Peter Robinson
Looking back at how the Irish took root in Peterborough. .
This series of articles has been following the route of the Peter Robinson Settlers, a party of 2,000 impoverished Irish Emigrants, as they made their way to what would become Peterborough in 1825. The exploits of these early settlers will be one of the focuses at this year’s inaugural Peter Robinson Festival, which coincides with the 190th anniversary of this large group in the Peterborough area.
The fall of 1825 found the 2,000 Irish men, women, and children of the Robinson Emigration encamped at Scott’s Plains, the present site of downtown Peterborough. They had been travelling since April, when they left their homes in the south of Ireland and joined a government sponsored emigration run by Peter Robinson which provided them with free passage to Canada and land upon arrival. Fleeing from poverty, starvation and violence, this group endured many hardships in their ocean passage and the subsequent journey by boat and by land from Quebec City to Scott’s Plains, located in what was then Newcastle District.
The final step for the Irish was to move to their own land in the townships surrounding Scott’s Plains.
The majority of the Irish families were settled in the townships adjoining the future city of Peterborough. 142 families settled in Emily, 60 in Douro, and 67 in the Gore of Emily, which soon became known as Ennismore. Additionally, there were 51 families settled in Otonabee, 36 in Asphodel, 34 in Smith, and the balance in townships further north and east.
The distribution of the Irish families upon their new land was an interesting process. Parties headed out from Scott’s Plains with a local guide to the surrounding townships. Upon inspection of the lots within the allowed areas, a mixture of allocation and selection took place. Those people who had worked harder during the emigration process and thereby ingratiated themselves with the government officials received first choice of land, and were therefore sometimes able to get bigger or better located lots. Trading and intriguing went on as people sought to locate themselves near family. For example, seven lots in a row were granted to different Leahy men in the seventh concession of Douro.
The Irish who chose to settle in Ennismore experienced one final boat voyage in reaching their land. From Scott’s Plains, they followed the route which would become Chemong Rd. to Chemong or Mud Lake, which they then crossed in several scows. As the first boat reached the shore, it is claimed that Patrick Gallivan, known as quite the character, leaped ashore and pronounced to all that he was the first to set foot in the township.
All men over the age of 18 were allocated 70 acres of a 100 acre lot, with the option to purchase the remaining 30 acres at a very reasonable rate if they met certain requirements of land improvement over the next few years.
Every family also received goods which would aid them in their new life as settlers in the Canadian woods. These included an axe, an auger, a handsaw, a hammer, 100 nails, two gimlets, three hoes, a kettle, frying pan, iron pot, five bushels of seed potatoes, and eight quarts of Indian corn. As well, a cow was eventually provided to be shared between families. For the first eighteen months as well each person received daily rations of salt pork and flour, which in some cases proved to be more than was necessary and was traded for locally distilled spirits, causing grumblings among the few earlier settlers, some of whom saw this as a waste of government funds.
All these goods and land were very well, but the most immediate issue facing the Irish in the late fall of 1825 was shelter for the forthcoming winter. The land given to these settlers was then a wilderness, full of forests, swamps, and stones. Vestiges of the original pine forests can be seen in Jackson’s Park in Peterborough, and as anyone who has tried to make their way through a cedar swamp can attest, travel through the lowlands was nearly impossible. To provide an initial shelter for the settlers of 1825, Robinson hired local settlers to build a small shanty for each family. Two experienced axemen could build one in two days, and received the equivalent of $10 for doing so.
A few Irishmen took advantage of this proposal and built their own homes, receiving the pay for doing so. These shanties were small, at most 15 by 20 feet, and were expected to shelter a family and all their possessions for the winter. The walls were typically cedar logs, and the roof made of split and hollowed basswood troughs. Initially, cooking and heating fires were lit on a flat stone at one end of the shanty and smoke allowed to escape through a small hole in the roof. Later, stone or wood and mortar chimneys were added. A model of one of these shanties will be on display at the Peter Robinson Festival, built by a descendant of one of the original settlers.
As the Irish settlers prepared for the coming winter, they began the arduous task of clearing land in order to plant crops in the spring. First the underbrush was cut and removed, then small trees, until there was room to drop the very largest. All of this was accomplished with axes and handsaws. Often in these early days the brush and timber was burnt in heaps as it fell as there was much more than the settlers required for building, burning, and fencing purposes. As a result, forest fires could be common, and a threat to people, livestock, and buildings. On the other hand, some hoped for and actively encouraged forest fires as they aided in the land clearing process.
New Year’s Day of 1826 found the Irish Robinson Settlers in a remarkably different position than they had been in a year before. They had travelled thousands of difficult miles by land and sea. Instead of renting small tracts of land, these new settlers were on track to becoming owners of sizable farms. Unlike many other settlers who would arrive in Upper Canada, these people had the benefit of having neighbours who shared the same culture and emigration experience. In a sense, the Irish settlements around Peterborough were transplanted communities, shaken and tossed in migration, yet forming into new entities in Canada which through struggles and successes would come to shape the Peterborough area.
This series of articles has been following the route of the Peter Robinson Settlers, a party of 2,000 impoverished Irish Emigrants, as they made their way to what would become Peterborough in 1825. The exploits of these early settlers will be one of the focuses at this year’s inaugural Peter Robinson Festival, which coincides with the 190th anniversary of this large group in the Peterborough area. T his group of roughly 2,000 impoverished farmers, labourers, and tradespeople effected the first large-scale settlement of many of the townships surrounding the city of Peterborough. Selected from 50,000 applicants by Peter Robinson, the government agent in charge of overseeing the migration and resettlement, the majority of those selected were extremely poor Catholic tenant farmers with families who were able to procure strong letters of recommendation. This initiative, funded and overseen by the British Government, sought to improve the tense conditions created by poverty, starvation, and violence in Ireland by settling the poor in sparsely settled regions of Upper Canada.
