Queen Street From George Street To Yonge Street

--MEMORIES OF THE OLD COURT HOUSE.





When we pass George Street we are in front of the park-lot originally

selected by Mr. Secretary Jarvis. It is now divided from south to north

by Jarvis street, a thoroughfare opened up through the property in the

time of Mr. Samuel Peters Jarvis, the Secretary's son. Among the

pleasant villas that now line this street on both sides, there is one

which still is the home of a Jarvis, the Sheriff of the County.



Besides filling the conspicuous post indicated by his title, Mr.

Secretary Jarvis was also the first Grand Master of the Masons in Upper

Canada. The archives of the first Masonic Lodges of York possess much

interest. Through the permission of Mr. Alfio de Grassi who has now the

custody of them, we are enabled to give the following extracts from a

letter of Mr. Secretary Jarvis, bearing the early date of March 28th,

1792:--"I am in possession of my sign manual from his Majesty," Mr.

Jarvis writes on the day just named, from Pimlico, to his relative

Munson Jarvis, at St. John, New Brunswick, "constituting me Secretary

and Registrar of the Province of Upper Canada, with power of appointing

my Deputies, and in every other respect a very full warrant. I am also"

he continues, "very much flattered to be enabled to inform you that the

Grand Lodge of England have within these very few days appointed Prince

Edward, who is now in Canada, Grand Master of Ancient Masons in Lower

Canada; and William Jarvis, Secretary and Registrar of Upper Canada,

Grand Master of Ancient Masons in that Province. However trivial it may

appear to you who are not a Mason, yet I assure you that it is one of

the most honourable appointments that they could have conferred. The

Duke of Athol is the Grand Master of Ancient Masons in England. Lord

Dorchester with his private Secretary, and the Secretary of the

Province, called on us yesterday," Mr. Jarvis proceeds to say, "and

found us in the utmost confusion, with half a dozen porters in the house

packing up. However his Lordship would come in, and sat down in a small

room which was reserved from the general bustle. He then took Mr. Peters

home with him to dine: hence we conclude a favourable omen in regard to

his consecration, which we hope is not far distant. Mrs. Jarvis," the

Secretary informs his relative, "leaves England in great spirits. I am

ordered my passage on board the transport with the Regiment, and to do

duty without pay for the passage only. This letter," he adds, "gets to

Halifax by favour of an intimate friend of Mr. Peters, Governor

Wentworth, who goes out to take possession of his Government. The ship

that I am allotted to is the Henneker, Captain Winter, a transport

with the Queen's Rangers on board."



The Prince Edward spoken of was afterwards Duke of Kent and father of

the present Queen. Lord Dorchester was the Governor-General of the

Province of Quebec before its division into Upper and Lower Canada. Mr.

Peters was in posse the Bishop of the new Province about to be

organized. It was a part of the original scheme, as shewn by the papers

of the first Governor of Upper Canada, that there should be an episcopal

see in Upper Canada, as there already was at Quebec in the lower

province. But this was not carried into effect until 1839, nearly half a

century later.



When Jarvis Street was opened up through the Secretary's park-lot, the

family residence of his son Mr. Samuel Peters Jarvis, a handsome

structure of the early brick era of York, in the line of the proposed

thoroughfare, was taken down. Its interior fittings of solid black

walnut were bought by Captain Carthew and transferred by him without

much alteration to a house which he put up on part of the Deer-park

property on Yonge Street.



A large fragment of the offices attached to Mr. Jarvis's house was

utilized and absorbed in a private residence on the west side of Jarvis

Street, and the gravel drive to the door is yet to be traced in the less

luxuriant vegetation of certain portions of the adjoining flower

gardens. Mr. Secretary Jarvis died in 1818. He is described by those who

remember him, as possessing a handsome, portly presence. Col. Jarvis,

the first military commandant in Manitoba, is a grandson of the

Secretary.



Of Mr. McGill, first owner of the next park-lot, and of his personal

aspect, we have had occasion to speak in connection with the interior of

St. James' Church. Situated in fields at the southern extremity of a

stretch of forest, the comfortable and pleasantly-situated residence

erected by him for many years seemed a place of abode quite remote from

the town. It was still to be seen in 1870 in the heart of McGill Square,

and was long occupied by Mr. McCutcheon, a brother of the inheritor of

the bulk of Mr. McGill's property, who in accordance with his uncle's

will, and by authority of an Act of Parliament, assumed the name of

McGill, and became subsequently well known throughout Canada as the Hon.

Peter McGill.



(The founder of McGill College in Montreal was of a different family.

The late Capt. James McGill Strachan derived his name from the

marriage-connection of his father with the latter.)



In the Gazette and Oracle of Nov. 13th, 1803, we observe Mr. McGill,

of York, advertising as "agent for purchases" for pork and beef to be

supplied to the troops stationed "at Kingston, York, Fort George, Fort

Chippewa, Fort Erie, and Amherstburg." In 1818 he is Receiver-General,

and Auditor-General of land patents. He had formerly been an officer in

the Queen's Rangers, and his name repeatedly occurs in "Simcoe's

History" of the operations of that corps during the war of the American

Revolution.



