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• Wilkins Expedition 1763, The
  On November 7, 1763, a fleet of small boats carrying nearly 700 officers and men of the 60th and 80th Regiments under Major John Wilkins was forced ashore by a violent storm about three miles east of this point. The expedition had set out from Niagara on October 19 to relieve the British post at Detroit, commanded by Major Henry Gladwin, which was then under siege by a powerful force of Indians led by Pontiac...

• London and Port Stanley Railway, The
  After the Great Western Railway reached London in 1853, local businessmen and politicians began promoting a competitive line south to Lake Erie. The London and Port Stanley Railway began operations in 1856. Like most early Canadian railways, it was expensive to build and difficult to pay off, but it contributed enormously to the local economy. Its main business was shipping coal from Pennsylvania and carrying tourists to and from the lakeshore. The City of London...

• French Settlement on the South Shore
  Windsor is the oldest known site of continuous settlement in Ontario. The government of New France, anxious to increase its presence on the Detroit River, offered land for agricultural settlement on the south shore in 1749. That summer, families from the lower St Lawrence River relocated to lots which began about 6.5 km downstream from here. Along with civilians and discharged soldiers from Fort Pontchartrain (Detroit), they formed the community of La Petite Côte. Additional...

• Honourable Alexander Grant 1734-1813, The
  Alexander Grant, son of the seventh Laird of Glenmoriston, was born in Inverness- Shire, Scotland. During the Seven Years' War he served with the Montgomery's Highlanders, eventually commanding a sloop on Lake Champlain. In 1776, Grant became Commander of the Great Lakes. This appointment, reduced to Lakes Erie, Huron, and Michigan in 1778, he held until 1812. With an estate at Grosse Pointe, Michigan, Grant served on the Land Board of the District of Hesse...

• Great Western Railway, The
  The main line of "The Great Western", from Niagara Falls through Hamilton and London to Windsor, was opened in 1854. The company extended its line from Hamilton to Toronto in 1855, from Komoka to Sarnia in 1858, and from Glencoe to Fort Erie (the "Loop Line") in 1873. "The Great Western" was an important connecting link for through traffic between railways in Michigan and New York states. This necessitated conversion from the original 5'6" gauge...

• Hull's Landing 1812
  On July 12, 1812, Brigadier-General William Hull, Commander of the North Western Army of the United States, landed with about 2,000 men near this site. He issued a proclamation stating that he came to liberate Canada from oppression. The British garrison at Amherstburg was too weak to oppose the invasion but later fought several skirmishes at the River Canard. On July 26, British reinforcements under Colonel Henry Proctor arrived and, on August 7-8, Hull withdrew to Detroit, leaving a small garrison near Sandwich which retired on August 11 at the approach of Major-General Isaac Brock.

• Jesuit Mission to the Hurons, The
  In 1728, a mission to the Huron Indians was established near Fort Pontchartrain (Detroit) by Father Armand de la Richardie, S.J. The Mission was moved to Bois Blanc Island and the adjacent mainland in 1742. In 1747 it was destroyed by disaffected Hurons and a party of Iroquois, and the next year re-established in this vicinity. The Huron Mission became the Parish of the Assumption in 1767 and was entrusted with the spiritual care of...

• William Dummer Powell 1755-1834
  The first professionally trained lawyer appointed a judge in what is now Ontario, Powell was born in Boston and educated abroad. He opened a legal practice in Montreal in 1779 and quickly gained a reputation as a brilliant advocate able to conduct cases in French and English. Powell was appointed sole presiding judge of the Court of Common Pleas here in the District of Hesse in 1789. When the district courts were abolished five years...

• Capture of the "Anne" 1838, The
  On January 9, 1838, a force of Canadians and Americans sympathizing with Mackenzie's Rebellion, sailed from United States territory and landed on Bois Blanc Island. The schooner "Anne", supporting the invasion, cruised along the Canadian mainland firing on structures near Fort Malden. Defending militia under Col. T. Radcliff returned the fire, disabling the helmsman and damaging the rigging. The "Anne" grounded on Elliott's Point and those aboard were captured. Their leader, Dr. E.A. Theller, an...

• Lieutenant-Colonel William Caldwell
  Born about 1750 in Fermanagh County, Ireland, Caldwell emigrated to Pennsylvania in 1773. During the American Revolution, he served with the British forces as a captain in Butler's Rangers at Niagara and Detroit. In 1784, he obtained land near the mouth of the Detroit River and became one of the area's earliest settlers. Caldwell's exceptional influence with the local Indians enabled him to obtain control of some 11,000 additional acres on the north shore of...

• Great Sauk Trail, The
  Part of an ancient network of Indian paths, the Great Sauk Trail, as it came to be known, extended from Rock Island in present-day Illinois to the Detroit River. It played a significant role in the communications between the native peoples in the Upper Mississippi Valley and the British in this region, particularly during the period of Anglo-American rivalry following the American Revolution. For four decades pro-British tribes such as the Sauk and the Fox...

• Philo Parsons Incident, The
  On September 19, 1864, the American steamer "Philo Parsons" was seized off Kelley's Island, about 35 miles southeast of here, by some twenty Confederate sympathizers under John Y. Beall, a Southern naval officer. The group, whose members had embarked at Sandwich and Amherstburg, Canada West, intended to free the Confederate inmates of a prison camp in Sandusky Bay, Ohio. The plan included the capture of the U.S. gunboat "Michigan" for use in commerce raiding and...

