New Brunswick Early Settlement - International Institute

Some Terminology
Acadian—Colonists from France who established settlements in what are now the Maritime Provinces starting in 1636. French-speaking, largely Roman Catholic, their settlements were eradicated and the population dispersed in 1755, but they slowly returned and resettled, many in New Brunswick.

Planters and Pioneers: Nova Scotia 1749-1775—the book by Esther Clark Wright. A study in historical demography, it details the names and families of known non-Acadian early settlers in Nova Scotia, which at that time included the area north of the Bay of Fundy that after 1784 became New Brunswick. Her introductory 22 pages are a concise summary of just who settled where, when, and where they came from. The rest of the book is the first source to consult on “pre-Loyalist” families.

Planter—an Elizabethan term for colonists. Planters are not people who plant crops, but rather those who plant, or establish colonies. Dr. Wright states: “The term … survived in Nova Scotia to designate the settlers of Cornwallis, Horton, Falmouth and Newport. Since the term “Planters” did not survive in connection with other settlements, “Pioneers” was added to cover them.” (page 6).

Currently, scholars tend to use the term for all of the New Englanders who came to Nova Scotia prior to the American Revolution, but there is no similar collective term for the early comers from Scotland, Yorkshire, and Ulster.

Foreign Protestants—In an attempt to counterbalance the Roman Catholic Acadian population, the British brought non-English speaking Protestants from the Rhine and Montbéliard, who they hoped would prove more loyal to Great Britain. Most settled around Lunenburg, Nova Scotia, but a few came to the Memramcook and Hillsborough area of New Brunswick.

Pre-Loyalist—a historical term, now unpopular with historians but used by earlier writers, to refer to the assorted Planters and Pioneers who settled Nova Scotia before the American Revolution.

Early comers—a term occasionally used in New Brunswick to refer to those who arrived and settled before the “late comer Loyalists.”

Late comers—a term applied by “early comers” to the refugees who fled the American Revolution and were given land in other British colonies.

Loyalist—“the popular expression of the hereditary designation UE.”

The Eddy Rebellion—was an attempt by a number of New Englanders living in the Chignecto Isthmus to bring the American Revolution to Nova Scotia. It was something of a comic opera operation, and did not succeed.

Early Comers
Needless to say, coastal areas were the first to be settled by people of European origins. A good harbour brought fishermen, traders and merchants, and soon a settlement.

The Atlantic Realm
This section of Volume I of Historical Atlas of Canada: From the Beginning to 1800, shows in a series of plates (nos. 19 to 24), how the annual cod fishery led to settlement, and in further plates (nos. 29 to 32) the Acadian settlements (No. 29), their population distribution in 1750, the routes and dates of their migrations, and the Acadian population distribution in 1803 (No. 30). Plate 31 shows the settlement of Nova Scotia prior to the American Revolution by Planters, foreign Protestants, etc. Plate 32 shows later 18th century arrivals, Loyalists etc.

When the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle (October 18, 1748) confirmed that peninsular Nova Scotia belonged to England but returned Louisbourg to France, Britain promptly established their right to the best harbour. Halifax was founded in July 1749 and soon became the seat of Government. Britain then proceeded to battle the French for the rest of Acadia.

Along the colony’s coasts, at the mouth of each river, we find different groups of people, from different places, and often several different peoples over a span of time. They settled along the river and its tributaries, but had to come to terms with the aboriginal tribes already well established and using the resources of those rivers, and the fugitive Acadians who in 1755 had fled their coastal settlements and hid upriver to avoid British efforts to expel them.

Let us turn now to the “early comers.” At the time of the American Revolution, the small population was spread thinly around the Gulf of St. Lawrence, Chaleur Bay and Northumberland Straits, with rather more around the Bay of Fundy, and along the three rivers: Mirimichi (mostly Scottish), Saint John (mostly Planters), and Petitcodiac (mixed). Originally few in number, they multiplied, prospered, and their descendants spread across the continent.

The Acadian Era
For those who only need a smattering of knowledge about Acadian research, a useful summary of records and an historical overview by Stephen A. White, CG(C), is found in the Genealogist’s Handbook for Atlantic Canada Research, pages 136-149.

Dr. Naomi Griffiths has written several books on early Acadian settlements, and her The Contexts of Acadian History 1686-1784 (Montréal and Kingston: Mcgill-Queen’s University Press, 1992) and The Acadians: Creation of a People (Toronto: McGraw-Hill Ryerson, 1973) would be a good place to start if you want to know more about early Acadia.

The first part of Stephen A. White’s Dictionnaire généalogique des familles acadiennes, première partie 1636 à 1714 en deux volumes, 1615 pages, was published in 1999, with an English Supplement to the Dictionnaire généalogique des familles acadiennes, première partie, 336 pages in 2000. Details of these and other publications can be found on Le Centre d’études acadiennes website.

M.A. MacDonald’s Fortune and La Tour: The Civil War in Acadia (Toronto, New York, London: Methuen, 1983) is an exciting, well written account of the struggles for control of Acadia and Fort La Tour (now Portland Point, Saint John) a century and a half before the Loyalists arrived. It is well researched and the notes and bibliography are an excellent guide to both original and secondary sources for this era.

