TWENTIETH REPORT OF THE artment of Public Records AND Archives of Ontario BY ALEXANDER FRASER, LL.D. 1931 PRINTED BY ORDER OF THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF ONTARIO ONTARIO TORONTO H'erbert H. Ball, Printer to the King's Moat Excellent Majesty 1932 REPORT OF THE DEPARTMENT OF PUBLIC RECORDS AND ARCHIVES OF ONTARIO 1931 ~ comjt~!J o/ diexandf»c ;#;aM31<, Jl.s;(, £!£~,£et.!!)_ [i] TWENTIETH REPORT OF THE Department of Public Records AND Archives of Ontario BY ALEXANDER FRASER, LLD. 1931 PRINTED BY ORDER OF THE LEGISLATIVE ASSEMBLY OF ONTARIO SESSIONAL!:PAPER No. 39, 1932 ONTARIO TORONTO Printed and Published by Herbert H. Ball, Printer to the King's Most Excellent Majesty 1932 CONTENTS PAGE LETTERS OF TRANS:VIISSION . V PREFATORY............................................... vii GRANTS OF CROWN L.\;'i'DS IN UPPER CANADA, 1796-1798: Land Book C ........................................ Land Book D ......................................... 101 INDEX ................................................... 195 [iv] To THE RIGHT HONOURABLE SIR WILLIAM ::\1uLocK, K.C.M.G., ETc., Administering the Government of the Province of Ontario. RIGHT HONOURABLE SIR: I have the pleasure to present for your consideration the Report of the Department of Public Records and Archives of Ontario for the year 1931. Respectfully submitted, E. A. DUNLOP, Treasurer of Ontario. Toronto, 1931. THE HONOURABLE E. A. DUNLOP, ESQUIRE, M.P.P., ETC., Treasurer of Ontario. SIR: have the honour to submit to you the following Report in connection with the Department of Public Records and Archives of Ontario. I have the honour to be, Sir, Your obedient servant, ALEXANDER FRASER, Deputy Minister. Toronto, 31st December, 1931. [v] Ex Rebus A ntiquis Erudito Oriatur PREFATORY The original documents published in this volume are a continuation of the material published in the reports of the Department of Public Records and Archives during recent years. This year the volume contains the records of land grants from 1st July, 1797, to 13th July, 1798. These records cover pages 100 to 334 of Land Book "C" and the first 195 pages of Land Book "D." It should be noted that an appendix in Land Book "C" contains grants made from 29th June, 1796, to 4th July, 1796. For the sake of convenience, because these records precede those of Land Book "C," they have been placed at the front of this volume. It is expected that the next volume published by the Department will bring these very interesting records of the early settlement of Upper Canada to 1800, which will complete the series. The Department notes with pleasure an increasing interest in the history of this Province as is shown in the publications, exhibitions and activities of the provincial and local historical societies and in requests for information from the Archives. In addition to the publications of societies, several histories of counties have appeared or are being prepared for publication. The Wom:en's Institutes have been commendably active and the accumulation of material under their hand is becoming formidable and will become a treasure house for future reference. It is understood that material of an historical character is being put in proper form for the press. Opportunity is taken at this time to acknowledge many obligations to which this Department is under to the Institutes. The Department finds the Institutes a valuable ally in disseminating an interest throughout the Province in family letters and papers of various kinds, many of which would be thoughtlessly destroyed. In this respect the Institutes are accomplishing work of inestimable value. ALEXANDER FRASER. [vii] UPPER CANADA LAND BOOK C 29th June, 1796 to 4th July, 1796 1st July, 1797 to 20th December, 1 797 [ix] UPPER CANADA, LAND BOOK C June 29th, 1796. Committee of Council held at the Council Chamber at the garrison at York:. Present: Hon. Peter Russell, chairman; Hon. AEneas Shaw, Hon. John McGill, Hon. D. W. Smith, members. The committee met according to adjournment and proceeded upon reading the paragraphs of His Grace the Duke of Portland's letter to Your Excellency submitted to the consideration of the committee on the 27th inst. "wherein His Grace informs Your Excellency that it has been represented to him, that His Majesty's bounty in making grants will be abundantly liberal after charging the grantees with the expences of surveying and setting out their lands, as well as with the amount of the fees for making the grants" together with His Grace's subsequent observations and suggestions thereon. The committee then had reference to the 34th article of His Majesty's Instructions to Your Excellency, viz: "And as a further encouragement to our subjects who shall become settlers as aforesaid it is our will and pleasure that the said townships and the respective allottments within the