[THE CITADEL AT HALIFAX]
NOVA SCOTIA
The province of Acadia had been in English possession for nearly half a century when, in 1749, the powers that were in the Mother Country decided that Annapolis, the little game-cock city of the peninsula, whose history went back to 1605, was not a fitting place for the capital of the province. Its harbor, while beautiful and secure, was not large enough for the purposes that England had in mind; moreover, it was on the western side of the peninsula, so that to get to it from Europe one must pass around Cape Sable and up the foggy Bay of Fundy. And so we find that the home authorities projected a new city, which was to be the capital of the province and whose location was to be the magnificent harbor of Chebucto on the east coast of Acadia. That they did not go astray in their anticipations of the future is proved by the present-day Halifax, Nova Scotia’s principal city, the child of the plans of these Englishmen of 1749.
The value of Chebucto as a harbor had been known for many years before this time, we may assume. It had been for many years a rendezvous for British vessels in American waters. When D’Anville’s misfortuned fleet of French men-of-war was scattered by the elements, its remnants came together in Chebucto Bay. That there was some form of settlement on the shores of the bay ere this time is highly probable, but the existence of human life in any organized form here, if such existence there was, has been completely over-shadowed in retrospect by the magnitude of the enterprise by which the present-day Halifax was founded.
As a consequence of its last war there were in England numbers of young and able-bodied men set suddenly at liberty who had been engaged in military or semi-military pursuits. Liberal inducements were offered these people to go to the projected metropolis. A free passage, maintenance for a year was promised, and grants of land varying from fifty to six hundred acres were given. The Imperial Government voted the sum of forty thousand pounds to help defray expenses. This sum was increased to four hundred thousand pounds before five years had passed. The Hon. Edward Cornwallis was appointed and the protection of British institutions and laws was promised.
VIEW FROM CITADEL HILL, HALIFAX, N. S.
The fleet on which the colony set sail entered Chebucto Bay in the month of July, 1749. There were thirteen transports, conveying nearly three thousand settlers. These were men of good stock, and the vigor with which they attacked the problems before them was sufficient evidence of this fact. Streets were promptly laid out, a civil government was organized, and the entire population got to work on the practical issue of providing shelter for themselves and their families. Houses were built, and, last, but not least, in that day and generation a fort was erected on the rounded top of the hill around which they had plotted their town. This was the forerunner of the citadel of Halifax of to-day. Around the entire settlement was built a high palisade.