The tale of Peter Smith, Esquire.

To join Butler's Rangers you had to be good at tracking, know how to survive weeks in the bush, and like wearing buckskin pants. Peter Smith was 23 years old and living in Vermont when war broke out. He was one of the first to make his way to Fort Niagara to sign up with Butler's Rangers, the most active and successful British regiment during the American Revolution, made up entirely of loyal colonists. In 1778 Smith was a private in Captain John McDonell's company (later first Speaker of the House in Upper Canada's first parliament). By the end of the war he'd been promoted to sergeant under Captain Peter Ten Broeck. It was a violent frontier war. When it ended, Butler's Rangers turned into settlers. Peter Smith could not return home. Connections to fellow soldiers turned into important business relationships, and he chose the right men to work with from the beginning. Richard Cartwright of Kingston, also associated with Butler's Rangers, received the lucrative army supply contract for Upper Canada in partnership with Robert Hamilton of Queenston. Cartwright and Hamilton's huge warehouse supplied not only the British forts but most of the merchants and traders in the province as well. There were almost 4,000 new settlers on the St. Lawrence. Around the other side, at the head of the lake, settlers were filling in Niagara to Queenston. They all needed supplies. Merchants supplied by Cartwright and Hamilton need no longer travel by boat to Montreal for inventory. Peter Smith went into partnership around 1783 with Cartwright's cousin, Richard Beasley, about 10 years younger than him.
Smith had land on the Bay of Quinte and in Kingston but he made his living trading at the mouth of the Ganaraska River from 1784-1790. He built a cabin as both home and trading post and lived here as the only white man among the Mississauga, fluent in the native language. The "peltries" he took back by canoe to Kingston for supplies. There were peddlar traders, but Peter Smith was operating as a gentleman trader, established, respected and well connected. The Smith's Creek land was not owned by the British crown. It was Indian hunting grounds, not eligible to be granted to settlers. After long negotiations an Indian Treaty was signed in August 1788 at Pemedash Wationg Landing - Port Hope. The chief specifies in the treaty that land be given to their friend the trader who has always treated them well. They even marked out with stakes the land they wanted Peter Smith to have. If the surveys had indeed been done soon after the treaty, Peter Smith would've been our first settler, as Harold Reeve points out in The History of the Township of Hope. Beasley and Smith petitioned for land at Pemedash Wationg Landing and Toronto in 1789, but it was not granted for lack of a survey. By 1789 the excellent hunters and trappers of the 300 Rice Lake Mississauga made Smith's Creek the most lucrative fur trading post on the north shore between Kingston and Queenston. Toronto was just thick wilderness with the ruins of the old French fort and a trading post. Young Lawrence Herkimer took over and Peter Smith moved to the centre of the action.
Kingston, certainly the commercial centre of the new province in 1791, expected to be named the capital of Upper Canada. Smith obtained a prime piece of property on the lakefront perfect for import and export to Montreal. On Kingston's grand occasion of the swearing in of Lt. Governor Simcoe at St. George's Church, on July 8, 1792 all the finery of the province was displayed. Robert Hamilton came in from Queenston. Richard Cartwright in breeches and silver buckled shoes, Captain Han Jost Herkimer, Commodore Jean Baptiste Bouchette in his gold braid uniform, and his son Captain Joseph Bouchette were all resplendent. Both Cartwright and Hamilton had been appointed to Upper Canada's first Executive Council in lieu of elections.
Peter Smith's name is in the minutes of their very first meeting when he was given permission to erect a wharf, quay and build a storehouse at Kingston. He had arrived. At 42 years old he finally married Ann Cook of Kingston. Settlers were finding some yield from successful farming and Smith began to export. Cartwright wrote May 14, 1801, "Smith has even sent to bring up Boats (from Montreal) with three men in each to carry down his Flour". His keen business sense led Peter Smith, the trader of Smith's Creek, to wealth in later life. The elite of Kingston purchased the Kingston Gazette in the fiery days just before the war of 1812. Among them: the Hon. Richard Cartwright, Lawrence Herkimer, esq. and Peter Smith, esq. In his later years Peter Smith was named justice of the peace and magistrate. He was one of the Kingstonians seeking authorization to incorporate a bank in Upper Canada. To facilitate trade, Smith was an investor in a daring venture to design and build the province's first steamboat, the Frontenac. His son, David John Smith, was a lawyer in Kingston with the young Scot, John A. Macdonald. And there's always another local connection: Peter Smith's daughter Janel married Donald Bethune, of Cobourg, brother of the Rector at St. Peter's, A. N. Bethune later Archbishop of York. Bethune's nephew was Dr. Norman Bethune the great physician and national hero of China. Peter Smith lived in a time when the commercial empire of the St Lawrence was built into a provincial economy, starting with fur trade. Smith's Creek was called by his name for 30 years after he left. In fact there's a fire map in the Ganaraska Archives dated 1901 that still labels the river Smith's Creek. We've found no picture of Peter Smith yet, but when he died at 75 years old, on Aug. 15, 1826, the Kingston paper called him "a fine specimen of an English gentleman" who "carried with him evidence that he was no stranger to good dinners, and understood the qualities of good wine."

