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Hosted by Ned and Sonia Shillington
By Clifford Howard Shillington
*Chapter III
The Thomas Shillington Family in Canada
Emigration to Canada
An old handwritten record relates that the Thomas Shillington family came to Canada by sailboat and were seven weeks at sea. While their experiences on this trip are unknown it can be surmised that they were similar to many other families migrating to Canada at that time, some of the experiences of which are related by E. C. Gullet in his book The Great Migration.
The main reason for migration to Canada at this particular time relates to the wish of the British government to establish settlers in the Ottawa Valley. The "Saga of Carleton County " reports on this as follows:
While the war (1812-1814) was still being waged the British government was thinking about the defense of the thinly defended settlement of loyal British stock north of the St.Lawrence and north of the Rideau. To populate this it was decided to bring in, on a selected basis, a stable element of assisted British settlers. It was suggested that all males should be potential militia who could be used to assist in the defence of the colony.
Another history record, "A Pioneer History of the County of Lanark" reports:
At the close of the war 1812-14,the British government was faced with two major problems, unemployment and industrial depression at home and an uneasy peace with the Americans abroad. Upper Canada was still vulnerable to invasion and it was thought the interior should be settled as a strong line of defence against further hostilities.
An immigration scheme was put into effect to settle the great wilderness north and west of the Rideau river which flowed into the Ottawa. The land which was purchased from the Chippewa and Missagisauga tribes included the present townships of Bathurst, Drummond, Beckwith and Goulbourn, It was part of the Precambrian shield, oldest rock in the world and only some of it was fit for agriculture. The remainder grew timber and much of it was swamp and rocky hillock.
To obtain the necessary settlers the British Government offered special incentives to both the discharged soldier settlers and to the non-military groups. Besides free or low cost transportation, each head of family received an axe, shovel, hoe, scythe, knife, hammer, saw, kettle, nails, putty, 12 panes of glass, 2 files and sharpening stone. Each man was allotted one hundred acres of land which had to be proved up.
The end of the war found a large force of British troops already in the country and these were to form the bulwark for the planned new settlements. A large number of the officers and men of the 99th and 100th regiments were discharged and given land grants and other help as mentioned and thereafter became the nucleus of the Military Settlements of Perth and Richmond. The members of the old 100th regiment were directed to the Perth area while those of the 99th were settled in the newly established military district of Richmond. All told, more than 400 officers and men received such grants.
As mentioned, it had been recommended and approved that a new military settlement be established somewhere between Perth and Ottawa (Bytown in those days). A site was selected on what is now known as the Jock River and given the name Richmond in honour of the Duke of Richmond who was arriving in Canada to take over as Governor-General. While the discharged soldiers of the 99th were waiting at Lachine, Quebec, for the opening up of a road to Richmond and completion of the military settlement, other events were taking place.
A party of 300 Scottish farmers, under the direction of John Robertson of Breadalbane, Scotland, arrived in Canada from Perthshire, desiring to settle in the Beckwith-Goulbourn area. These independent immigrants had made their own arrangements for emigration with the Earl of Bathurst. They paid their own passage to Quebec and were to be conveyed thereafter to their land at the expense of government. After landing at Quebec City they were brought down river to Lachine and up to Bellows Point on the Ottawa River, at the foot of Chaudiere Falls. It was at this location (now a part of Ottawa) where the families remained while the menfolk blazed a trail about 60 miles in length through the woods. During these weeks it is a matter of record that these settlers suffered much hardship through sickness, fire and loss of luggage. Eventually, however, a trail was cleared to enable them to trudge through the woods carrying their belongings.
Most of those arriving were from Loch Earn and Loch Tay and other neighboring parishes. Each head of family deposited ten pounds as security and the terms of their arrangement required the Colonial Office to provide land grants of 100 acres to each member or family head. Interesting to Shillington descendants is the record which shows that among the three hundred settlers mostly from Scotland, there was a small contingent of Irish settlers from northern Ireland, After much research of the existing records I have come to the conclusion that among this small group of Irish settlers, was Thomas Shillington and his family. The embarkation point for sailing was Greenock, where after a lengthy delay for suitable winds, they set sail on three ships, the Jane , the Sophia and the brig, Curlew , in the spring of the year 1818.
Most of the eastern section of Beckvith, known as The Derry, so called after a similar spot in Scotland, was largely settled by this group of immigrants. Others took up land in an area near the Township of Montague, known as "The Cuckoo's Nest”, lying between the fifth and sixth concessions in Beckwith Township and on the western fringes of Goulbourn Township which was still part of Beckwith and not organized into a separate township until after the arrival of these settlers. For a history of Goulbourn County see their website . While the Perthshire settlers had battled their way through the woods from the Ottawa River landing to the land of their choice, the discharged soldiers due to settle at Richmond, were still waiting at Lachine for the completion of that road and military settlement base. Eventually the first of the discharged soldiers began to arrive in August and by November, Colonel Cockburn was able to report to the Duke of Richmond that a very good road had now been built from the Bay below the Chaudiere Falls to the village now known as Richmond. By November, four hundred families had been located at this new settlement.
Cockburn had also linked the depots
of Richmond and Perth with a bush road which followed the 4th concession
line of Beckwith as far west as the centre of the township (now the
road linking Frank!own and Richmond). Here it turned south to third
line to Gillies Corners thence south-west to Drummond and thereafter
to Perth,
In the Ottawa Archives there is a document, Richmond
Military Settlement dated November 30th, 1821, giving a list of persons
entitled to grants of lands having performed the terms of their settlement.
This list contains over six hundred names of first families located
in Beckwith and Goulbourn, among which is Shillington.
