|
Extract from a Report of a
Committee of the Executive Council, Dated February 26th, 1842, and
approved by His Excellency the Governor-General two days later:
"William H. Peterson with a
petition from the inhabitants of a tract of land called the 'Queen's
Bush,' in the District of Wellington, praying to have it surveyed.
"The Committee recommend
that the tract of land above mentioned be forthwith surveyed, and that a
plan of survey be submitted for approval of your Excellency-in-Council.
The charges for survey will be against the Clergy Reserve Fund."
Memory has an odd way at
times of retaining a recollection of that which is unimportant, whilst the
relatively important things too often are forgotten. To some such
peculiarity of memory the writer must attribute his recollection of a
school Geography, in use some fifty years ago—which even then must have
been almost obsolete—in which was a map of Upper Canada, showing its
divisions into Districts. Besides the Districts, the map also showed a
large blank tract, which was designated "Indian Territory," roughly
bounded, as far as memory recalls, by the Home District on the east, the
Huron District on the south, and Lake Huron on the west and north
respectively. This "Territory" is that tract of land mentioned in the
preceding chapter as ceded to the Crown by the treaty executed at Manitowaning. Shortly thereafter it came to be known as the "Queen's
Bush," a title given, no doubt, to distinguish it from the lands belonging
to the Canada Company, the German Company, and others that had obtained
large blocks of land from the Crown, holding them largely for speculative
purposes.
Piled away among the
records of the Crown Lands Department are several petitions presented in
1847-8, similar in effect to the one referred to in the above headnote,
the constant demand being for the opening up of lands suitable for
settlement.
At that period Canada was
being favored with a large wave of immigration, landing a yearly
increasing number of immigrants upon her shores. There were but 25,375
immigrants in 1845, but 1817 saw this figure increased to 89,110. The
population of Upper Canada, which in 1812 was 486,055, rose to 723,332 in
1848, and to 952,004 in 1852, an increase of nearly one hundred per cent.
in ten years, which in a large measure was due to immigration.
The demand for lands for
settlement resulting from such a rapid increase in population was
responded to by the Executive, and plans were made for the opening up and
settlement of the "Queen's Bush." On the 19th April, 1847, an
Order-in-Council was passed, "To open up the waste lands of the Crown in
the Huron District, by the survey of a double concession of lots on a line
from the northerly angle of the township of Mornington, to the north-east
angle of the township of Wawanosh. Also a single concession along the rear
boundary line of the townships of Wawanosh and Ashfiekl, [This "single
concession" became Con. 1 in the townships of Kinloss and Huron.] and one
along the shore of Lake Huron, northerly from Ashfield." This to be all in
one survey.
The Hon. D. B. Papineau,
Commissioner of Crown Lands, followed up this order, on May 8th, 1847, by
directing Alex. Wilkinson, P.L.S., to make the foregoing survey, with the
proviso, that "the extent of the survey along the lake shore is to be
limited by the demand for lands."
Mr. Wilkinson promptly
proceeded to undertake the work allotted to him. Taking a party of twelve
men and the needed supplies, he started for the Bush. At Goderich he
endeavored to engage a man sufficiently acquainted with the locality to
act as guide, so as to reach the north-east angle of Wawanosh, the point
where he purposed to commence the survey. So completely was the Bush a
terra incognita that he could not obtain anyone who possessed the required
knowledge. In his report Mr. Wilkinson says, "I was forced to find the
place myself from the best information obtainable from the settlers in
Wawanosh, which was but little, as none of them had ever been back that
far." Following the course of the river Maitland, the surveying party at
length reached their destination. After running the Wawanosh road
south-easterly to the townships of Mornington and Maryborough, Mr.
Wilkinson retraced his steps to his original starting point; thence
reopening and reblazing the line to Lake Huron, [This line formed the rear
of the townships of Ashfield and Wawanosh; these two townships having been
surveyed several years prior to this.] at the same time planting the posts
along the north side of the line, marking out the farm lots in what are
now the first concessions of the townships of Kinloss and Huron, which
farm lots, therefore, can claim the honor of being the first surveyed farm
lands in the county of Bruce. Mr. Wilkinson was not, however, the first
surveyor to work in the county. Mr. Charles Rankin preceded him, having in
1845 run the line from Owen Sound to the mouth of the Saugeen River, that
constituted the southern boundary of the Indian Reserve. [Whether Mr.
Rankin at the same time surveyed the "Half-Mile Strip " or not, the writer
cannot say. It is indicated in a draft map of the proposed new townships
in Bruce, made in 1848, but the land was not ceded to the Crown until
1851.]
