Voyage In Canada

Source (1836)

Agent Stickney, Captain Rhea And Antoine Bondy

Note: Antoine, the son of Joseph Duarte Bondy and Marie Josette Gamelin and also my daughter's 6th great grand uncle.

From the Valley of the upper Maumee River, with historical account of Allen County and the city of Fort Wayne, Indiana (also here):

The agent was thankful for the information, but was doubtful whether to credit or reject it, as a mistake in a matter of so much importance, either way, would prove ruinous to his character and cause his disgraceful ejection from the important office which he held. He had been but three months in office or in the country and was acquainted with but few persons.

The character of Bondie was not known to him, and the nature of his communication was such as to require great secrecy, and if true, immediate preparation for the defense of the fort. [Benjamin Franklin] Stickney sent a note to Capt. [James] Rhea, the commanding officer of the garrison, desiring a meeting with him in the open esplanade of the fort, where there could be no one to overhear what might be said.

In weighing and comparing chances and consequences, he determined that it was better that he should be ruined in his reputation, and the government suffer all sacrifices consequent upon the falsity of the report, than that they should both suffer if it proved true. He, therefore, sent a second time to Capt. Rhea, and declared his intention to make the report and give it his sanction. He informed him that he had just received a dispatch from Gov. Harrison, from Vincennes, saying that he was going to Cincinnati, where he must be addressed, if necessary, and that he should send an express to him, directed to that city, and another to Captain Taylor, at Fort Harrison. 

Reconstruction Of Fort Wayne

When nearly ready to dispatch his messenger, Capt. Rhea sent a note to him requesting that he would delay his express to Cincinnati, until he could write a letter to the governor of Ohio, informing him of the report. Stickney complied with this request, and the express was sent with letters to Gov. Harrison and Gov. Meigs. Active preparations were now begun by the little garrison of 100 for defense. Such men as could be spared with teams were employed to send off ladies who were there, with children, to the frontier; and it was subsequently ascertained that within a few hours after the messengers had started, the Indians drew their lines around the fort.

[Captain Rhea]...met the agent, heard his communication and dismissed it by observing that Bondie was a trifling fellow and no reliance could be placed upon what he said. This increased the perplexity of the agent. He sent for Bondie and his interpreter, to have a cross-examination. This being completed, it remained for the agent either to pass the matter without notice and incur the chances of the siege by the Indians of the two posts, to be followed by a regular force of British troops with artillery without any preparation for defense or relief from abroad, or to report the information, without attaching to it his official belief in its correctness, in which case it would have no effect.

The Indian warriors, to the number of some 500, as then supposed, assembled in the neighborhood of the fort; and it was evident that they had hopes of getting possession of it by stratagem. They would lie in wait near the fort, day after day, a few near, but the majority of them as much out of sight as possible. 

Lands At Detroit

George Rogers Clark Papers, 1771-, Volume 8, By George Rogers Clark:

The Cree Language

Source

James Evans And The Cree Language

Source

Note: James Evans' Wikitree profile here.

French-Indian War Illustrations

The Idler, Volume 20:

General James Wolfe's entry at Wikitree.

Newcomer Entered Canada

Source

11th--"To-day I entered Canada, crossed the Niagara river at Black Rock, and lodged with Jacob Miller, in Lincoln county." [Christian Newcomer of Lancaster County, Pennsylvania]

Morvern, Scotland

Source

Emigration from Scotland: Emigrants' Correspondence
Year: 1813
Reference: Fassiefern Papers, Acc. 11910/32 
Description: Letter of Norman MacLeod, Minister of Morven, to Ewen Cameron of Fassiefern with details from the parish register of the family of Captain Donald Cameron, now living in Montreal, Quebec, Canada

Queenstown And The Falls

"Queenstown is the key to the trade of the Western Lakes...".

Source

Circa 1812 Map (Queenstown In The Middle) (LOC)

The Backwoods of Canada

The Backwoods of Canada: Being Letters from the Wife of an Emigrant Officer ...,  By Catherine Parr Strickland Traill:

"The only vessel in the river bound for Canada, was a passenger-ship, literally swarming with emigants, chiefly of the lower class of Highlanders."

"When the weather is fine I sit on a bench on the deck, wrapped in my cloak, and sew, or pace the deck with my husband, and talk over plans for the future, which in all probability will never be realized."

"...one of my countrymen [who] just returned from the western district on his way back to England...entreats us by no means to go further up this horrid country as he emphatically styles the Upper Province... .  He had been induced by reading Cattermole's pamphlet on the subject of Emigration to quit a good farm and gathering together what property he possessed to embark for Canada. Encouraged...he purchased a lot of wild land in the western district...".

Detroit In The Clergy Reserves Book

Detroit

"Except the settlement at Detroit, no part of Upper Canada was settled or cultivated till the year 1784."

Diary From A Resident Of Sombra Township

Source

Inception Of The Canada Company

Source

"...the belief was 'Niagara must be considered the utmost limit west ward capable of cultivation.' In a word, the country had so far been considered only fit to produce peltries and pine masts. This wish to recompense the losses sustained by those colonists who had so faithfully served the parent overnment took active form in the inception of the Canada Company."

"The British officers who returned after the war had told those at home that although description had been true in calling the colony a "vast solitude," it was by no means " a hopeless wilderness." It is true, so late as 1804, Upper Canada had County Lieutenants, and a Domesday Book which contained records of grants of land from the beginning of the organization of that province in 1792. The still familiar name of Baby figured there as County Lieutenant for Kent."