From that work we learn that in 1779 he, with the commander himself of

the corps, then Lieut.-Col. Simcoe, fell into the hands of the

revolutionary authorities, and was treated with great harshness in the

common jail of Burlington, New Jersey; and when a plan was devised for

the Colonel's escape, Mr. McGill volunteered, in order to further its

success, to personate his commanding officer in bed, and to take the

consequences, while the latter was to make his way out.



The whole project was frustrated by the breaking of a false key in the

lock of a door which would have admitted the confined soldiers to a room

where "carbines and ammunition" were stored away. Lieut.-Col. Simcoe, it

is added in the history just named, afterwards offered Mr. McGill an

annuity, or to make him Quartermaster of Cavalry; the latter, we are

told, he accepted of, as his grandfather had been an officer in King

William's army; and "no man," Col. Simcoe himself notes, "ever executed

the office with greater integrity, courage and conduct."



The southern portion of Mr. McGill's park-lot has, in the course of

modern events, come to be assigned to religious uses. McGill Square,

which contained the old homestead and its surroundings, and which was at

one period intended, as its name indicates, to be an open public square,

was secured in 1870 by the Wesleyan Methodist body and made the site of

its principal place of worship and of various establishments connected

therewith.



Immediately north, on the same property, the Roman Catholics had

previously built their principal place of worship and numerous

appurtenances, attracted possibly to the spot by the expectation that

McGill Square would continue for ever an open ornamental piece of

ground.



A little farther to the north a cross-street, leading from Yonge Street

eastward, bears the name of McGill. An intervening cross-street

preserves the name of Mr. Crookshank, who was Mr. McGill's

brother-in-law.



The name that appears on the original survey of York and its suburbs as

first occupant of the park-lot westward of Mr. McGill's, is that of Mr.

George Playter. This is the Captain Playter, senior, of whom we have

already spoken in our excursion up the valley of the Don. We have named

him also among the forms of a past age whom we ourselves remember often

seeing in the congregation assembled of old in the wooden St. James'.



Mr. Playter was an Englishman by birth, but had passed many of his early

years in Philadelphia, where for a time he attached himself to the

Society of Friends, having selected as a wife a member of that body. But

on the breaking out of the troubles that led to the independence of the

United States, his patriotic attachment to old far-off England compelled

him, in spite of the peaceful theories of the denomination to which he

had united himself, promptly to join the Royalist forces.



He used to give a somewhat humorous account of his sudden return to the

military creed of ordinary mundane men. "Lie there, Quaker!" cried he to

his cutaway, buttonless, formal coat, as he stripped it off and flung it

down, for the purpose of donning the soldier's habiliments. But some of

the Quaker observances were never relinquished in his family. We well

remember, in the old homestead on the Don, and afterwards at his

residence on Caroline Street, a silent mental thanksgiving before meals,

that always took place after every one had taken his seat at the table;

a brief pause was made, and all bent for a moment slightly forwards. The

act was solemn and impressive.



Old Mr. Playter was a man of sprightly and humorous temperament, and his

society was accordingly much enjoyed by those who knew him. A precise

attention to his dress and person rendered him an excellent type in

which to study the costume and style of the ordinary unofficial citizen

of a past generation. Colonel M. F. Whitehead, of Port Hope, in a letter

kindly expressive of his interest in these reminiscences of York,

incidentally furnished a little sketch that will not be out of place

here. "My visits to York, after I was articled to Mr. Ward, in 1819,"

Colonel Whitehead says, "were frequent. I usually lodged at old Mr.

Playter's, Mrs. Ward's father. [This was when he was still living at the

homestead on the Don.] The old gentleman often walked into town with me,

by Castle Frank; his three-cornered hat, silver knee-buckles, broad-toed

shoes and large buckles, were always carefully arranged."--To the

equipments, so well described by Colonel Whitehead, we add from our own

boyish recollection of Sunday sights, white stockings and a gold-headed

cane of a length unusual now.



According to a common custom prevalent at an early time, Mr. Playter set

apart on his estate on the Don a family burial-plot, where his own

remains and those of several members of his family and their descendants

were deposited. Mr. George Playter, son of Captain George Playter, was

some time Deputy Sheriff of the Home District; and Mr. Eli Playter,

another son, represented for some sessions in the Provincial Parliament

the North Riding of York. A daughter, who died unmarried in 1832, Miss

Hannah Playter, "Aunt Hannah," as she was styled in the family, is

pleasantly remembered as well for the genuine kindness of her character,

as also for the persistency with which, like her father, she carried

forward into a new and changed generation, and retained to the last, the

costume and manners of the reign of King George the Third.



Immediately in front of the extreme westerly portion of the park lot

which we are now passing, and on the south side of the present Queen

Street in that direction, was situated an early Court House of York,

associated in the memories of most of the early people with their first

acquaintance with forensic pleadings and law proceedings.



This building was a notable object in its day. In an old plan of the

town we observe it conspicuously delineated in the locality

mentioned--the other public buildings of the place, viz., the

Commissariat Stores, the Government House, the Council Chamber (at the

present north-west corner of York and Wellington Streets), the District

School, St. James's Church, and the Parliament House (by the Little

Don), being marked in the same distinguished manner. It was a plain

two-storey frame building, erected in the first instance as an ordinary

place of abode by Mr. Montgomery, father of the Montgomerys, once of the

neighbourhood of Eglinton, on Yonge Street. It stood in a space defined

by the present line of Yonge Street on the west, by nearly the present

line of Victoria Street on the east, by Queen Street on the north and by

Richmond Street on the south. Though situated nearer Queen Street than

Richmond Street, it faced the latter, and was approached from the

latter.--It was Mr. Montgomery who obtained by legal process the opening

of Queen Street in the rear of his property. In consequence of the

ravine of which we have had occasion so often to speak, the allowance

for this street as laid down in the first plans of York had been closed

up by authority from Yonge Street to Caroline Street.