After enduring many difficulties in the sea voyage from Ireland to Quebec City, and the subsequent journey by boat and on foot to the future town site of Peterborough, by the late fall of 1825 the Irish settlers had largely dispersed to their assigned lots throughout the townships surrounding the supply depot in present day downtown Peterborough.
The first months of 1826 were a harsh introduction to the Canadian winter, with the intensity of snow and cold unfamiliar to the Irish. Rations for eighteen months in the form of pork and flour were provided and much needed, as the immigrants had arrived too late in the year to grow anything of their own. Loneliness and isolation, too, played a role in the shock of adjustment to life in the woods of Canada. At home, many of the Irish were used to living in small village settings, with neighbours close at hand. Here, even the nearest neighbour’s shanty could not be seen through the dense forests, and the scarcely existent roads were clogged with mud, snow, or a combination of both.
Class distinctions, too, were evident in the first years of the Peter Robinson settlement. The few settlers who had come to the area between 1818 and 1825 were largely minor members of the British gentry who had been granted vast tracts of land and were hopeful of becoming the proprietors of extensive estates. As such, some initially greeted the arrival of 2,000 impoverished Irish with trepidation and some dismay. Their fears of violence and crime were to improve unfounded, however, and neighbourly feeling began to be established.
The great social event of the winter of 1826 was the visit of the Lieutenant Governor, Sir Peregrine Maitland. Maitland, a distinguished soldier who had played a crucial role at Waterloo, had served as Lieutenant Governor since 1818. His visit to the Robinson settlement signified the perceived importance and impact of such a large scale emigration and settlement system. According to Frances Stewart, Maitland arrived on a cold winter’s evening. Many of the Irish gathered upon the town site at Scott’s Plains to witness the arrival of the distinguished visitors. These travellers included Thomas Talbot, who personally oversaw and administered the settlement of much of Southwestern Upper Canada, and the Attorney General of Upper Canada, John Beverly Robinson, the brother of Peter. Upon the appearance of Maitland and his retinue in five sleighs, “The immigrants formed a line on each side of the road for a quarter of a mile, and as soon as his sleigh came in sight, 10 men took off the horses, fastened basswood ropes on and drew him to Government House (at the present corner of Water and Simcoe streets) where a great fire was blazing to welcome him …” Later, deputations of the Irish were able to have audiences with the Lieutenant Governor and thanked him for the government assistance which they had received.
From Scott’s Plains, Maitland and his entourage made their way north by sleigh to visit with the Irish settlement in what was then called “The Gore of Emily.” Crossing Mud or Chemong Lake on the ice, the party of government officials were entertained at the home of Owen McCarthy on south half lot 7 in the fourth concession, on what is now Yankee Line. McCarthy’s shanty was thought to be the most comfortable in the settlement, and combined with its proximity to Chemong Lake was thought to be the most fitting for entertaining prestigious visitors.
Maitland’s visit across Chemong Lake evidently impressed him, as the next year he had that northern part of Emily he had visited renamed “Ennismore” in honour of Viscount Ennismore, from whose estates many of the Irish settlers had come from.
Events such as the visits of officials and dignitaries provided some respite from the tedium and isolation experienced by the Irish settlers in the earliest years of settlement. As time went on, additional Irish settlers arrived in the Peterborough area, some in semi-organized groups such as the 1831’s Rubidge Emigration which included emigrants from England and Scotland as well, while many others came to join family members or friends who had originally arrived in 1825.
The Robinson settlers, due to their large numbers and shared experiences, were to form the core of strong communities which would greatly aid in the growth and development of the Peterborough area as the 19th century progressed. By the 1890s, very few of the original Robinson settlers were still alive. At this time, both The Peterborough Examiner and Peterborough Review took an interest in documenting the stories of the few remaining Robinson Emigrants, hoping to capture the memories of those who had witnessed the transformation of Peterborough from rugged forest to a modern city with streetcars and electric street lights.
In 1899, both newspapers published the account of John Leahy, who had sailed aboard the Fortitude in 1825 at the age of 12 with his father Patrick and twin sister Catherine. John is referred to as Patrick; this mistake was likely made as John would have been commonly referred to as John Patrick, or Patrick`s John, to distinguish him from the several other John Leahys. This was a common casual naming practice at the time.
Leahy, at the age of 85, still recalled several of the names of vessels which the Robinson settlers sailed in, and the arduous journey from Quebec City to the site of Peterborough. Upon Leahy`s death in 1899, his obituary stated, “Of the (Douro) pioneers of 1825 there are eight now living, six men and two women. All of course were children at the time of the settlement, several of them being very young. The men surviving are Messrs. Thomas Sullivan, David Quinn, John Torpey, William O’Brien, John O’Brien, and John Crandley, and the women Mrs. John Torpey and Mrs. Patrick Leahy.”
The 2,000 Irish settlers Peter Robinson brought to Peterborough in 1825 provided a nucleus about which the communities of Peterborough County and City could grow. The large and well-connected population provided impetus for local trade, agriculture, and social development. The stories of the trials and successes of this group once settled in Canada are highly interesting in their own right, and are even more poignant in light of the struggles which this group endured both in their old homeland and in the process of reaching their new one. The reader is strongly encouraged to learn more of them. As we begin to approach the 200th anniversary of this remarkable migration and settlement, it is fitting that such a unique event as the transatlantic movement of such a large group of people from the same region be commemorated. The work ethic, faith, community spirit, and love of life which these early Irish settlers of Peterborough possessed shaped the development of their community and traces of it can be still felt in ours today.