Saint Croix Courier, St. Stephen, NB
July 12, 1894
GLIMPSES OF THE PAST
Contributions to the History of Charlotte County and the Border Towns.
CXXIV – OTHER LOYALISTS.
Captain Joseph Ferris,1 according to Sabine, was born at Stamford, Conn. He raised a company, joined Col. Butler, and was a captain in the Rangers. After the peace he went to Newfoundland; but returned to New Brunswick, where he settled. He lived at Moose Island while it was held by the British, during the war of 1812, but left there on its surrender to the United States. He died at Indian Island in 1836, aged ninety-two.
Captain Christopher Hatch, of the Loyal American regiment, commanded by Col. Beverly Robinson, was another half-pay officer who came to Passamaquoddy. He was a grantee of Parr Town, but went into mercantile business at Campobello. On his return to St. John, he sold to Thos. Henderson, a lieutenant of the same regiment, a stone house and a wharf at Snug Cove. Capt. Hatch finally settled at St. Andrews, where he died in 1819. The late H. H. Hatch, registrar of deeds, was his grandson.
Lieut. Henderson was a customs officer at Campobello. He died at St. Andrews in 1828.
Captain Nathan Frink was also a grantee of St. John, from which place he came to Campobello, thence removing to St. Andrews, and afterwards to St. Stephen. He was a native of Pomfret, Conn. He became a captain in the King’s Loyal American Dragoons, and was afterwards aide-de-camp to General Arnold. Capt. Frink was educated for the bar. His wife, Hester Cuyler, was a descendant of one of the old families of New York who worshipped at Trinity church. On their first coming to St. John, (where Capt. Frink had a grant of four lots on the Carleton side of the harbor,) they occupied a log house with Commissary Davis, grandfather of the wife of the late Joseph Howe, governor of Nova Scotia. Here was born, in February, 1784, their first child, Lucy, the mother of Mrs. W. T. Rose, of St. Stephen. Captain Frink was a magistrate in St. Stephen, and was in receipt of a pension of £200 stg. per annum. He died in 1817 at the age of 60. His wife, Hester, survived him, and enjoyed half pension until her death in 1829. Three of their children were buried at St. Andrews in 1796; descendants of the others reside in this province and in New Haven and New York. The only sister of Captain Frink remained in the old colonies and became the wife of Schuyler Putnam, youngest son of General Israel Putnam.
Another St. Andrews Loyalist who was not a grantee of land in the county was Joseph Garnett, first vestry clerk at St. Andrews, and also for some years registrar of deeds. Ward Chipman says of him, in a letter of introduction dated 18 Dec., 1789:-
This will be handed to you by Mr. Garnett, a Gentleman of St. Andrews, Passamaquoddy, in this Province, formerly an officer in the British American Forces, who goes home to solicit half pay, which by neglect of his friends has not been secured to him. His merit, sufferings and services are such as justly intitle him to the most favorable notice of Government.
Mr. Garnett went to Sissiboo, N. S., leaving provision for his family in St. Andrews; but returned, and, according to Sabine, died in St. Andrews in 1801.
Hugh McKay, a lieutenant in the Queen’s Rangers, served throughout the war. He was a native of Scotland, and, Sabine says, was ‘distinguished for his urbanity and gentlemanly bearing.’ He died in St. George, in 1848, at the age of 97, having served as a member of the provincial assembly for more than thirty years, and held the offices of colonel of militia and senior justice of the court of common pleas.
Jacob Maybee, a New York Loyalist, died at St. Stephen about 1820.
Jonathan Wallace, one of the first of the loyal refugees, died at St. George in 1840, aged 89 years.
Joseph Garrison died at Deer Island in 1819.
Abijah Garrison, his brother, (son of Joseph Garrison who is said to have discovered the coal at Grand Lake,) married Fanny Lloyd, of Deer Island. Their youngest son, William Lloyd Garrison, born at Newburyport, Mass., in 1805, was the famous advocate of the abolition of slavery.
James Smith, a captain in the war, settled at Grand Manan, and died there in 1836, at the age of 87.
Even among the Quaker colonists of Pennfield there were military men. Gideon Vernon was captain of a Loyalist corps in Pennsylvania; and Evan Thomas, also of Pennsylvania, commanded a company of Loyalists called the Bucks County Volunteers.
Henry Barlow Brown, a Loyalist, was for many years registrar of deeds for Charlotte. His son, Thomas Storrow Brown, born in St. Andrews, was an author of some note.
Two Loyalist clergymen were stationed in this county: Rev. Samuel Andrews, first rector of St. Andrews, whose charge for many years included the whole county, and Rev. Richard Clarke, first rector of St. Stephen. A sketch of the life and work of each belongs properly to history of church work in Charlotte, for which the church records and the S. P. G. reports furnish abundant material, and which may at some future time find a place in these columns.
1Not to be confounded with Captain Ferrell of article xlii.
CORRECTIONS AND ADDITIONS.
Article cx.-In the paragraph following the second letter, the date ‘May, 1776,’ should be ‘May, 1767.’
Article cxiii.-The first sentence of the third paragraph should read: ‘Matthew Thornton, the nephew, was born in New Hampshire in December, 1746, and was therefore about thirty years of age at the time of the Revolution.’ In the paragraph before the last, ‘at the age of 95’ should be erased.
Article cxxii.-The paragraph before the last should read: ‘Since they had been on the island twenty years, as stated in their memorial, if not all Loyalists, they must have gone there at the time of the Loyalist settlement or earlier.’
To these notes of the Loyalist settlers of Charlotte, necessarily disconnected and incomplete, we shall be glad to add at any time such further facts as may be brought to our notice.
Notes of errors or omissions in any part of the series will be gratefully received by the writer.
J. VROOM