It was seriously proposed in 1800 to close up Queen Street to the

westward also from Yonge Street "so far as the Common," that is, the

Garrison Reserve, on the ground that such street was wholly unnecessary,

there being in that direction already one highway into the town, namely,

Richmond Street, situated only ten rods to the south. In 1800 the

southern termination of Yonge Street was where we are now passing, at

the corner of Montgomery's lot. At this point the farmers' waggons from

the north turned off to the eastward, proceeding as far as Toronto

Street, down which they wended their way to Richmond Street, and so on

to Church Street and King Street, finally reaching the Market Place.



Of the opening of Yonge Street through a range of building lots which in

1800 blocked the way from Queen Street southwards, we shall speak

hereafter in the excursion which we propose to make through Yonge Street

from south to north, the moment we have finished recording our

collections and recollections in relation to Queen Street.



Memories of the Old Court House.



In the old Court House, situated as we have described, we received our

first boyish impressions of the solemnities and forms observed in Courts

of Law. In paying a visit of curiosity subsequently to the singular

series of Law Courts which are to be found ranged along one side of

Westminster Hall in London--each one of them in succession entered

through the heavy folds of lofty mysterious-looking curtains, each one

of them crowded with earnest pleaders and anxious suitors, each one of

them provided with a judge elevated in solitary majesty on high, each

one of them seeming to the passing stranger more like a scene in a drama

than a prosaic reality--we could not but revert in memory to the old

upper chamber at York where the remote shadows of such things were for

the first time encountered.



It was startling to remember of a sudden that our early Upper Canadian

Judges, our early Upper Canadian Barristers, came fresh from these

Westminster Hall Courts! What a contrast must have been presented to

these men in the rude wilds to which they found themselves transported.

Riding the Circuit in the Home, Midland, Eastern and Western Districts

at the beginning of the present century was no trivial undertaking.

Accommodation for man and horse was for the most part scant and

comfortless. Locomotion by land and water was perilous and slow, and

racking to the frame. The apartments procurable for the purposes of the

Court were of the humblest kind.



Our pioneer jurisconsults in their several degrees, however, like our

pioneers generally, unofficial as well as official, did their duty. They

quietly initiated in the country, customs of gravity and order which

have now become traditional; and we see the result in the decent dignity

which surrounds, at the present day, the administration of justice in

Canada in the Courts of every grade.



Prior to the occupation of Mr. Montgomery's house as the Court House at

York, the Court of King's Bench held its sessions in a portion of the

Government Buildings at the east end of the town, destroyed in the war

of 1813. On June 25, 1812, the Sheriff, John Beikie, advertises in the

Gazette that "a Court of General Quarter Sessions of the Peace for the

Home District will be holden at the Government Buildings in the town of

York on Tuesday, the fourteenth day of July now next ensuing, at the

hour of ten o'clock in the forenoon, of which all Justices of the

Peace, Coroners, Gaolers, High Constables, Constables and Bailiffs are

desired to take notice, and that they be then and there present with

their Rolls, Records, and other Memoranda to do and perform those things

which by reason of their respective offices shall be to be done."



It is with the Court Room in the Government Buildings that the Judge,

Sheriff and Crown Counsel were familiar, who were engulfed in Lake

Ontario in 1805. The story of the total loss of the government schooner

Speedy, Captain Thomas Paxton, is widely known. In that ill-fated vessel

suddenly went down in a gale in the dead of night, along with its

commander and crew, Judge Cochrane, Solicitor-General Gray, Mr. Angus

McDonell, Sheriff of York, Mr. Fishe, the High Bailiff, an Indian

prisoner about to be tried at Presqu'Isle for murder, two interpreters,

Cowan and Ruggles, several witnesses, and Mr. Herchmer, a merchant of

York; in all thirty-nine persons, of whom no trace was ever afterwards

discovered.



The weather was threatening, the season of the year stormy (7th

October), and the schooner was suspected not to be sea-worthy. But the

orders of the Governor, General Peter Hunter, were peremptory. Mr.

Weekes, of whom we have heard before, escaped the fate that befel so

many connected with his profession, by deciding to make the journey to

Presqu'Isle on horseback. (For the seat in the House rendered vacant by

the sudden removal of Mr. McDonell, Mr. Weekes was the successful

candidate.)



The name of the Indian who was on his way to be tried was Ogetonicut.

His brother, Whistling Duck, had been killed by a white man, and he took

his revenge on John Sharp, another white man. The deed was done at Ball

Point on Lake Scugog, where John Sharp was in charge of a trading-post

for furs belonging to the Messrs. Farewell. The Governor had promised,

so it was alleged, that the slayer of Whistling Duck should be punished.

