Canada: the Empire of the North / Being the Romantic Story of the New Dominion's Growth from Colony to Kingdom

by Agnes C. Laut

WILLIAM LYON MACKENZIE

All the autumn of 1837 Fitzgibbons, now commander of the troops in Toronto, hears vague rumors of farmers secretly drilling, of workmen extemporizing swords out of scythes, of old soldiers furbishing up their arms of the 1812 War. What does it mean? Sir Francis Bond Head, the new governor of Ontario, refuses to believe his own ears. Neither does the family compact realize that there is any danger to their long tenure of power. They affect to sneer at these poor patriots of the plow, little dreaming that the rights which these poor patriots of the scythe swords are burning to defend, will, by and by, be the pride of England's colonial system. The story of plot and counter plot cannot be told in detail here; it is too long. But on the night of Monday, December 4, Toronto wakes up to a wild ringing of college bells. The rebel patriots have collected at Montgomery's Tavern outside Toronto, and are advancing on the city.

Poor MacKenzie's plans have gone all awry. Four thousand patriots had pledged themselves to assemble at the tavern on December 7, but Dr. Rolph, or some other friend in the city, sends word that the date has been discovered. The only hope of seizing the city is for them to come sooner; and MacKenzie arrives at the tavern on December 3, with only a few hundred followers, who have neither food nor firearms; and I doubt much if they had even definite plans; of such there are no records. Before Van Egmond comes from Seaforth, doubt and dissension and distrust of success depress the insurgents; and it does n't help their spirits any to have four Toronto scouts break through their lines in the dark and back again with word of their weakness, though they plant a fatal bullet neatly in the back of one poor loyalist. If they had advanced promptly on the 4th, as planned, they might have given Sir Francis Bond Head and Fitzgibbons a stiff tussle for possession of the city, for Toronto's defenders at this time numbered scarcely three hundred; but during the days MacKenzie's followers delayed north of Yonge Street, Allan McNab came up from Hamilton with more troops. By Wednesday, the 6th, there were twelve hundred loyalist troops in Toronto; and noon of the 7th, out marches the loyalist army by way of Yonge Street, bands playing, flags flying, horses prancing under Fitzgibbons and McNab. It was a warm, sunny day. From the windows of Yonge Street women waved handkerchiefs and cheered. At street corners the rabble shouted itself hoarse, just as it would have cheered MacKenzie had he come down Yonge Street victorious.

MacKenzie's sentries had warned the insurgents of the loyalists' coming. MacKenzie was for immediate advance. Van Egmond thought it stark madness for five hundred poorly armed men to meet twelve hundred troopers in pitched battle; but it was too late now for stark madness to retreat. The loyalist bands could be heard from Rosedale; the loyalists' bayonets could be seen glittering in the sun. MacKenzie posted his men a short distance south of the tavern in some woods; one hundred and fifty on one side of the road west of Yonge Street, one hundred on the other side. The rest of the insurgents, being without arms, did not leave the rendezvous. In the confusion and haste the tragic mistake was made of leaving MacKenzie's carpet bag with the list of patriots at the tavern. This gave the loyalists a complete roster of the agitators' names.

ALLAN McNAB

Fifteen minutes later it was all over with MacKenzie. The big guns of the Toronto troops shelled the woods, killing one patriot rebel and wounding eleven, four fatally. In answer, only a clattering spatter of shots came from the rebel side. The patriots were in headlong flight with the mounted men of Toronto in pursuit.

It was over with MacKenzie, but, as the sequence of events will show, it was not all over with the cause. A book of soldiers' yarns might be told of hairbreadth escapes, the aftermath of the rebellion. Knowing his side was doomed to defeat, Dr. Rolph tried to escape from Toronto. He was stopped by a loyalist sentry, but explained he was leaving the city to visit a patient. Farther on he had been arrested by a loyalist picket, when luckily a young doctor who had attended Rolph's medical lectures, all unconscious of MacKenzie's plot, vouched for his loyalty. Riding like a madman all that night, Rolph reached Niagara and escaped to the American frontier. A reward of 1000 pounds had been offered for MacKenzie dead or alive. He had waited only till his followers fled, when he mounted his big bay horse and galloped for the woods, pursued by Fitzgibbons' men. The big bay carried him safely to the country, where he wandered openly for four days. It speaks volumes for the stanch fidelity of the country people to the cause which MacKenzie represented, that during these wanderings he was unbetrayed, spite of the 1000 pounds reward. Finally he too succeeded in crossing Niagara. Van Egmond was captured north of Yonge Street, but died from disease contracted in his prison cell before he could be tried. Lount, another of the leaders, had succeeded in reaching Long Point, Lake Erie. With a fellow patriot, a French voyageur, and a boy, he started to cross Lake Erie in an open boat. It was wintry, stormy weather. For two days and two nights the boat tossed, a plaything of the waves, the drenching spray freezing as it fell, till the craft was almost ice-logged. For food they had brought only a small piece of meat, and this had frozen so hard that their numbed hands could not break it. Weakening at each oar stroke, they at last saw the south shore of Lake Erie rise on the sky line; but before the close-muffled refugees had dared to hope for safety on the American side, a strong south wind had sprung up that drove the boat back across the lake towards Grand River. To remain exposed longer meant certain death. They landed, were mistaken for smugglers, and thrown into jail, where Lount was at once recognized.

In West Ontario one Dr. Duncombe had acted as MacKenzie's lieutenant. Allan McNab had come west with six hundred men to suppress the rebellion. Realizing the hopelessness of further resistance, Duncombe had tried to save his men by ordering them to disperse to their homes. He himself, with his white horse, took to the woods, where he lay in hiding all day—and it was a Canadian December—and foraged at night for berries and roots. Judge Ermatinger gives the graphic story of Duncombe's escape. Starvation drove him to the house of a friend. The friend was out, and when the wife asked who he was, Duncombe laid his revolver on the table and made answer, "I am Duncombe; and I must have food." Here he lay disguised so completely with nightcap, nightdress, and all, as the visiting grandmother of the family, that loyalists who saw his white horse and came in to search the house, looked squarely at the recumbent figure beneath the bedclothes and did not recognize him. Duncombe at last reached his sister's home near London.