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• Founding of Cornwall, The
  In June 1784, disbanded Loyalist soldiers and their families settled at New Johnstown, the site of present-day Cornwall. Initially called Pointe Maligne, the area had been visited by native traders and French missionaries and explorers during the 17th and early 18th centuries. In 1794, Cornwall was designated a judicial and administrative centre for the Eastern District and by 1805 contained a courthouse, a schoolhouse, two churches and numerous dwellings. The community grew gradually and was...

• Glengarry Fencibles, The
  The regiment of Glengarry Light Infantry Fencibles was raised in 1811-12 largely from among the Highland settlers of this region, many of whom had served previously in Europe with the Glengarry (British Highland) Fencibles. The Canadian corps was recruited through the efforts of Major George Richard John Macdonell ("Red George") assisted by the Rev. Alexander Macdonell (later Upper Canada's first Roman Catholic Bishop) who served as its chaplain. The regiment was taken on the regular...

• Colonel Darby Bergin, 1826-1896
  Bergin was born in York (Toronto) and received his medical degree from McGill College in Montreal. He practised medicine in Cornwall, where he also assisted at a local typhus hospital. He later worked with the Mohawks of Akwesasne during a devastating smallpox outbreak. Bergin was elected Member of Parliament in 1872. He was a passionate and early advocate for rural affairs, public health and social justice. His innovative efforts and political appeals to improve workplace...

• Flying Frenchmen, The
  Professional hockey was in its infancy in the autumn of 1909 when the promoters behind the National Hockey Association, forerunner of the National Hockey League, created the Montreal Canadiens team to attract French-Canadian spectators. Belleville-born Jean-Baptiste "Jack" Laviolette was hired as the playing-manager and captain. Laviolette signed Cornwall's Édouard "Newsy" Lalonde to play forward and recruited his friend Didier "Cannonball" Pitre from the Renfrew Creamery Kings ('Renfrew Millionaires') as a defenceman. This trio of francophone...

• Cornwall Grammar School
  Cornwall Collegiate and Vocational School traces its beginning to an educational institution founded by John Strachan in 1803. Strachan, an Anglican priest, opened a private school in his home where he hoped to educate young men to take on leading roles in society. In 1806 he built a schoolhouse that became one of the first provincially funded district grammar schools one year later. Many of Upper Canada's elite received their education under Strachan's respected and...

• French Presence in Cornwall, The
  A vital cultural force in eastern Ontario, the Franco-Ontarian community in Cornwall was established during the late 1870s when large-scale industrial expansion led to an influx of workers and tradesmen from Quebec. By 1881 French-speaking residents comprised the largest single cultural group in the town. Supported by a number of religious and scholastic institutions, including l'Église de la Nativité de la Bienheureuse Vierge Marie, the Francophone community grew steadily in the decades that followed. Increasingly...

• Captain Samuel Anderson 1736-1836
  This property formed part of the extensive lands granted to Capt. Samuel Anderson, U.E.L., one of the first persons to settle on the site of Cornwall. Born in New England of Irish parents, he served with the British forces during the Seven Years War. At the outbreak of the American Revolution Anderson was imprisoned by the rebels after he had refused a commission in the Continental Army. He escaped in 1776 and was appointed a captain in the 1st Battalion K.R.R.N.Y. He became a justice of the peace for this area in 1785 and later served as the first judge of the Eastern District.

• District Court House and Gaol 1833
  The central portion of this building was completed in 1833 and served as the court-house and gaol of the Eastern District. First named Luneburgh, this district was established in 1788 by proclamation. In 1794 an Act of the Legislative Assembly of Upper Canada authorized the magistrates of the District Court of Quarter Sessions to erect a court-house and gaol at Cornwall. A two-storey frame structure was completed on this site about 1802 and, until destroyed...

• Reverend John Strachan in Cornwall, The
  This pioneer clergyman, legislator and teacher was born in 1778 in Aberdeen, Scotland and, in 1799, came to Kingston as a tutor. In 1803, after entering the Church of England, he was ordained and appointed missionary at Cornwall. Here, in 1804-05, he built its first Anglican Church. Shortly afterwards, he opened a boys' school, which became renowned for its high academic standards and eminent graduates. In 1812, he became Rector of York (Toronto), and subsequently...

• Lost Villages of the St. Lawrence
  Construction of the St. Lawrence Seaway required the flooding of 20,000 acres along the Canadian shoreline between Iroquois and Cornwall. Some of these lands had been settled by loyalists in the 1780s. Between 1955 and 1957, 6,500 residents were relocated, many of them to the new communities of Ingleside and Long Sault. Work crews moved buildings to new sites and re-routed highways and railway tracks. Iroquois and part of Morrisburg were rebuilt on higher ground...