But a twelvemonth had elapsed and nothing had been done. The whole

tribe, the Muskrat branch of the Chippewas, with their Chief

Wabbekisheco at their head, came up in canoes to York on this occasion,

starting from the mouth of Annis's creek, near Port Oshawa, and

encamping at Gibraltar Point on the peninsula in front of York. A guard

of soldiers went over to assist in the arrest of Ogetonicut, who, it

appears, had arrived with the rest. The Chief Wabbekisheco, took the

culprit by the shoulder and delivered him up. He was lodged in the jail

at York.



During the summer it was proved by means of a survey that the spot where

Sharp had been killed was within the District of Newcastle. It was held

necessary, therefore, that the trial should take place in that District.

Sellick's, at the Carrying Place, was to have been the scene of the

investigation, and thither the Speedy was bound when she foundered.

Mr. Justice Cochrane was a most estimable character personally, and a

man of distinguished ability. He was only in his 28th year, and had been

Chief Justice of Prince Edward Island before his arrival in Upper

Canada. He was a native of Halifax, in Nova Scotia, but had studied law

in Lincoln's Inn, and was called to the Bar in England.



In the old Court House, near which we are now passing, were assigned to

convicted culprits, with unflinching severity and in a no inconsiderable

number of instances, all the penalties enjoined in the criminal code of

the day--the lash, the pillory, the stocks, the gallows. We have

conversed with an old inhabitant of Toronto, who had not only here heard

the penalty of branding ordered by the Judge, but had actually seen it

in open court inflicted, the iron being heated in the great wood-stove

that warmed the room, and the culprit made to stretch out his hand and

have burnt thereon the initial letter of the offence committed.



Here cases came up repeatedly, arising out of the system of slavery

which at the beginning was received in Canada, apparently as an

inevitable part and parcel of the social arrangements of a colony on

this continent.



On the first of March, 1811, we have it on the record, "William Jarvis,

of the Town of York, Esq. (this is the Secretary again), informed the

Court that a negro boy and girl, his slaves, had the evening before been

committed to prison for having stolen gold and silver out of his desk in

his dwelling-house, and escaped from their said master; and prayed that

the Court would order that the said prisoners, with one Coachly, a free

negro, also committed to prison on suspicion of having advised and aided

the said boy and girl in eloping with their master's property."

Thereupon it was "Ordered,--That the said negro boy, named Henry,

commonly called Prince, be re-committed to prison, and there safely kept

till delivered according to law, and that the girl do return to her said

master; and Coachly be discharged."



At the date just mentioned Slavery was being gradually extinguished by

an Act of the Provincial Legislature of Upper Canada, passed at Newark

in 1793, which forbade the further introduction of slaves, and ordered

that all slave children born after the 9th of July in that year should

be free on attaining the age of twenty-five.



Most gentlemen, from the Administrator of the Government downwards,

possessed some slaves. Peter Russell, in 1806, was anxious to dispose of

two of his, and thus advertised in the Gazette and Oracle, mentioning

his prices:--"To be sold: a Black Woman named Peggy, aged forty years,

and a Black Boy, her son, named Jupiter, aged about fifteen years, both

of them the property of the subscriber. The woman is a tolerable cook

and washerwoman, and perfectly understands making soap and candles. The

boy is tall and strong for his age, and has been employed in the country

business, but brought up principally as a house servant. They are each

of them servants for life. The price of the woman is one hundred and

fifty dollars. For the boy two hundred dollars, payable in three years,

with interest from the day of sale, and to be secured by bond, &c. But

one-fourth less will be taken for ready money. York, Feb. 19th, 1806.

Peter Russell."



According to our ideas at the present moment, such an advertisement as

this is shocking enough. But we must judge the words and deeds of men by

the spirit of the age in which they lived and moved.



Similar notices were common a century since in the English newspapers.

It is in fact asserted that at that period there were probably more

slaves in England than in Virginia. In the London Public Advertiser,

of March 28th, 1769, we have, for example, the following: "To be sold, a

Black Girl, the property of J. B----, eleven years of age, who is

extremely handy, works at her needle tolerably, and speaks English

perfectly well; is of an excellent temper, and willing disposition.

Enquire of Mr. Owen, at the Angel Inn, behind St. Clement's Church, in

the Strand." And again, in the Edinburgh Evening Courant of April

18th, 1768, we have, "A Black Boy to sell. To be sold a Black Boy with

long hair, stout made and well limbed; is good tempered; can dress hair,

and take care of a horse indifferently. He has been in Britain near

three years. Any person that inclines to purchase him may have him for

L40. He belongs to Captain Abercrombie, at Brighton. This advertisement

not to be repeated."



The poet sings--



"Slaves cannot breathe in England: if their lungs

Receive our air, that moment they are free;

They touch our country and their shackles fall."



But this was not true until Lord Mansfield, in 1772, uttered his famous

judgment in the case of James Somerset, a slave brought over by a Mr.

Stewart from Jamaica. Cowper's lines are in reality a versification of a

portion of Lord Mansfield's words. A plea had been set up that

villeinage had never been abolished by law in England; ergo, the

possession of slaves was not illegal. But Lord Mansfield ruled:

"Villeinage has ceased in England, and it cannot be revived. The air of

England," he said, " has long been too pure for a slave, and every man

is free who breathes it. Every man who comes into England," Lord

Mansfield continued, "is entitled to the protection of English law,

whatever oppression he may heretofore have suffered, and whatever may be

the colour of his skin: Quamvis ille niger, quamvis tu candidus esses.

