chapters were printed the author chanced to discover some interesting manuscripts in the collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society which throw a good deal of light upon the history of the old townships on the River St. John. It is to be regretted that this discovery was not made a little sooner, but it is not too late to give the reader the benefit of it in a supplementary way. The association that undertook the settlement of the townships of Conway, Gage, Burton, S

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CHAPTER XXI.

The circumstances under which James Simonds, William Hazen and their associates organized the first trading company at St. John have been already related. Their business contract was signed on the 1st of March, 1764. In the course of a year or two the character of the original company was essentially altered by the death of Richard Simonds, the retirement of Samuel Blodget and Richard Peaslie and the admission of Leonard Jarvis as a new partner. Questions had also arisen as to the rights of the

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CHAPTER XXII.

Our knowledge of affairs on the River Saint John down to the period of English occupation is largely derived from the correspondence of the Jesuit missionaries, the last of whom was Charles Germain. After his retirement the Acadians and Indians remained for several years without any spiritual guide, a circumstance that did not please them and was also a matter of concern to the Governor of Nova Scotia, who in December, 1764, informed the Secretary of State that a promise had been made the Indian

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CHAPTER XXIII.

When the county of Sunbury was established in 1765, there was no English settlement north of St. Ann’s and the river was but sparsely settled from that place to the sea. Nevertheless the immense forest wealth of the St. John was gradually becoming known and appreciated. The French ship of war “Avenant,” as long ago as the year 1700, after discharging her cargo of supplies for Villebon’s garrison and goods for the French traders, took on board some very fine masts for the French navy that had bee

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CHAPTER XXIV.

In the year 1775 armed vessels were fitted out in several of the ports of New England to prey on the commerce of Nova Scotia. Many of these carried no proper commissions and were manned by hands of brutal marauders whose conduct was so outrageous that even so warm a partizan as Col. John Allan sent a remonstrance to congress regarding their behaviour: “Their horrid crimes,” he says, “are too notorious to pass unnoticed,” and after particularizing some of their enormities he declares “such procee

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CHAPTER XXV.

The establishment of Fort Howe rendered the situation of the people at the mouth of the St. John comparatively secure, but the following summer was a very anxious and trying time to those who lived in the townships up the river. The Indians were restless and dissatisfied. They complained bitterly of being left without a missionary, and it was in vain that Lieut. Gov. Arbuthnot and Colonel Franklin endeavored to keep them in good temper by promising that a missionary would be sent them immediatel

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CHAPTER XXVI.

In the year 1779 many of the Indians at Machias and Passamaquoddy began to waver in their adherence to the Americans and to imagine they would fare better by withdrawing from John Allan and returning to their old haunts on the River St. John. Allan wrote in the autumn of this year, “The unsteady conduct of the Indians has obliged me to use every means to prevent their going to St. Johns. I have not met with such difficulty previous to this summer.” He managed to keep them a little longer, but in

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CHAPTER XXVII.

The enormous lumbering operations carried on upon the St. John river and its tributaries in modern times had their small beginning, two centuries ago, when masts for the French navy were cut by order of the King of France. [114] The war of the Revolution obliged the English government to look for a reserve of trees suitable for masts in the remaining British colonies. In the year 1779, arrangements were made with William Davidson to provide a number of masts at the River St. John. Colonel Franck

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CHAPTER XXVIII.

Considerable information has already been given in the preceding chapters of this history concerning the first English settlers on the River St. John, and the names of such men as Francis Peabody, Israel Perley, James Simonds, James White, William Hazen, Jonathan and Daniel Leavitt, Beamsley P. and Benjamin Glasier, Benjamin Atherton, William Davidson, Gilfred Studholme and others will be familiar to the majority of our readers. Some further information concerning the early settlers may prove of

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CHAPTER XXIX.

After the establishment of Major Studholme’s garrison at Fort Howe, in the fall of 1777, the settlers on the river found adequate protection. The Indians occasionally assumed a hostile attitude it is true, especially when they were stirred up by Allan’s emissaries from Machias, but they were rather overawed by the proximity of the fort and were for the most part peacefully disposed. The privateers continued their depredations on the coast, but kept clear of Fort Howe. The condition of the settle

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CHAPTER XXX.

The vanguard of the Loyalists now began to make its appearance. Captain Simon Baxter has a fair claim to be considered the pioneer Loyalist of this province. He arrived at Fort Howe with his family in March, 1782, in distressed circumstances, and was befriended by William Hazen and James White, who recommended him to the favorable consideration of the authorities at Halifax. Captain Baxter was a native of New Hampshire. He was proscribed and banished on account of his loyalty, and had several na

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