THOMAS SHILLINGTON
From all available records it is generally accepted that Thomas, who with a part of his family, left his home in northern Ireland to emigrate to Canada in 1818, was the first of the Shillington families to come to the new world of the North American continent. We are not sure as to the reasons he may have had for choosing to do so. Possibly it was the challenge and opportunity promised. Who knows?
As the record shows, he acquired land which he farmed for more than twenty years, during which time son John was born. In 1840,at the age of 63 years he died, leaving John, at the age of 17 years, to run the farm and look after his mother, the widow Barbara. It was only a few months after this that John married Ann Kerfoot and together they farmed and took care of Barbara until her death in 1870,at the age of 90 years.
From an ancient Atlas of Carleton County there is a record showing that the Shillingtons, along with certain other of their neighbors from back home, settled in a location almost in the middle of what subsequently became Goulbourn Township in Carleton County, Ontario, Canada. Historical records tell us that Thomas Shillington was born in County Tyrone in 1777 and married Barbara Robinson of Portadown in 1798. The same records indicate that there were four sons and six daughters in the family but not all are known to us. Those recorded as coming to Canada in 1818, include Thomas, his wife, Barbara, a son, James, and two daughters, Nancy Ann and Barbara. The Shillingtons, along with their neighbors were eventually able to secure a post office which was named Munster, the area back home from where some had immigrated.The OttawaArchives contain records of land grants to both Thomas and his son, James.
In reference to Thomas, there is a petition, dated 18th,March 1828, asking that the Order-in-Council, dated 24th February, 1824, granting a deed to Thomas Shillington of NE 1/2 of Lot 12,Concession 5 of the Township of Goulbourn. be corrected to read NE 1/2of Lot 13. This homestead land of Thomas' was eventually turned over to his son John, who lived his lifetime there and founded a dynasty of his own, among whom the author of this record is a great grandson.
Among those settling in the general area was the Kerfoot family who arrived in 1819 and whose old family home, built in 1823 or thereabouts, was known as the Cuckoo's Nest from the name given to the community.
This family and the Shillingtons who arrived a year earlier were to subsequently forge a family link which has since been ably recorded in the Kerfoot History.
LIVING CONDITIONS
For those early Shillington pioneers, life was difficult, with the settlements being buried deep in the forest and far from any larger towns. The home, itself, was usually a crude cabin of thick logs, earthen floors and stone fireplaces. Land clearing was a laborious process of drawing out the huge stumps by oxen and later by a stump puller. The hoe was used to plant potatoes, which, among the stumps, was usually the first food crop to survive. A wooden drag covered the hand sown grain which was harvested with a "cradle" and collected into stocks by the women, after which, the grain was threshed with a flail on the barn floor. The settlers made most of their own clothes, shoes, furniture and cooking utensils. Their main foods were, maple sugar, syrup, honey, berries, wheat, oats, turnips and potatoes, plus such wild fowl and animals as they were able to shoot, trap or raise for themselves.
Rev.John May has written:
Imagine what it was for men who had never swung an axe to attack that dense jungle of brushwood, that endless array of huge tree trunks. But by chopping they learned to chop. The novice hacked the tree all around and it fell where it would. Lives were lost in felling trees. The second generation were fine axe men; today good ones are scarce. The great felled trees and the resultant cleared space constituted the material and the site of the settler's first log cabin or shanty. It had the earliest type of roof, of scoope basswood. The chinks between the logs were stuffed at first with moss and bark. Later the settler would burn his own lime from the rocks and mix the powder for a mortar with which the chinks were then plastered.
Barn raisings were a popular and often rowdy part of community life. There were also the corn huskings and apple bees and above all, the hoedowns, where the songs and music of back home days were sung with gusto. Religion and Methodism in particular, played an important role because of the itinerant backwoods preachers who struggled through storms in winter and bad roads in summer to bring the message. Camp meetings were an important event and provided an outlet for pent-up emotions in what, otherwise, were often lonely lives.
In spite of the problems, an extract of a letter by Andrew Bell at Perth in 1819 states:
The three townships (Bathurst, Drumnond, and Beckwith) are all settled. The Richmond settlement, a new one formed to the northeast of us (Groulbourn township) is flourishing. I like the place extremely well and we were never in better health nor happier in our life than we are now.
Unfortunately, in 1870,the Goulbourn hall was burned down and most of the existing records of the area up to that time, were destroyed.
Generation II
James and His Descendants
James (# 7) was born in Ireland and accompanied his parents to Canada. Whether or not he was the oldest son is unknown. As a matter of history it is believed that he had an older brother Thomas, who did not accompany the family. Like his father, James filed on land in the area and was granted the East ½ of Lot 19, 5th concession, which, according to Archive records, was near that of Thomas in District 7 of the future Township of Goulbourn. Here, he married Eliza Kerfoot and raised his family and made, during his time, a notable contribution to his community. He is recorded as having been one of the trustees of the first grammar school in the area. Later, in 1850,he was a member of the first Council of the Township of Goulbourn. He died in 1867,the year of Canada's birth, and was buried in the 5th line cemetery on the old Thomas Shillington homestead. His wife died six months later and is buried beside him. The old James Shillington log home survived until the 1950's. The host of this website, Ned Shillington remembers seeing it when he accompanied his parents (#120) in 1952 to the Goulbourn area. Unhappily, when he returned in 1987 it had been torn down after to make way for a sewage lagoon.
Quick Links
This site maintained by:
Ned Shillington
1501, 750-5th Street S.E.
Calgary, Alberta
T2G 5B4
403-262-7527
Email:ned@shillington.org;