Let the negro be discharged." But this is a digression.



Peter Russell's Peggy had been giving him uneasiness a few years

previous to the advertisement copied above. She had been absenting

herself without leave. Of this we are apprised in an advertisement dated

York, September 2nd, 1803. It runs as follows: "The subscriber's black

servant Peggy, not having his permission to absent herself from his

service, the public are hereby cautioned from employing or harbouring

her without the owner's leave. Whoever will do so after this notice may

expect to be treated as the law directs. Peter Russell."



In the papers published at Niagara advertisements similar to those just

given are to be seen. In the Niagara Herald of January 2nd, 1802, we

have, "For sale: A negro man slave, 18 years of age, stout and healthy;

has had the small pox and is capable of service either in the house or

out-doors. The terms will be made easy to the purchaser, and cash or new

lands received in payment. Enquire of the printer." And again in the

Herald of January 18th: "For sale: the negro man and woman, the

property of Mrs. Widow Clement. They have been bred to the business of a

farm; will be sold on highly advantageous terms for cash or lands. Apply

to Mrs. Clement."



Cash and lands were plainly beginning to be regarded as less precarious

property than human chattels. In 1797 purchasers, however, were still

advertising. In the Gazette and Oracle of October 11th, in that year,

we read; "Wanted to purchase, a negro girl from seven to twelve years of

age, of good disposition. For fuller particulars apply to the

subscribers, W. and J. Crooks, West Niagara, Oct. 4th." At York, in

1800, the Gazette announces as "to be sold"--"A healthy strong negro

woman, about thirty years of age; understands cooking, laundry and the

taking care of poultry. N.B.--She can dress ladies' hair. Enquire of the

Printers. York, Dec 20, 1800."



In respect to the following notice some explanation is needed. We

presume the "Indian slave" spoken of must have been only part Indian.

The detention of a native as a slave, if legal, would have been

difficult. Mr. Charles Field, of Niagara, on the 28th of August, 1802,

gave notice in the Herald: "All persons are forbidden harbouring,

employing, or concealing my Indian slave Sal, as I am determined to

prosecute any offender to the extremity of the law; and persons who may

suffer her to remain in or upon their premises for the space of

half-an-hour, without my written consent, will be taken as offending,

and dealt with accordingly."



In the early volumes of the Quebec Gazette these slave advertisements

are common. A rough wood-cut of a black figure running frequently

precedes them. It appropriately illustrates the following one: "Run away

from the subscriber on Tuesday, the 25th ult., a negro man, named

Drummond, near six feet high, walks heavily; had on when he went away a

dark coloured cloth coat and leather breeches. Whoever takes up and

secures the said negro, so that his master may have him again, shall

have Four Dollars reward, and all reasonable charges paid by John

McCord. Speaks very bad English and next to no French." Another reads

thus: "To be sold, a healthy Negro Boy, about fifteen years of age, well

qualified to wait on a gentleman as a Body Servant. For further

particulars inquire of the Printers."



Mr. Sol.-General Gray, lost in the Speedy, manumitted by his will,

dated August 27th, 1803, and discharged from the state of slavery in

which, as that document speaks, "she now is," his "faithful black woman

servant, Dorinda," and gave her and her children their freedom; and that

they might not want, directed that L1200 should be invested and the

interest applied to their maintenance. To his black servants, Simon and

John Baker, he gave, besides their freedom, 200 acres of land each, and

pecuniary legacies. The Simon here named went down with his master in

the Speedy; but John long survived. He used to state that his mother

Dorinda, was a native of Guinea, and to describe Governor Hunter as a

rough old warrior, who carried snuff in an outside pocket, whence he

took it in handfuls, to the great disfigurement of his ruffled

shirt-bosoms. His death was announced in the public papers by telegram

from Cornwall, Ontario, bearing date January 17, 1871. "A coloured man,"

it said, "named John Baker, who attained his 105th year on the 25th

ult., died here to-day. He came here as a chattel of the late Colonel

Gray, in 1792, having seen service in the Revolutionary war.

Subsequently he served throughout the war of 1812. He was wounded at

Lundy's Lane, and has drawn a pension for fifty-seven years." Mr. Gray,

it may be added, was a native of our Canadian town of Cornwall. His

place of abode in York was in what is now Wellington Street, on the lot

immediately to the west of the old "Council Chamber" (subsequently the

residence of Chief Justice Draper.)



We ourselves, we remember, used to gaze, in former days, with some

curiosity at the pure negress, Amy Pompadour, here in York, knowing that

she had once been legally made a present of by Miss Elizabeth Russell to

Mrs. Captain Denison.



But enough of the subject of Canadian slavery, to which we have been

inadvertently led.



The old Court House, when abandoned by the law authorities for the new

buildings on King Street, was afterwards occasionally employed for

religious purposes. By an advertisement in the Advocate, in March,

1834, we learn that the adherents of David Willson, of Whitchurch,

sometimes made use of it. It is there announced that "the Children of

Peace will hold Worship in the Old Court House of York, on Sunday, the

16th instant, at Eleven and Three." Subsequently it became for a time

the House of Industry or Poor House of the town.