First Loyalist families settle near trading post.

Two hundred and ten years ago our first five families arrived from different places but all for the same reason — the American Revolution. Two came by way of Nova Scotia, another two gave up hoping to return to the States, and one family came directly from the new American republic. The families of Myndert Harris and Lawrence Johnston had lived near each other in Nova Scotia since the British lost the war. Both men had joined the British army, were captured by the rebels and exiled. On April 26, 1783 alone, 7,000 loyalists were evacuated from the docks of New York City. Myndert Harris was the eldest son of 14 children of Joseph Harris and Annetje Viele. His unusual first name came from his mother's family. She was one of hundreds of descendants of Dutch pioneers who gave rise to the spelling of Dutchess County where Myndert was born. Annetje Harris' ancestor had been the first white settler on Long Island, later New Amsterdam, in 1636, so Harris descendants have been in North America for a remarkable 375 years. Myndert and his wife Polly Youmans had a young family when Patrick Henry stood and said "give me liberty or give me death" in March 1775. After joining the British, Harris was captured and thrown in patriot prison where he remained until his father ransomed him for the enormous sum of 1,000 pounds. Exiled after the war, disbanded loyalist regiments started over, farming side by side in Nova Scotia. But the land at Annapolis was too rocky to support Harris' growing family after a decade of trying. A new Governor had arrived to organize Upper Canada and his neighbour Captain Jonathan Walton was settling an entire township with Montreal merchant Elias Smith. They liked the sound of the Township of Hope. Transporting his family would be costly, but Harris made a deal with Captain Walton: sweat for safe passage. Harris would complete all the settlers' duties on Walton's land grants in Hope, as well as his own. Clearing untouched forest, a road in the frontage, fencing and a log building, which would gain Walton the final deed, in return for transport for his family from Nova Scotia to Smith's Creek by way of Newark. In his history book, Harold Reeve relates stories of Harris building the first wheeled cart for Herkimer to take supplies north to Rice Lake, and of wrestling a bear with his, ahem, bare hands. Lawrence Johnson was corporal in a loyalist regiment when he was taken prisoner. He was sent back to Pennsylvania where he came from, to rebel prison where he remained for the duration. A message went with him to the officer in charge: "Lawrence Johnson is an impudent determined villain, undoubtedly in the service of the enemy. If you examine him, you will find him to be one of the greatest liars you have ever met." After the war years he rejoined his family and prepared to evacuate. Johnson was a tall spare man, with considerable physical strength, great powers of endurance, sharp witted, clever with his tongue and with the remarkable power of rapid decision in emergencies. All rather good qualities for a settler in the wilderness bur Johnson and his family didn't stay in Smith's Creek more than a few years. He never did pay for his family's passage from Nova Scotia and Phyllis White uncovered the July 1799. records which shows Elias Smith and Jonathan Walton took Johnson to court in York to sue him for the 66 pounds 8 pence fare. He seems to have been trying out living on Yonge Street at the time but the Johnson family settled in Long Point, Norfolk County. Many in this well documented settlement came after some years in Nova Scotia, including the ancestors of Egerton Ryerson, the founder of public education. The Ashford and Stevens families may have been related. Both were from Dutchess County, like the Harrises, but they didn't go to Nova Scotia. Instead these two couples with their young children struggled through the deep forests of New York to Fort Niagara after the war. They waited at the head of the lake expecting yearly to hear they could return to the lands they had abandoned back home. After 10 years of waiting it was clear they needed to find explore other options. Ashford descendants report that Nathaniel Sr. died before they could find a new place to settle. Ann Graham Ashford decided to board Captain Bouchette's gunboat anyway and homestead with her children. The widow later married Abraham Hager-mar of Hamilton Township. James Stevens, about 32 years old when the settlers landed in 1793, was the tallest man in the township. His Oath of Allegiance to the crown on June 29, 1801 states he has black hair and stood 6-foot-2. The night the family moved to their own land grant, Mrs. Stevens gave birth to the first white child born in the Township of Hope, Simeon Stevens, who later married Elizabeth Goheen. The story is told that the birth was under a tree and when the land was sold, it was specified the tree could never be cut down. Less is known about the Haskills who were the fifth of the first families to carve a settlement out of Smith's Creek. Unlike the other first settlers Nathaniel Haskill had joined the patriots in the War of Independence, sons of the American Revolution. He was about 38 years old when the first settlers arrived, but not likely aboard the gunboat. One of the Haskills was hired to help Peter Harris drive the cattle from Newark to Smith's Creek through the narrow forest trail so they'd have some livestock. No easy task. The area seems to have been to Nathaniel's liking and the rest of the family met him here. Sons Will and Jed were of age to petition for land in their own right by 1801 and they also swore an Oaths of Allegiance. Nathaniel Haskill, 5-foot-7 with light brown hair, and Abigail Sawyer, his wife, were the first family of many to follow from Dorset, Vermont. On June 8, 1793 the first families landed at Smith's Creek, "27 souls" Elias Smith wrote. They stood on the shore of Lake Ontario watching the gunboat sails grow smaller, all their possessions at their feet in cloth bags. Behind them was solid, silent forest. No log cabin for 50 miles in any direction. They would have to rely on each other to survive their first year in the Township of Hope. The children and grandchildren of the Haskills, Stevens, Ashfords and Harrises remained at Smith's Creek - their descendants live here still. The Harris family got together in 1993 to celebrate the 200th anniversary of the arrival of Myndert and Polly Harris, but neither the town nor township have ever celebrated the landing.

