Neville Trueman, the Pioneer Preacher : a tale of the war of 1812

by W. H. Withrow

CHAPTER XIV.

TORONTO OF OLD.

The state of religion in Canada could not be expected to be prosperous during the prevalence of the demoralizing influences of war. The Methodist circuit work, as well as the work of other denominations, was very much disorganized. It was, from the interruption of intercourse caused by the unnatural conflict, without any supervision of the American Conference by which the Canadian preachers had been stationed. They were consequently left to their own resources to carry on their work as best they could, and most of them struggled bravely, like Neville Trueman, the example we have selected for illustration, against the various obstacles in their way—the recklessness and spiritual indifference begotten by the war—and the unjust and cruel suspicions and aspersions to which they were themselves subject.

The Rev. Henry Ryan, as Presiding Elder of the Upper Canada District—extending from the banks of the St. Lawrence to the banks of the St. Clair—endeavoured, by frequent journeyings throughout the vast field, to encourage both preachers and people in carrying on the work of God, amid the disheartenments and difficulties of the times. The Rev. Ezra Adams, in his recollections of the period, says, "He used to travel from Montreal to Sandwich, holding Quarterly Meetings: to accomplish which, he kept two horses at his home at the Twenty Mile Creek, and used one on his trip from the Niagara Circuit on his down country route; the other he used on his Sandwich route."

Supplementing this statement with additional facts, the Rev. Dr. Carroll, in his invaluable "History of Canadian Methodism," further remarks: "As his income was very small and precarious, he eked out the sum necessary to support his family by selling a manufacture of his own in his extensive journeys, and by hauling, with his double team in winter time, on his return route from Lower Canada, loads of Government stores or general merchandise." Such were the shifts to which Methodist preachers had to resort in order to sustain themselves in a work which they would not desert. Mr. Ryan, by his loyalty, gained the confidence and admiration of all friends of British supremacy, and, by his abundant and heroic labours, the affections of the God-fearing part of the community. During the progress of the war he held three Conferences, one as we have seen at St. David's; another, in 1813, at Matilda; and a third, the following year, at the old Methodist settlement of the Bay of Quinte.

After the burning of Niagara, and the complete disorganization of his circuit by the border strife, Neville Trueman sought an interview with his Presiding Elder during one of his periodical visits to the town of York. In consequence of the military exigencies of the times, navigation was maintained across the lake by armed brigs and schooners during the greater part of the winter. Taking advantage of one of these trips, Neville obtained permission from the military authorities to take passage in the armed schooner Princess Charlotte to York. The voyage was tedious and the weather bleak, so he suffered severely from the cold. As York harbour was frozen over, he landed on the ice and made his way to the twice-captured capital. It presented anything but a striking appearance, unless for dreariness and ruin. The half-burned timbers of the Parliament Building, Jail, and Court- House, showed in all their hideous blackness through the snow that failed to conceal beneath its mantle of white the desolation of the scene. In its most flourishing estate before the war, the town hardly numbered some nine hundred inhabitants, whose residences, for the most part humble wooden structures, were grouped along the loyally-named King Street, near the river Don. At the western extremity of the straggling town were the ruin-mounds of the fort, rent and torn by the terrific explosion of its magazine. On the banks of the Don, and commanding the bridge across that sluggish stream, as though the enemy thought it not worth the trouble of destroying, stood a rude log blockhouse, loop-holed for musketry, the upper story projecting over the lower, after the manner of such structures. [Footnote: A cut of this is given in "Lossing's Field Book of the War.">[

Neville proceeded to the hospitable house of Dr. Stoyles, on King Street, near the intersection of the little-used road leading to the country,—Yonge Street, now the great artery of the circulation of the city. Till the erection of the first humble meeting-house, the Methodist preaching was often held in Dr. Stoyles' house. That gentleman also gave a cordial welcome to the travelling preachers of the day, and here Trueman found, as he expected, Presiding Elder Henry Ryan.

The following is the account given by Dr. Scadding, our Canadian historiographer and antiquarian, in his charming book "Toronto of Old," of the mother Church of Methodism in this goodly city, the parent of the fair sisterhood which now adorn its streets: "The first place of public worship of the Methodists was a long, low, wooden building, running north and south, and placed a little way back from the street. Its dimensions were forty by sixty feet. In the gable end towards the street were two doors, one for each sex. Within, the custom obtained of dividing the men from the women; the former sitting on the right hand on entering the building, the latter on the left."

The learned Doctor then goes on to illustrate historically the separation of the sexes in places of public worship, from the time of the Jews and the primitive church down to the modern Greek Church, so that at least the early Methodists had good precedent for their usage.

This old church was situated on the south side of King Street, on the corner of Jordan Street, so named from Mr. Jordan Post, the pioneer goldsmith of the capital, while the street in the rear commemorates the name of Melinda, his wife. When the Adelaide Street Church, which, for the time, was a very imposing brick structure, was built on what was then the public square, the old mother church was converted into a "Theatre Royal,"—to what base uses must we come!

All this, however, at the time of which we write, was still in the future; and Elder Ryan preached and prayed and exhorted to a little company in the worthy Dr. Stoyles' great kitchen, which was employed for that purpose as being the most commodious room in the house. It was the day of small things for Methodism in the capital of Upper Canada. But of the religious zeal of the little company of believers, we may judge from the fact that several of the members of the society came from two to eight miles, through the proverbially wretched roads of "Muddy York," to the class meeting. [Footnote: Carroll's "Case and his Cotemporaries," Vol. II., p. 167.]