ON April 27th, 1813, upon the taking of York by Chauncey and his fleet, orders were given by the officer left in command of the British militia when General Sheaffe retreated to blow up the fort. The boom of the explosion was distinctly heard by my grandsire, Thomas Conant, at his home thirty-five miles distant. With the exception of this incident no records connected with the events from that time until the close of the war in 1814 have been preserved among the reminiscences of the family.
The supplies needed for the soldiers had encouraged agriculture in the back townships and brought money into circulation in the country. At the close of the war immigration increased, sturdy settlers coming into the country both from the British Isles and the United States. The settlement of the wild lands, the clearing of the forests and the building of roads went on apace; an era of prosperity and wealth succeeded as peace became assured.
The most thriving industry was that of the lumberman, awaiting whose axe lay the magnificent forests of timber which covered so large a portion of Upper Canada. My father embarked in this trade. His mother’s decease induced his relative, David Annis, a bachelor, to ask for and adopt him as his heir.
David Annis was a descendant of the Charles Annis mentioned in the quit-rent deed given on [page 29]. Though unlettered and untaught, even unable to write his own name, David was possessed of excellent business ability and an untiring body; a man of fine heart, a friend to the poor, and hospitable to all. It is said of him that no Indian or white ever went from his door hungry. Together he and Daniel Conant built what was probably the first lumber mill erected in the Home District. Its capacity was seven thousand feet of lumber per day only. At [page 135] a picture of this mill is given.
All that lumber (generally pine) would have been
DAVID ANNIS.
THE AUTHOR’S UNCLE.
valueless when manufactured unless means had been provided to take it to market by schooner. Niagara, at the mouth of the Niagara River, was, even as late as 1835, one of the largest towns in Upper Canada. Thither the lumber must be taken to find a market. No wharves had then been built upon the north shore of Lake Ontario, and lumber must be floated down the stream from the mill in rafts to the lake, and so placed on board the waiting schooners. Three vessels were built by ship carpenters (many of whom came from the United States) of the lumber sawn at the mill. They were built on fine lines and had excellent sailing properties, their owners boasting they could sail them “as close to the wind’s eye as any craft that ever floated.”