The Frenchman’s dream: a water route to Dundas
THE DESJARDINS CANAL — one man’s dream. Dundas officials and citizens this year will take part in the dedication ceremony for the town’s centennial project 50 years ago — a public park at the Desjardins Canal basin.
One of the highlights of the ceremony will be the erection of a memorial plaque in honour of the man who many years ago brought a dream to the Valley Town.
It was a dream that sparkled for a time and then slowly dropped into oblivion as Hamilton’s deeper harbour — and the coming of the railroad — throttled the commerce that came to the town through the once-busy waterway.
THE CANAL area is part of that region known to Hamilton and district residents as “Coote’s Paradise” and sometimes just referred to as “The Marsh.”
For more than 100 years, this picturesque expanse of water and wooded areas was known throughout the Niagara region as a famous gathering place for water fowl. In the early part of the 19th century, it was a well-known hunting spot for army personnel who came over from York, now Toronto, to hunt game.
Marsh
In fact, the area took its name from Captain Coote, of the Eighth Regiment, who spent a summer hunting in the marsh.
And Dundas, for a time, was known as The Village of Coote’s Paradise.
And Desjardins Canal has always been an important part of the history of the marsh area.
Pierre Desjardins, who was called Peter when he immigrated to Canada, was born at Nesle, France, in 1775.
Transferred
The young Frenchman of vision was just crowding 17 when he came to Canada and settled in Niagara, where he worked in Richard Hatt’s store as a clerk.
Hatt, credited as being one of the early settlers and developers for Dundas, had considerable business interests in the area known as Coote’s Paradise, and after some months in the store at Niagara, Desjardins was transferred to the Dundas area.
Hatt was also a man of vision, and in 1809 he hired a work crew to start the dredging of the natural creek which flowed from Dundas into the marsh.
IT WAS HIS hope that by opening this water artery, river boats could be encouraged to use the creek to bring additional trade to the village.
Liked odds
The young French clerk also saw considerable merit in the idea, and following the War of 1812, a growing Hamilton and Coote’s Paradise became rivals for the trade of nearby port towns.
Desjardins felt odds favoured the development of Coote’s Paradise, later Dundas, especially with the opening of the military highway by Governor Simcoe in 1794. The highway, now known as Highway 99 or the Governor’s Road, connected Dundas with Galt, Kitchener, and other nearby communities.
Dredging
It was Desjardins’ dream that Dundas would face a great future as a general trade centre if the channel could be opened to permit the passage to the village of larger ships.
A royal charter was granted to Desjardins in 1816, and steam dredges started on the laborious task of deepening the channel, completing the job 12 years later.
The canal not only cut through the marsh but also through the area known then as Burlington Heights, a high piece of ground which divided Hamilton Bay from the marsh land.
Before the job was finished, however, Peter Desjardins was in financial trouble and appealed to the government for assistance.
An act of parliament in 1826 provided $100,000 for the completion of the job.
The Desjardins Canal Company was then formed. Company officials decided that since Desjardins himself had put up his life’s savings, he should be given stock in the company and security for payment of the balance. But he did not see his dream come true. FIVE YEARS before the canal, about 1½ miles long, was actually put into service, he died while on a business trip to nearby Grimsby.
Playground
He was just 52 years of age. His dream of added commerce through the waterway flourished for a time, as the canal became a busy thoroughfare for steamers and tallmasted sailing vessels which brought varied cargos to Dundas.
Dundas’ David Mitson, the town’s citizen of the year in 1964, can remember steamers in the canal basin.
“The canal area was our playground more than 70 years ago.”
In the early days, men of vision saw the canal being extended to meet with the Grand and Thames Rivers to provide a water route to Lake Huron.
But two factors provided the death knell for the canal: the coming of the railway, and the facilities provided by Hamilton’s deeper harbour.
Railroad
A few years after the opening of the canal, the water levels dropped several feet, forcing sailing vessels to lighten their loads. This caused a financial loss for the ship owners, and they soon turned to the facilities of Hamilton Bay.
THE COMING of the Great Western Railroad to Hamilton was another blow.
The once-busy canal had lost its importance by 1855, and by the early 1870s the once-flourishing waterway was in a state of bankruptcy.
Boat haven
It held on grimly, however, and for a brief period was used to float lumber to Hamilton from the east, but this didn’t last. It later became a haven for small pleasure craft.