• Jack Miner 1865-1944
  A noted naturalist, John Thomas Miner was born in Dover Centre, Ohio, and in 1878 settled on this property. In 1904, he established this world-famous bird sanctuary primarily for the conservation for migrating Canada Geese and ducks. Five years later, he began banding waterfowl to determine their subsequent movements. During his life, Miner lectured extensively throughout North America on wildlife conservation. To perpetuate his work, the Jack Miner Migratory Bird Foundation was incorporated in the...

• Unitarian Universalist Church of Olinda
  The Universalist faith developed in New England in the late 1700s and reached Canada in the early 1800s. Its central doctrine of universal salvation made it more liberal and inclusive than most Christian churches of the day. Local farmer Michael Fox began organizing Universalist services in the hamlet of Olinda around 1860. Twenty-three men and women formed a congregation in 1880 and built this church the following year. It was one of six Universalist churches...

• Founding of Belle River, The
  The settlement of this area began following the survey in 1793 of the lots fronting on the Belle River, among the early settlers were many French Canadians from the vicinity of the Detroit River. When the Great Western Railway was constructed, 1852-53, a station name Belle River was opened here. By 1855 a steam grist-mill and sawmill had been erected by Luc Ouellette and others, and a community known as Rochester soon developed. It was...

• Founding of Stoney Point, The
  French-speaking settlers from the Detroit-Sandwich area and Lower Canada (Quebec) were the first to locate in Tilbury West Township after it was surveyed in 1824. They established farms along Lake St. Clair and later near the Tecumseh Road and by 1851 formed a community called Stoney Point. After the arrival of the railway in 1854, the village developed into a market and industrial centre serving an agricultural and lumbering hinterland. In 1881, Stoney Point and...

• Founding of Leamington, The
  Parts of Mersea Township were surveyed in the 1790s, but it was not until 1833 that Alexander Wilkinson, who had acquired land elsewhere in the township by 1810, obtained his patent for a lot now located in the heart of Leamington. A settlement known as Wilkinson's Corners developed and on June 1, 1854, a post office called Leamington was opened. A saw and grist-mill was in operation the following year. By 1860 the community comprised...

• Founding of Tecumseh, The
  The intersecting of the Tecumseh Road, named for the eminent Indian leader, by the Great Western Railroad line in 1854 stimulated settlement in this largely French-Canadian area. A community gradually developed, and in 1873 it contained a sawmill, several stores and hotels, and a population of about 200. The village, first called Ryegate, and later Tecumseh, evolved from a local service center to a shipping point for area timber, cordwood, and especially grain. The establishment...

• Founding of Hanover, The
  A tavern established here about 1849 by Abraham Buck provided the nucleus around which a small settlement began to develop. Strategically located at the intersection of the Durham Road and a branch of the Saugeen River, the community grew quickly as settlers, many German in origin, flocked to the area. A town plot was surveyed in 1855 and the next year the hamlet, known as Buck's Crossing, then Adamstown, was renamed Hanover. By 1867 it...

• Newash Indian Village 1842, The
  Following the Indian treaty of 1836, a Reserve along the western shore of Owen Sound was set aside for the Band headed by Chief Newash. In 1842, the Indian village of Newash, established here previous to the founding of the adjacent community of Sydenham (now Owen Sound), was rebuilt by the government. It contained fourteen log houses, a school and a barn. Wesleyan Methodist missionaries ministered to the Indians, and in 1845, a frame chapel...

• Founding of Dunnville, The
  The construction of a dam and canal designed to feed water from the Grand River to the new Welland Canal fostered the development of a settlement here during the late 1820s. A town plot, named Dunnville after John Henry Dunn, Receiver General of Upper Canada, was laid out and, following the opening of the Feeder Canal to navigation in 1829 the community thrived as a trans shipment point and industrial centre. By 1832 it contained...

• Nelles Settlement 1785, The
  After receiving lands in the Grand River in 1784, the Six Nations Indians invited Captain Hendrick Nelles, a loyalist from the Mohawk Valley, to settle there with five of his sons. He and Robert, the eldest, established farms in what is now Seneca Township and built houses in which they lived until Captain Nelles's death in 1791 and Robert's removal to Grimsby. Their grants, confirmed in 1787, were later changed to 999-year leases and John...

• Lieutenant Charles Davidson Dunbar, D.C.M. 1870-1939
  An internationally renowned piper, Dunbar was born in Halkirk, Scotland. In 1886 he joined the British army, embarking upon a distinguished career as a military piper. During the Boer War, Dunbar was wounded while piping troops into battle. For his gallantry he was awarded the Distinguished Conduct Medal. In 1911 he emigrated to Hamilton where he soon joined the 91st (later the Argyll and Sutherland) Highlanders. As pipe-major of the 19th Battalion, he saw action...

• Hamilton Central Public School
  This school, built to accommodate 1,000 students, was the largest graded school in Upper Canada, and became the only public school in Hamilton at the time of its opening in 1853. Among the earliest examples of an institution inspired by the reforms of Egerton Ryerson, the province's chief superintendent of education (1844-76), it incorporated his scheme of an integrated, rational and graduated public education system based upon a central school and primary feeders. The building's...

• George Hamilton 1787-1836
  Born at Queenston, George Hamilton was the son of a prosperous merchant, the Hon. Robert Hamilton. He followed his father's career as a merchant in the Niagara District until the War of 1812, in which he served as a Captain of Light Dragoons. In 1815 Hamilton acquired land here at the Head of the Lake, laid out a village plot and sold lots. When the settlement was chosen as the administrative centre of the Gore...

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