Glimpses of the Past Part 51

From this source we learn that soon after the arrival of the Loyalist regiments at St. John, her family joined a party bound up the river in a schooner to St. Anns. In eight days they got to Oromocto, where they were landed by the Captain, who refused to proceed further on account of the lateness of the season. He charged them each four dollars for their pa.s.sage. The night was spent on sh.o.r.e and the next day the women and children proceeded to St.

Anns in Indian canoes, the others coming on foot. It was the 8th of October when they reached their destination, and pitched their tents at Salamanca, near the sh.o.r.e. Before any effectual steps had been taken to provide a shelter, winter was at hand. Snow fell on the 2nd November to the depth of six inches. The best that some of the unfortunate people could do was to pitch their tents in the depths of the forest. Stones were used for a rude fire place. The tent had no floor but the ground. The winter was very cold, with deep snow, which afforded some protection. Still it was an awful winter.

There were mothers who had been reared in a pleasant country, enjoying the luxuries of life, who now clasped their helpless little ones to their bosoms and tried by the warmth of their own bodies to protect them from the bitter cold. Many of the weaker ones died from cold and exposure. Graves were dug with axes and shovels near by, and there in stormy wintry weather, the survivors laid their loved ones. They had no minister, and they were buried without any religious service. The burial ground at Salamanca, continued to be used for some years until it was nearly filled. They used to call it "the Loyalist Provincials burial ground."

[144] See "Founders of Fredericton," p. 165, Dr. G. U. Hay's Canadian History Readings.

This old burial ground is on the Ketchum place, just below the town.

Some of the older citizens of Fredericton remember old head boards placed at the graves, since fallen into decay. Many names that were painted or carved on them served to show the Dutch ancestry of the men of Van Buskirk's battalion. The names were such as Van Horn, Vanderbeck, Ackermann, Burkstaff, Ridner, Handorff, Van Norden, Blaicker, Blann, Ryerson, etc.

As soon as the snow was off the ground the people began to build log houses, but they were soon obliged to desist for want of provisions.

There was again delay in sending supplies, and the settlers were forced to live after the Indian fashion. They made maple sugar, dug edible roots, caught fish, shot partridges and pigeons and hunted moose. Some who had planted a few potatoes had to dig them up again and eat them. In their distress these poor souls were gladdened by the discovery of large patches of beans that were found growing wild. The beans were white, marked with a black cross, and had probably been planted by the French. "In our joy at this discovery," said Mrs.

Fisher, "we at first called them the Royal Provincial's bread; but afterwards the staff of life and hope of the starving." There was great rejoicing when at length a schooner arrived with corn-meal and rye. It was not during the first season only that the settlers at St.

Anns suffered for food, other seasons were nearly as bad.

During the summer all hands united in the task of building log houses.

They had few tools beside the axe and saw. They had neither bricks nor lime. Chimneys and fire-places were built of stone, laid in yellow clay. The walls of the houses were of logs; the roofs of bark bound over with small poles. The windows had only four small panes of gla.s.s.

The first house finished was that of Dr. Earle, whose services in a variety of ways were of the utmost value to the little community.

Lieut. Col. Hewlett's house was built on Queen Street, where the Barker House now stands. It would seem that the old veteran accompanied his comrades to St. Anns, for he makes an affidavit before Major Studholme at that place on the 13th of October, stating that by the wreck of the Martha he had lost in tools, stores and baggage, property of the value of 200 stg. His loss included the greater part of his effects and left him well nigh penniless.

Col. Hewlett was born at Hampstead, Queens County, Long Island in New York, and died at Hampstead, Queens County, New Brunswick. His grant of land at the latter place included part of Long Island in the St.

John river. He died in 1789 in the 60th year of his age. Two monuments have been erected in his memory, one at Hampstead on the St. John river, the other at his native town of Hampstead Long Island, N. Y.

The inscriptions on the monuments are nearly identical.

SACRED To the Memory of LIEUT. COL. RICHARD HEWLETT,

Who served as Captain at the Conquest of Canada, and contributed to the Capture of Fort Frontenac, August, 1758, and at the breaking out of the American Revolution, 1775, received a Lieut.-Colonel's commission, and served during the war under General Oliver Delancey.

Born at Hampstead on Long Island in the then Province of New York, and died at this place, July 26th, 1789, aged 59 years.

Some interesting particulars of the services of Lt. Col. Hewlett during the Revolution are to be found in Jones' Loyalist History of New York. He was a brave and capable officer.

We cannot at this time follow further the fortunes of the Loyalists of 1733. Their privations and their toils were not in vain. History has justified their att.i.tude during the Revolutionary epoch, and their merits are acknowledged by broad minded and impartial students of history in the United States. The late Professor Moses Coit Tyler, of the University of Cornell, gave it as his opinion, "That the side of the Loyalists, as they called themselves, of the Tories, as they were scornfully nick-named by their opponents, was even in argument not a weak one, and in motive and sentiment not a base one, and in devotion and self-sacrifice not an unheroic one." The same sentiments were even more emphatically expressed by Dr. Tyler on the occasion of the celebration of the centenary of the founding of the University at Fredericton, a few years since, on which occasion he said:

"We Americans here to-day wish to express our friendship toward you, not only on account of yourselves and the good work you are doing, but also on account, of those n.o.ble men and women, your ancestors, who founded this Province of New Brunswick, this town of Fredericton, and this University which is the crown and glory of both. We remember what sort of men and women they were--their sincerity, their devotion to principle in defiance of loss and pain, their courage, their perseverance, their clear prevision of the immense importance of race unity. So, very honestly, with all our hearts we greet you as a kindred people, many of you of the same colonial lineage with ourselves, having many things in your public and private experience identical with our own, still bound to us by antique and indestructible bonds of fellowship in faith, in sympathy, in aspiration, in humane effort, all coincident with the beginnings of English civilization in North America, nay with the beginnings of civilization itself in that fast-anch.o.r.ed isle beyond the sea, which is the beloved mother of us all. If between your ancestors and ours, on opposite sides of the old Revolutionary dispute a century and a quarter ago, there were many and bitter years of unfriendly tradition, we, on our part, are glad to think that such tradition lives no longer; that in the broad-minded view which time and the better understanding of our own history have brought us, the coming years are to witness a renewal and a permanent relation of good-will and mutual help, which bound together the earlier generations of our common race on this continent."

To these kindly words every generous souled descendant of the Loyalists will utter a fervent Amen. And still we say--all honor to the brave hearts that sacrificed so much and suffered so severely for the preservation of a united British empire, and whose hands in later years laid strong and deep the foundation of our Canadian Dominion.