Native families encountered at landing.

The signs on the way into town say "founded 1789" so why is a June event planned to celebrate the 1793 landing of the first settlers 210 years ago? Which is it? Both, actually. Peter Smith, the fur trader, had a permanent fur trading post here by 1789. It was a one-room log cabin store that he also slept in. A letter in the Ontario Archives written Aug. 2, 1790 from Kingston by Thomas Markland to Robert Macaulay says "Mr. McGill has informed you of an order which I sent down for Mr. Herkimer for the Port of Pemitescoutiang, which was bought of Smith after your departure." James McGill in Montreal brought in goods from England and sold them to traders in exchange for pelts - in fact the university which began with his bequest was "built by fur packs." Pemetescoutiang was Port Hope's second known name. The earlier name "Ganaraske" dates back to one of the earliest map of Ontario in 1652. Kingston was a wholesale shipping stop between Montreal and Burlington Bay. Smith's Creek was an easy stop in between. No documents have surfaced yet as to the exact year Smith arrived but 1789 is the earliest confirmed year. "Founded in 1789" refers to the first non-native resident, although he was here for the business. It was a small world then. Smith, Macaulay and Markland had all been involved in the commissary trade during the American Revolution when selling food to the British army would make you rich. When the war ended in 1783 they parlayed their skill into setting up and supplying trading posts and selling the fur pelts back to England through McGill and Todd. Peter Smith became an integral part of the community at Pemetescoutiang. In the first Treaty talks of 1788, the Ojibway asked for land for the trader Smith, as he had always been fair. They even staked out the land he should have, but no land was being granted yet between Quinte and Burlington Bay. Peter Smith would have been our first actual settler if he had received land then. As it was, he wasn't officially informed the land wasn't his for six years, in June, 1793 when Elias Smith and Jonathan Walton were confirmed as the patentees of Hope Township. Peter J. Smith was the son of James Smith, esquire, a Judge of the Court of Common Pleas in Dutchess county, New York - so named after the New Amsterdam Dutch. In his land petition for land in Quinte, July 30, 1789, Smith's father says "at the commencement of the late unhappy dissention in America, your Memorialist discharging his duties in that office by endeavouring to put a stop to the unlawful proceedings and executions of an unruly Mob was most inhumanely abused and partlly lost the use of his right hand your Memorialist had been tarred and feathered in the basest manner they could effect". A newspaper of the day confirms "last Saturday night" (September 1775) Judge Smith was carted off five or six miles in the country and "very handsomely tarred & feathered for acting in contempt of the committee." The patriots' Safety Committee had taken all the arms of the loyalists. Judge Smith jailed a committee member and returned the loyalists' arms to them "which enraged the people so much that they rose and rescued the prisoner, and poured out their resentment on this villainous retailer of the law." Judge Smith was jailed by the patriots and suffered on board prisonships for the first three years of the war. Eventually he got behind British lines in New York where he raised a company with Col. Abraham Cuyler's corps. James Smith was the first settler at Port Trent, now Trenton. He had moved to Carrying Place, Bay of Quinte when Peter petitioned in 1798 to have his father's land confirmed as he was an old man and hadn't yet received his patent. Peter was only 23 years old when his father was jailed as a loyalist. He eventually became a Lieutenant in the King's American Regiment during the Revolution and his name appears in association with the British commis-sary department in the Carleton papers. It appears he was a sharp busi-nessman from the beginning. Although we don't know what the J. stands for, it fortunately distin-guishes his signature so we can follow him. He moved to Kingston after sell-ing his post to Herkimer and became a wealthy businessman. His land ran from behind present day Kingston City Hall all the way down to the lake where he had a quay. When he died in 1826 at age 75 Peter Smith left more than 5,600 acres between Hope and Kingston to his widow and 8 children. His son, David John, born in Kingston in 1796, became a lawyer in the same office as young John A. Macdonald, and his daughter Janet married Rev. A. N. Bethune and lived in Cobourg.

On June 8, 1793 there were more than 50 native families encamped at Pemetescoutiang for the fishing. Native families had lived seasonally on the banks of the Ganaraska for hundreds of years. The first settlers arrived in 1793, but the first year-long residents were the fur traders, there by 1789.