Bosworth Farm at Trafalgar

 

Introduction

During his early life, Newton Bosworth (1778-1848), son of a schoolmaster, himself ran a school in Cambridge, England. His children were born in that town. In 1823, he gave up the school, and moved to London. But having financial difficulties, he decided to emigrate to Canada, and try his hand at farming. This he did in 1834, at age 56. This article describes what has been found todate (September, 2005) about his life on the two farms near Toronto, the first near York Mills (1834-1835), and the second in the township of Trafalgar (1835-1842), plus some of what he did while in Montreal (1835-1839). Life on the farms at Woodstock (1842-1845) and at Paris (1845-1848) will have to wait until further research has been done on these.

York Mills Farm

Bosworth and his family emigrated to Canada shortly after the first wave of British (English, Scottish, Irish) immigrants to Upper Canada. Newton Bosworth's two middle sons, Thomas and Frederick, went ahead to scout out the new land. A Mr Fletcher, a neighbour of the Bosworths in London, offered a free passage to Canada for Thomas and Frederick, and they emigrated there in August 1833, to set up a farm for the rest of the family. Newton Bosworth, his wife Catherine, his oldest son Alfred, his daughter Catharine, and his young son Ebenezer, followed in April 1834 with the same generous help from Mr Fletcher. Thomas and Frederick had planned to farm in the Eastern Townships of Lower Canada, but finding the winters too long to allow fall sowing and other farming operations, they had pushed west [actually SW] to Upper Canada. Newton and family eventually tracked them down, on an excellent farm which they had rented for one year (with options to four), eight miles north of Toronto, about a mile and a half off Yonge St, near York Mills. Newton Bosworth joined the old York Mills Baptist Church there (see church minutes June 4, 1835) 1. 1. F.H. Armstrong, The Rev Newton Bosworth: Pioneer Settler on Yonge Street, Ontario History, v58, #3 (1966-09-01), p165 (CHIP No 843). Newton Bosworth would have been about 56 years old, and his wife about 52, when they arrived in Canada in April 1834. Their sons Thomas and Frederick, who arrived the previous August, would have been about 22 and 19 years old respectively at that time. The other children came with their parents, and would have been about 28 (Catharine), 26 (Alfred) and 12 (Ebenezer) when they arrived. 2

2. The ages of Newton Bosworth and his immediate family when they arrived in Canada, may be calculated approximately from the following birth data, originally extracted by Kenneth Parsons from Cambridgeshire and Huntingdonshire Births at Dr Williams's Library, 1754-1837, compiled by Norman and Vicky Uffindell, a copy of which may be found at the Cambridge Family History Society,
Newton Bosworth (1778-1848) was said to have been born in 1778, although his age was given as 71 when he died in Paris, CW, on July 15, 1848.  He married Catherine Paul (Dec 1781 - Jan 1877) on 1 July 1805. They had six children:
Catharine Bosworth (1806 - ), their only daughter, was born Dec 20, 1806, shortly before they moved in to Merton Hall, Cambridge in March 1807.
Alfred Bosworth MD (1808-1848), their first son, was born  Dec 27, 1808 in Merton Hall, Cambridge, England. , He married Sarah Howell, in St James Cathedral, Toronto, on 17 June, 1837.  He died in Paris, CW, on July 28, 1848
Thomas Newton Bosworth (1811-1877), their second son, was born April 22, 1811 in Merton Hall, Cambridge, England , and died in Paris, ON, on Dec. 23, 1877 at "64 years of age".
Frederick Bosworth(1814-1881)and his twin, William, their third and fourth sons, were born on Aug 23, 1814 in Merton Hall, Cambridge, England. William died an infant six weeks later. Frederick died back in England at Exeter on Aug. 4, 1881.
Ebenezer Paul Bosworth (1822- 1839) their youngest son, was born Oct 10, 1822 in Llandaff House, Cambridge, and died in Montreal on December 4th, 1838.

No doubt Thomas and Frederick found the land too rocky as well as being too far north. The Eastern Townships, including Sherbrooke, are geologically part of the Appalachian orogenic belt, which extends all down the eastern side of the Richelieu river and through the US east of Lake Champlain. The Grenville (geological) Province of the Canadian Shield, extends down the western side of the St Lawrence, as far south as an imaginary line drawn between Kingston and Orillia. The Grenville Province also extends across the St Lawrence in the area of the Thousand Islands. The St Lawrence Platform, is a more fertile area, which includes all of today’s Ontario south of this line, plus an area east of Ottawa between Brockville and Montreal, and a narrow strip northwards along the banks of the St Lawrence 3.  3. Geological Provinces. In 1864, The Toronto Globe dismissed the Shield as "gaps of rough and . . . barren country which lie between us and the fertile prairies of North-Western British America" 4 4. Life on the Shield , but they might as well have been comparing the land north and south of the Orillia-Kingston line. Newton Bosworth, said at the time: "It may be well, however, that we are going into the Upper Province, where the winters are milder, and the land generally superior." 5

5. Recorded by Bosworth in his "Journal of a voyage across the Atlantic, from London to Quebec, . . ." in his entry for May 25-27, 1834, and quoted by Rev Alfred J. Barker, A Pioneer Baptist Minister of Lower and Upper Canada; the Reverend Newton Bosworth, Canadian Baptist Home Missions Digest, v.6 (1963-1964), pp283-93, footnote 7.

This warmer and more fertile southern area, being part of Upper Canada, was late in being cleared and settled. The Mississaugas were the main occupiers of the north shore of Lake Ontario, when the British defeated France in the Seven Years War (1756-1763), gaining control of France's North American possesions. In the Paris Treaty of 1763, France had opted to keep Guadaloupe rather than New France, because the sugar crop made the island more valuable 6 6. The Toronto Purchase, Seven Years War, Treaty of Paris (1763), The Seven Years War , Treaty of Paris (1763), etc. The British were concerned to acquire the Missassaugan lands by treaty (involving purchase), since many of the native peoples had been their allies in the war. The "First Purchase" was in 1805 7 7. History & Heritage of Mississauga Once purchased, the British could survey the territory, start  building roads and settle the land. In the early 19th century the first roads were built for strategic reasons, to protect access to Lake Huron and the fur trade, as well as to encourage settlement. One of the first of these was Yonge Street connecting York/Toronto to Lake Simcoe, which allowed development in the area where the Bosworths first settled.