Early Census-type Records
Aside from Planters and Pioneers, one of the basic sources for locating where early settlers lived are a number of census-type records that survive for 18th century Nova Scotia. These are lists of heads of households with other numerical data; lists of males over 21; poll tax records and the like.

In the Annual Report, Public Archives of Nova Scotia, for 1934, “Appendix B, Early Census Rolls of Nova Scotia”, you will find the returns of the head-of-household census of 1770 for Cumberland and Sackville Townships, as well as most other Nova Scotia Townships for 1770 and a few for 1787.

Also included is the return of 1775 “At the Harbour of the St. John River” on page 32. The Conway (West Saint John) and Harbour of the St. John River census is printed in Generations, Vol. 19, No. 1, Spring 1997, page 12; the 1770 census of Sackville Township, in Generations, Vol. 19, No. 3, Fall 1997, page 18.

“The Studholm Report”, transcribed by George H. Hayward, was a survey taken in June 1783 of settlement in the townships along the St. John River. In essence, it is a head-of-household census with additional information on land ownership and loyalty. The complete text, with a foreword by Cleadie B. Barnett, C.G.(C), is available through the New Brunswick GenWeb website.

Library and Archives Canada microfilm reel M-5219 holds census-type records, mostly lists of men over 21, or poll tax records, for many parts of Cumberland Township for 1770, 1791, 1792, 1793, 1794, and 1795. As well, there is a Return of Refugees, Township of Cumberland, August 30, 1785. When researching in the Chignecto Isthmus area, never overlook records from just over the border in Nova Scotia (Cumberland County).

Town Record Books
The New England-type townships of Nova Scotia usually had a town clerk who kept a record of decisions made at town meetings about animal ear-marks, who would cut the pickets to fence the graveyard, and other community matters. These books also kept a record of each family because the township needed to know who, and whose children, the community was responsible for. Quite a number survive and are available on microfilm at Library and Archives Canada including Sheffield (Maugerville), C-3020; Sackville (Westmorland County) C-3201, covering 1768-1822; and Fort Lawrence (Cumberland County), M-843, starting in 1766. This last remained part of Nova Scotia. Most have been published in Generations or other periodicals.

Planter Studies
The History and Classics Department at Acadia University in Wolfville, Nova Scotia, supports the Planters Studies Centre which publishes Planter Notes, twice a year. They have now held four Planter conferences at which historians, genealogists, and scholars from other disciplines have presented papers on almost every aspect of life in Planter Nova Scotia.

For anyone researching early settlers, these papers will give valuable insights on what records exist and where they are located. As well, try to locate copies of the two Planter bibliographies noted earlier in the course. Judith Norton’s talk at “Ancestor Quest ‘97” entitled “Sources for Planter Research” is printed in Generations, Vol. 20, No. 1, Spring 1998, pages 3-8. In the same issue you can read “Pre-Loyalist New Brunswick An Overview” (pages 30-34), by George Hayward.

Types of Settlement
They Planted Well includes D. Murray Young’s, “Planter Settlements in the Saint John Valley” in which he points out:


 * The new settlements founded or projected in the St. John Valley in the 1760s were of three distinct types: first there was one “do-it-yourself” settlement; second, there was one mercantile settlement; and third, there were a number of townships and estates projected either on managerial-proprietorial or on landlord-tenant principles. (page 29)

The “do-it-yourself” settlement was Maugerville (pronounced Majer-ville), which followed the New England pattern where a group of settlers leave an established town (township), find good land, manage to get title to it, divide it into lots, settle in and set up some form of town-meeting type of local government. There were usually two or three educated men with some wealth and influence, in this case, Captain Francis Peabody and Israel Perley. The settlement prospered, and was enough upriver to avoid attacks and depredations by revolutionary privateers after 1774.

The Mercantile Settlement was at Portland Point (Saint John) at the mouth of the river, where James and Richard Simonds and William Hazen (a cousin) set up a post. When Richard was killed by Indians, another cousin, James White joined the firm. They employed seasonal workers from New England and several planter families from Nova Scotia; most became permanent settlers.

At the mouth of the Mirimichi River, another mercantile settlement was started by William Davidson who brought settlers from both New England and Scotland. Both appear to have employed some local Acadians. When attacked by American rebels, both merchants shut down operations and moved inland to Maugerville.

Old-World thinking engendered a third category of settlement on land acquired by men of influence, who either hoped to raise capital, form a company and exploit the timber and fishery, or live like English gentlemen on the rents paid by respectful tenants, as in Britain. The settlements at Gagetown and Burton, across the river from Maugerville had small populations by 1783, but other townships remained little more than trading posts or a base for fishing, if that. In North America, respectful tenants were not easy to find.

The Non-Pioneer, I suggest, makes a fourth category of settlement. Around the Bay of Fundy, at the urging of British officials, Planters and then Yorkshire and some Ulster settlers took over the already cleared and cultivated land from which Acadian farmers had been expelled. These settlers did not find virgin forest to be cleared as on the Saint John River or Mirimichi, but rather, land that had been farmed for several generations. The farms may have lain fallow for a decade or two, but getting them into production again was easier, even if the management of dyked marshland was unfamiliar work. Much of the Chignecto Isthmus falls into this category, particularly Sackville, Amherst and Cumberland Townships.