The demand for new lands in
the summer of 1847 must have been considerable, for on September 21st of
that year, further instructions were issued to Mr. Wilkinson, in which he
was directed to "survey the eastern shore of Lake Huron northerly from the
township of Ashfield to the extent of two townships. From thence to make
an angular survey of the shore to the mouth of the Saugeen river, and a
survey of the river for about ten miles."
An examination of a map of
the county of Bruce will show that the lots surveyed by Mr. Wilkinson,
which extend from the south-east corner of Kinloss to the lake, thence
northward along the shore line, are in form narrower and longer than are
to be found elsewhere in the county in farms of equal size. The reason
assigned for this is, such a shape of lot would result in the settlers
dwelling closer together. They would, therefore, be able the more readily
to render each other assistance in case any trouble with the Indians
should occur, a contingency that fortunately has never arisen.
In the winter following the
completion of the above-mentioned surveys, Mr. Wilkinson furnished the
Crown Lands Department with an outline map, by which he showed how the
unsurveyed part of the "Queen's Bush" might be desirably blocked out into
townships. The uniqueness of this document makes it an exceedingly
interesting one. The fact of it having been drafted at that time indicates
that the question of a suitable division into townships of the last of the
wild lands in the western part of Upper Canada belonging to the Crown was
being considered. Although the projected surveys suggested by Mr.
Wilkinson were but partially carried out, his plan no doubt formed the
basis for the one ultimately adopted, which divided the tract into
seventeen townships. Eleven of these comprise those townships in Bruce
south of the Indian Reserve; the other six are Turnberry, Howick, Morris
and Grey, in the county of Huron, and Elma and Wallace, in the county of
Perth. The exact date when the plan of the final surveys was decided upon
cannot be given, but it is a safe surmise to say that it must have been
some time during the spring or early summer of 1848.
To attract the attention of
prospective settlers to the district about to be surveyed, the Government
decided to open up a colonization road from the county of Simcoe to the
mouth of the Penetangore River on Lake Huron, and to offer as a free grant
to actual settlers a fifty acre farm lot on one of the two concessions
north or south of this road. This decision was formulated by an
Order-in-Council passed August 26th, 1848. [See Appendix D for copy of
this Order, and note the conditions therein given attached to the offer of
a free grant.]
On the day the order was
passed, A. P. Brough, P.L.S., [Allan Park Brough, P.L.S., surveyed not
only the Durham Road, but also the Elora Road, from the north-west corner
of Carrick to its southerly terminus in the township of Maryborough, the
town plot of Kincardine, the township of Brant, and was proceeding with
the survey of the township of Bruce when he died. His name is preserved in
the name of "Allan Park," bestowed on a village on the Durham line in the
township of Bentinck.] received instructions to survey the western part of
the road, from where the village of Durham now stands, to the lake; also
to make a cursory survey of the reserve for a town plot at the mouth of
the Penetangore River.
Mr. Brough had among those
who formed his surveying party some men who ultimately became settlers in
the county and assisted in its development in a prominent manner. Latham
B. Hamlin, his principal assistant, years afterward became the County
Engineer, [Latham B. Hamlin after ceasing to be Countv Engineer of Bruce
(see Chapter VII.) was engaged in the construction of the Intercolonial
Railway, and afterwards in that of the Canadian Pacific Railway in British
Columbia. While in the west he accumulated some means, but unfortunately
lost them. Advanced in years as he was, he went to the Klondike, hoping to
be fortunate enough to retrieve his fortunes. He and a partner took up a
claim on Hunker Creek, a small tributary of the Klondike, some thirty
miles from Dawson. The two men were caught out in a severe snowstorm and
were badly frozen before they succeeded in returning to their cabin. The
Mounted Police found the partner dead, and Mr. Hamlin with his arms and
legs frozen almost up to his body. They brought him to Dawson, where he
died within a few days after reaching there. This sad occurrence happened
in the month of February or March in the year 1898.] and superintended the
construction of the system of county gravel roads. Another was Peter
Smith, a pioneer settler of Saugeen Township. Others were John Caskanette
and Joseph Chartrand, of Greenock, who survived to see the county of Bruce
attain its jubilee.