Flotilla Got Past The Guards

Heights (or Plains) Of Abraham And Quebec City  Illustrated on Map (Partial Section - Map Source LOC)

From The Plains of Abraham:

"As it came level with the batteries of Sillery and Samos, the flotilla had reached its crucial danger point. The French had posts passed without incident, but at the second a guard sighted the leading boats and immediately challenged them."

"Invisible in the dark hour before the dawn, his sharp Qui vive? came as an unwelcome shock. A quick-witted officer of the Fraser Highlanders, Captain Donald McDonald, who in his time had served the Jacobite cause in France and spoke the language perfectly, answered in a low voice, "La France!" The sentry was insistent:  "A quel regiment," he demanded--"De la Reine," McDonald ventured, knowing that part of this battalion was with Bougainville. The sentry, apparently satisfied, did not ask for the password."

"A little further on, under the Samos battery, another sentry repeated the challenge and he could just be seen running down to the water within pistol shot. What are you speaking so quietly for, he wanted to know. Provision boats, replied McDonald. Don't make noise or the English will hear us. Again the sentry let them pass."

Belestre's Incursions

By a letter from him [Belestre] dated April 29, 1756, it appears that, with a number of French and Indians, he went down the Ohio river, and thence east and south to the Carolinas, and

"marched about 30 leagues through settlements that had been abandoned, at the end of which time he fell in with a village of 30 or 40 houses which were taken and burnt; close by was a small wooden fort that was summoned to surrender; on its refusing to comply it was carried by assault and the garrison put to the sword. The killed and prisoners amounted to about 300; all the oxen and cows having been collected together were killed; 120 horses, which they found, served to carry the large quantity of plunder the Indians got, and in returning they set fire to all the settlements they had left."

Belestre was slightly wounded in one arm and in the shoulder. Returning to Fort Duquesne, he engaged with a party of Cherokees and a few Frenchmen on incursions in the neighborhood of that place and was captured by the English troops on June 17, 1757, and on June 20 was taken for examination before a committee composed of Edmund Atkin, superintendent of Indian affairs, Col. George Washington and George Croghan, deputy to Sir William Johnson.

Source - Scouts Overlooking Fort Duquesne (Site Of Pittsburgh)

We have no account of the manner in which Belestre escaped from the Americans, but the next we hear of him he was in the northern part of New York, commanding a body of 300 men, of whom 200 were Indians. They left Montreal in October 1757 and proceeded among the Iroquois Indians to stir them up to attack the English. Some forts and a village in the Palatine were attacked and destroyed, and the people either carried off or massacred. The official report states that during this time a party of Canadians and Indians ravaged and burned 60 houses of the Palatines, their barns, and other outhuildings, as well as the water mill. Forty English perished, either killed or drowned, and 150 men women and children were taken prisoners. Apparently in 1758 Belestre was promoted to a lieutenancy, for he is referred to as a lieutenant in Montcalm's report of Feb 19, and a few months later in the "Bulletin of the most important operations during the winter of 1757-58," he is called a captain of colonial troops. [Historical Collections, Volume 34]

See another post about Belestre at Braddock's Defeat

Remainder Of Justus Sherwood's Company Of Tories

At any rate, *[Colonel John] Peters tells Haldimand that in September he mustered 317 men at Saratoga; doubtless that number included the contingent brought in there by Gershom French, which was incorporated with Peter's corps. It probably also included whatever remained of Captain Justus Sherwood's company of Tories, for Sherwood, who had entered Canada in 1776, had raised a company and served under Peters throughout the campaign, returning to Canada immediately after the Convention. [Source]

*"A...corps that accompanied Burgoyne was that of John Peters, a colonel of militia and judge of the court of common pleas from Gloucester County, New York. As early as August, 1774, Peters had been 'mobbed and kept from his house'... .  In consequence he fled to Canada... .  On June 24, he received formal enlisting orders from General Carleton for his batallion, which was to be called the Queen's Loyal Rangers, and...was commissioned lieutenant colonel of the new corps." [Source]

See Problems With Justus Sherwood's Petition and Justus Sherwood, Thomas Sherwood And Gersham French at my In Deeds blog.

Source

Sir William Johnson Came To Detroit In 1761

(Partial) Carte des possessions françoises et angloises dans le Canada, et partie de la Louisiane, 1756.
Map Held At The Library Of Congress
(Fort de Detroit Is On This Part Of The Map)

Source

A Colony of Émigrés in Canada

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Ruled By France

Under the lily and the rose: A Short History Of Canada For Children:

Source - Une Petite Canadienne

Quebec is a long distance from Versailles. In the days of which I write it seemed far, so very far away, and oft-times the settlers longed for the sunny land of France which the older people still  remembered. The colony had fallen on evil days. Sickness and want had left their impress. Even the Governor was quite as helpless as the people, for they were still largely dependent on France for support. There were no factories either in Quebec, Three Rivers, or Montreal, and when the crops were poor the inhabitants were reduced to starvation.

Henry Hay's "Christmas" Present

Hay's Journal Entry for December 26, 1789, in Fort Wayne:

Source

James Abbott, the father of Elizabeth (Betsey) Abbott Baby, 1777-1812, "gave" Henry Hay "his daughter Betsy over the bottle."