Besides the legal cases tried and the judgments pronounced within the

homely walls of the Old Court House, interest would attach to the

curious scenes--could they be recovered and described--which there

occurred, arising sometimes from the primitive rusticity of juries, and

sometimes from their imperfect mastery of the English language, many of

them being, as the German settlers of Markham and Vaughan were

indiscriminately called, Dutchmen. Peter Ernest, appearing in court with

the verdict of a jury of which he was foreman, began to preface the same

with a number of peculiar German-English expressions which moved Chief

Justice Powell to cut him short by the remark that he would have to

commit him if he swore:--when Ernest observed that the perplexities

through which he and the jury had been endeavouring to find their way,

were enough to make better men than they were express themselves in an

unusual way.--The verdict, pure and simple, was demanded. Ernest then

announced that the verdict which he had to deliver was, that half of the

jury were for "guilty" and half for "not guilty." That is, the Judge

observed, you would have the prisoner half-hanged, or the half of him

hanged. To which Peter replied, that would be as his Lordship

pleased.--It was a case of homicide. Being sent back, they agreed to

acquit.



Odd passages, too, between pertinacious counsel and nettled judges

sometimes occurred, as when Mr. H. J. Boulton, fresh from the Inner

Temple, sat down at the peremptory order of the Chief Justice, but

added, "I will sit down, my Lord, but I shall instantly stand up again."



Chief Justice Powell, when on the Bench, had a humorous way

occasionally, of indicating by a kind of quiet by-play, by a gentle

shake of the head, a series of little nods, or movements of the eye or

eyebrow, his estimate of an outre hypothesis or an ad captandum

argument. This was now and then disconcerting to advocates anxious to

figure, for the moment, in the eyes of a simple-minded jury, as oracles

of extra authority.



Nights, likewise, there would be to be described, passed by juries in

the diminutive jury-room, either through perplexity fairly arising out

of the evidence, or through the dogged obstinacy of an individual.



Once, as we have heard from a sufferer on the occasion, Colonel Duggan

was the means of keeping a jury locked up for a night here, he being the

sole dissentient on a particular point. That night, however, was

converted into one of memorable festivity, our informant said, a

tolerable supply of provisions and comforts having been conveyed in

through the window, sent for from the homes of those of the jury who

were residents of York. The recusant Colonel was refused a moment's rest

throughout the live-long night. During twelve long hours pranks and

sounds were indulged in that would have puzzled a foreigner taking

notes of Canadian Court House usages.



When 10 o'clock a.m. of the next day arrived, and the Court

re-assembled, Colonel Duggan suddenly and obligingly effected the

release of himself and his tormentors by consenting to make the

necessary modification in his opinion.



Of one characteristic scene we have a record in the books of the Court

itself. On the 12th of January, 1813, as a duly impanelled jury were

retiring to their room to consider of their verdict, a remark was

addressed to one of their number, namely, Samuel Jackson, by a certain

Simeon Morton, who had been a witness for the defence: the remark, as

the record notes, was in these words, to wit, "Mind your eye!" to which

the said Jackson replied "Never fear!" The Crier of the Court, John

Bazell, duly made affidavit of this illicit transaction. Accordingly, on

the appearance in court of the jury, for the purpose of rendering their

verdict, Mr. Baldwin, attorney for the prosecution, moved that the said

Jackson be taken into custody: and the Judge gave order "that Samuel

Jackson do immediately enter into recognizances, himself in L50, and two

sureties in L25 each, for his appearance on the Saturday following at

the Office of the Clerk of the Peace, which," as the record somewhat

inelegantly adds, "he done." He duly appeared on the Saturday indicated,

and, pleading ignorance, was discharged.



In the Court House in 1822 was tried a curious case in respect of a

horse claimed by two parties, Major Heward, of York, and General

Wadsworth, commandant of the United States Garrison at Fort Niagara.

Major Heward had reared a sorrel colt on his farm east of the Don; and

when it was three years old it was stolen. Nothing came of the offer of

reward for its recovery until a twelvemonth after the theft, when a

young horse was brought by a stranger to Major Heward, at York, and

instantly recognized by him as his lost property. Some of the major's

neighbours likewise had no doubt of the identity of the animal, which,

moreover, when taken to the farm entered of his own accord the stable,

and the stall, the missing colt used to occupy, and, when let out into

the adjoining pasture, greeted in a friendly way a former mate, and ran

to drink at the customary watering place. Shortly after, two citizens of

the United States, Kelsey and Bond, make their appearance at York and

claim the horse which they find on Major Heward's farm, as the property

of General Wadsworth, commandant at Fort Niagara. Kelsey swore that he

had reared the animal; that he had docked him with his own hands when

only a few hours old; and that he had sold him about a year ago to

General Wadsworth. Bond also swore positively that this was the horse

which Kelsey had reared, and that he himself had broken him in, prior to

the sale to General Wadsworth. It was alleged by these persons that a

man named Docksteader had stolen the horse from General Wadsworth at

Fort Niagara and had conveyed him across to the Canadian side.



In consequence of the positive evidence of these two men the jury gave

their verdict in favour of General Wadsworth's claim, with damages to

the amount of L50. It was nevertheless generally held that Kelsey and

Bond's minute narrative of the colt's early history was a fiction; and

that Docksteader, the man who transferred the animal from the United

States side of the river to Canadian soil, had also had something to do

with the transfer of the same animal from Canada to the United States a

twelvemonth previously.