The report of this survey
submitted by Mr. Brough is a lengthy one. Many details in it are
interesting, and will be referred to in the chapters relating to the minor
municipalities through which the survey ran. Having been supplied with the
required astronomical bearings, Mr. Brough projected his lines
accordingly. Starting at Penetangore (now Kincardine), the party pushed
their way through the unbroken forest that then covered the lands
comprising the townships of Kincardine and Kinloss, until they reached the
large tract of swamp subsequently known as the Greenock Swamp, of which
Mr. Brough says in his report: "Previous to deciding upon the route for
the Durham Road in the township of Greenock, I explored the country some
eight or ten miles in extent and found it to be almost continuous swamp,
the extent of which was not fully ascertained; but it may in general terms
be said to embrace a belt of country some ten or twelve miles in length by
four in width, and contains more than 25,000 acres. This immense swamp
lies on the west side of the Au-shuskisibbi, or Muddy River. [This stream
bears so many names that it will not be out of place to refer to them
here. On the map of the county of Bruce, published by James Warren, P.L.S.,
the river is called the ''Yokasippi," which is a corruption of the Indian
word "Ah-ta-yahko-sibbi," which means "The Drowned Lands River." At the
junction of this stream with the Saugeen, the Indians call it the "Mekenakoncesibbi,"
or "Small Mud Turtle River." The " Mud River" is what the early settlers
called it; but it is probably more frequently called the "Teeswater"
to-day than by any other of its numerous names. As to the origin of the
name "Mud River," the following incident is given: The late Peter Smith,
of Saugeen, was flagman in Brough's surveying party. He used to relate
that, during the progress of the survey, when he reached the river he
somehow fell into it, and was thoroughly bemired in its oozy bed. As he
floundered out upon firm ground Brough came up and said. "What name shall
we give this river?" Smith, looking down on his mud-covered garments,
said. "You had better call it Mud River." Being apt and descriptive of
part of the stream, the name stuck for many years.] On the east side of
Otter Lake (in the township of Kinloss) a small neck of hard land
protrudes itself into the swamp; of this I took advantage to carry forward
the Durham Road into the township of Greenock, as it is the only piece of
land in a range of several miles that is practicable for a line of road."
The taking of this route through the swamp brought the line of road so far
south, that the survey proceeded on what would have been the "South Line,"
if the first projection had been followed out. It also resulted in
bringing the line of road distant but the width of a concession from the
southerly boundary of the township. In consequence the survey of free
grant farm lots was limited to one concession on each side of the Durham
Road throughout Greenock. The deviation necessitated by the foregoing
circumstances no doubt influenced Mr. Brough to drop the survey at this
point and proceed to Durham, and from there to survey the road westward,
through the townships of Bentinck and Brant. These details have been given
as an explanation of the jog of a mile and a quarter which occurs in the
Durham line at the boundary of the townships of Brant and Greenock, where
was laid out the Greenock town-plot to connect the roads running east and
west with each other. This town-plot failed to respond to the early
expectations, never developing into even the semblance of a centre of
population. It ultimately was surveyed into farm lots. [An
Order-in-Council, dated April 7th, 1852, abolished the Greenock town-plot.
Although not in the market the lands therein were largely squatted upon.
As a matter of speculation the lands were purchased from the Crown by
James Webster, of Guelph, and Dr. Hamilton, of Goderich, who succeeded in
having the actual settlement clause waived, but on condition that they
satisfy the claims of the squatters. They held the lands, still mostly
bush, until 1862 when John S. and James Tolton purchased the greater part
of the block.]
The surveys made by A.
Wilkinson and A. P. Brough, extended in long lines through several
townships, attained the object sought, namely, that of opening up the "Queen's Bush." It was upon these surveys that the first permanent settlers
in search of farm lands located, the initial settlements being on the lake
shore at or near Kincardine, in the summer of 1848. Others who came into
the county in the fall of the same year located on the Durham Line in the
same vicinity. The spring of 1849 added to these and also witnessed many
of the "free grants" in Brant being settled upon.
The town-plot of
Penetangore (Kincardine) was laid out toward the close of 1849, and with
it the survey assigned to Mr. Brough was completed.
Up to the last-mentioned
date no township in the county of Bruce had been surveyed into farm lots;
this was a work commenced in the ensuing year. The following is the order
in which the various subsequent government surveys were made. In 1850,
Brant and Kincardine Townships were surveyed. In the winter following, the
Elora Road from the Greenock town-plot southwards was laid out. A survey
was made in 1851 of the townships of Arran, Elderslie, Huron, Saugeen, the
west part of Bruce, and the town-plot of Southampton; in 1852, the east
part of the township of Bruce and the townships of Carrick, Culross,
Kinloss, and Greenock; in 1855, the townships of Amabel and Albemarle and
town-plot of Alma; in 1856, the townships of Eastnor and Lindsay, the
town-plot of Wiarton and the village of Paisley; in 1857, the township of
St. Edmunds; in 1875, the six hundred acres reserve forming the southerly
part of Southampton town-plot, and in 1899 and 1900 the Fishing Islands,
completing the last of the Crown surveys of any moment. |