same, together with the lands to be reserved as aforesaid, shall be run and laid out by our Surveyor General of lands for the said province or some skilful person authorized by him for that purpose, that surveys together with the warrant and grants for the respective allotments shall be made out for and delivered to the several grantees free of any expence or fee whatsoever, other than such as may be payable to the different officers according to the table of fees to be established upon grants of lands made in the said province: and a proclamation having been issued by Your Excellency agreeable to this Instruction on the 7th of February, 1792, announcing to the settlers in this province, "That they were to take the estates granted to them severally free of quit rent and of any other expence, than such fees as are or may be allowed to be demanded and received by the different officers concerned in passing the patents and recording the same, to be stated in a table authorized and established by the government." The committee might not have judged themselves at liberty to deviate from the principles of what is therein promised, had not His Grace the Duke of Portland suggested the propriety of also charging to the patentees the expence of surveying the lots granted to them. Being therefore anxious to promote every plan which may have a tendency to lessen the national expence and relieve the public from the charges of settling the province, they most readily adopt His Grace's ideas, and beg leave in consequence to recommend to Your Excellency, that the Secretary of the province be directed to add to the fees to be taken on all grants which may be issued upon petitions lodged in the Council office, subsequent to the first of July, in the present year a charge towards the expence of surveys at the rate of 26/8½ upon every 200 acres granted and 20/0 upon those of a lesser quantity to be paid by him at the end of each quarter in every year into the hands of the Acting Surveyor General for his special purpose: which [ 1] 2 REPORT OF THE DEPARTMENT OF No. 39 will, it is supposed, agreeable to the opinion of the Acting Surveyor General upon an average indemnify Government for the expence of laying off the reserves and surveying the side and concession lines of· each township and marking the lots thereon, they having been the only lines which have been usually hitherto run at the expence thereof. All those however to whom the public faith has been pledged either by order from the commander in chief, the Governor and Council of Quebec, or by proclamation issued in either province to have their lands free of expence, are of course to be exempted from this charge as well as every other, and should Your Excellency approve of this regulation, the committee recommends, that immediate notice be given to the public of its having taken place, by a proclamation rescinding in this particular the promise made by the forementioned one of Your Excellency's on the 7th of February, 1792, and which at present must be considered as binding on Government. His Grace having likewise desired Your Excellency to consider whether this additional charge may not be extended beyond a mere indemnification to Government, by reserving such further sum as shall be judged reasonable in every grant of 1000 acres, to be laid out in defraying the public expence of the province in such manner as His Majesty may from time to time be pleased to direct. The committee have taken this matter into their serious consideration, and beg leave with all deference to submit to Your Excellency whether it may not be equally conducive to the purposes of national economy and probably less offensive to the loyalists who are the original founders of the colony, to permit from time to time the sale of certain portions of the waste lands of the Crown for the purposes of establishing funds for erecting churches, gaols, court houses, seminaries of learning, bridges and other beneficial uses, than to grant 1200 acres individually to each person as proposed in Lower Canada, and as there still remains unaccommodated a great many land board certificates and orders of Council of two or three years standing, which from their priority of date claim of course a preference to at least recommendations of a subsequent one. The committee are induced to suggest to Your Excellency the expediency of suspend­ ing the power granted under a former resolution of Council to magistrates of recommending to farm lots, that the offices may be able to get a little forward in their business, and confining for the present the disposal of the vacant lands to Your Excellency in Council, especially as the addition lately made to its members will probably render its sittings more frequent and occasion greater dispatch with respect to the granting of lands than was before possible.