The subject of this story survived to the year 1851, and was recognized

and known among all old inhabitants as "Major Heward's famous horse

Toby."



Within the Court House on Richmond Street took place in 1818 the

celebrated trial of a number of prisoners brought down from the Red

River Settlement on charges of "high treason, murder, robbery, and

conspiracy," as preferred against them by Lord Selkirk, the founder of

the Settlement. When our neighbourhood was itself in fact nothing more

than a collection of small isolated clearings, rough-hewn out of the

wild, "the Selkirk Settlement" and the "North West" were household terms

among us for remote regions in a condition of infinite savagery, in

comparison with which we, as we prided ourselves, were denizens of a

paradise of high refinement and civilization. Now that the Red River

district has attained the dignity of a province and become a member of

our Canadian Confederation, the trial referred to, arising out of the

very birth-throes of Manitoba, has acquired a fresh interest.



The Earl of Selkirk, the fifth of that title, was a nobleman of

enlightened and cultivated mind. He was the author of several literary

productions esteemed in their day; amongst them, of a treatise on

Emigration, which is spoken of by contemporaries as an exhaustive,

standard work on the subject. For practically testing his theories,

however, Lord Selkirk appears to have desired a field exclusively his

own. Instead of directing his fellow-countrymen to one or other of the

numerous prosperous settlements already in process of formation at

easily accessible and very eligible spots along the St. Lawrence and the

Lakes Ontario, Erie and Huron, he induced a considerable body of them to

find their way to a point in the far interior of our northern continent,

where civilization had as yet made no sensible inroad; to a locality so

situated that if a colony could contrive to subsist there, it must

apparently of necessity remain for a very long period dismally isolated.

In 1803, Bishop Macdonell asked him, what could have induced a man of

his high rank and great fortune, possessing the esteem and confidence of

the Government and of every public man in Britain, to embark in an

enterprise so romantic; and the reply given was, that, in his opinion,

the situation of Great Britain, and indeed of all Europe, was at that

moment so very critical and eventful, that a man would like to have a

more solid footing to stand upon, than anything that Europe could offer.

The tract of land secured by Lord Selkirk for emigration purposes was a

part of the territory held by the Hudson's Bay Company, and was

approached from Europe not so readily by the St. Lawrence route as by

Hudson's Strait and Hudson's Bay. The site of the actual settlement was

half-a-mile north of the confluence of the Assiniboine and Red Rivers,

streams that unitedly flow northward into Lake Winnipeg, which

communicates directly at its northern extremity with Nelson River, whose

outlet is at Port Nelson or Fort York on Hudson's Bay. The population of

the Settlement in the beginning of 1813 was 100. Mr. Miles Macdonell,

formerly a captain in the Queen's Rangers, appointed by the Hudson's Bay

Company first Governor of the District of Assiniboia, was made by the

Earl of Selkirk superintendent of affairs at Kildonan. The rising

village was called Kildonan, from the name of the parish in the county

of Sutherland whence the majority of the settlers had emigrated.



The Montreal North West Company of Fur Traders was a rival of the

Hudson's Bay Company. Whilst the latter traded for the most part in the

regions watered by the rivers flowing into Hudson's Bay, the former

claimed for their operations the area drained by the streams running

into Lake Superior.



The North West Company of Montreal looked with no kindly eye on the

settlement of Kildonan. An agricultural colony, in close proximity to

their hunting grounds, seemed a dangerous innovation, tending to injure

the local fur trade. Accordingly it was resolved to break up the infant

colony. The Indians were told that they would assuredly be made "poor

and miserable" by the new-comers if they were allowed to proceed with

their improvements; because these would cause the buffalo to disappear.

The colonists themselves were informed of the better prospects open to

them in the Canadian settlements and were promised pecuniary help if

they would decide to move. At the same time, the peril to which they

were exposed from the alleged ill-will of the Indians was enlarged upon.

Moreover, attacks with fire-arms were made on the houses of the

colonists, and acts of pillage committed. The result was that in 1815,

the inhabitants of Kildonan dispersed, proceeding, some of them, in the

direction of Canada, and some of them northwards, purposing to make

their way to Port Nelson, and to find, if possible, a conveyance thence

back to the shores of old Scotland. Those, however, who took the

northern route proceeded only as far as the northern end of Lake

Winnipeg, establishing themselves for a time at Jack River House. They

were then induced to return to their former settlement, by Mr. Colin

Robertson, an agent of the Hudson's Bay Company, who assured them that a

number of Highlanders were coming, via Hudson's Bay, to take up land at

Kildonan. This proved to be the fact; and, in 1816, the revived colony

consisted of more than 200 persons. On annoyance being offered to the

settlement by the North West Company's agent, Mr. Duncan Cameron, who

occupied a post called Fort Gibraltar, about half a mile off, Mr. Colin

Robertson, with the aid of his Highlandmen, seized that establishment,

and recovered two field-pieces and thirty stand of arms that had been

taken from Kildonan the preceding year. Cameron himself was also made a

prisoner. (Miles Macdonell, Governor of Assiniboia, had been captured by

the said Cameron in the preceding year, and sent to Montreal.) A strong

feeling was aroused among the half-breeds, far and near, who were in the

interest of the North West Company. In the spring of 1816, Mr. Semple,

the Governor of the Hudson's Bay Company, appeared in person at the Red

River, having been apprized of the growing troubles. During an angry

conference on the 18th of June, with a band of seventy men, headed by

Cuthbert, Grant, Lacerte, Fraser, Hoole, and Thomas McKay, half-breed

employes of the North West Company, he was violently assaulted; and in

the melee he was killed, together with five of his officers and sixteen

of his people. Out of these events sprang the memorable trials that took

place in the York Court House in 1818.



The Earl of Selkirk being desirous of witnessing the progress made by

his emigrants at Red River, paid a visit to this continent in the autumn

of 1815. On arriving at New York he heard of the dispersion at Kildonan,

and the destruction of property there. He proceeded at once to Montreal

and York to consult with the authorities. The news next reached him that

his colony had been re-established, at least partially. He immediately

despatched a trusty messenger, one Lagimoniere, with assurances that he

himself would speedily be with them, bringing proper means of

protection. But Lagimoniere was waylaid and never reached his

destination.



It happened, about this time, in consequence of the peace just

established with the United States, that the De Meuron, Watteville and

Glengarry Fencible Regiments were disbanded in the country. About eighty

men of the De Meuron, with four of the late officers, twenty of the

Watteville, and a few of the Glengarry, with one of their officers,

agreed to accompany Lord Selkirk to the Red River. On reaching the

Sault, the tidings met the party of the second dispersion of the colony,

and of the slaughter of Governor Semple and his officers. The whole band

at once pushed on to Fort William, where were assembled many of the

partners of the North West Company, with Mr. McGillivray, their

principal Agent. Here were also some of the persons who had been made

prisoners at Kildonan.



Armed simply with a commission of a Justice of the Peace, Lord Selkirk

then and there, at his encampment opposite Fort William across the

Kaministigoia, issued his warrant for the arrest of Mr. McGillivray.



It is duly served and Mr. McGillivray submits. Two partners who came

over with him as bail are also instantly arrested. The prisoners had

been previously liberated and information was procured from them.



Warrants were then issued for the arrest of the remainder of the

partners, who were found in the Fort. Some resistance was now offered.

The gate of the Fort was partially closed by force; but a party of

twenty-five men instantly rushed up from the boats and cleared the way

into the Fort. At the signal of a bugle-call more men came over from

the encampment, and their approach put an end to the struggle. The

arrests were then completed, and the remaining partners were marched

down to the boats. "At the time this resistance to the warrant was

attempted there were," our authority informs us, "about 200 Canadians,

i. e., French, in the employment of the Company, in and about the

Fort, together with 60 or 70 Iroquois Indians, also in the Company's

service."



The Earl of Selkirk was plainly a man not to be trifled with; a chief

who, in the olden time, would have been equal to the roughest emergency.



The prisoners brought down from Fort William, and after the lapse of

nearly two years placed at the Bar in the Old Court House of York, were

arraigned as follows: "Paul Brown and F. F. Boucher, for the murder of

Robert Semple, Esq., on the 18th of June, 1816; John Siveright,

Alexander McKenzie, Hugh McGillis, John McDonald, John McLaughlin and

Simon Fraser, as accessories to the same crime; Cooper and Bennerman,

for taking, on the third of April, 1815, with force and arms, eight

pieces of cannon and one howitzer, the property of the Right Hon.

Thomas, Earl of Selkirk, from his dwelling house, and putting in bodily

fear of their lives certain persons found therein." The cannons were

further described as being two of them brass field-pieces, two of them

brass swivels, four of them iron swivels.--In each case the verdict was

"not guilty."



The Judges were Chief Justice Powell, Mr. Justice Campbell, Mr. Justice

Boulton, and Associate Justice W. Allan, Esq. The counsel for the Crown

were Mr. Attorney-General Robinson and Mr. Solicitor-General Boulton.

The counsel for the prisoners were Samuel Sherwood, Livius P. Sherwood,

and W. W. Baldwin, Esq.



The juries in the three trials were not quite identical. Those that

served on one or other of them are as follows:--George Bond, Joseph

Harrison, Wm. Harrison, Joseph Shepperd, Peter Lawrence, Joshua Leach,

John McDougall, jun., Wm. Moore, Alexander Montgomery, Peter Whitney,

Jonathan Hale, Michael Whitmore, Harbour Stimpson, John Wilson, John

Hough, Richard Herring.



The Earl of Selkirk was not present at the trials. He had proceeded to

New York, on his way to Great Britain. He probably anticipated the

verdicts that were rendered. The North-West Company influence in Upper

and Lower Canada was very strong.



At a subsequent Court of Oyer and Terminer held at York, a true bill

against the Earl and nineteen others was found by the Grand Jury, for

"conspiracy to ruin the trade of the North-West Company." Mr. Wm. Smith,

Under-Sheriff of the Western District, obtained a verdict of L500

damages for having been seized and confined by the said Earl when

endeavouring to serve a warrant on him in Fort William; and Daniel

McKenzie, a retired partner of the North-West Company, obtained a

verdict of L1,500 damages for alleged false imprisonment by the Earl in

the same Fort.--Two years later, namely, in 1820, Lord Selkirk died at

Pau, in the South of France.