thousand Loyalists who came to the Maritime region were civilian refugees. The other half were disbanded British soldiers and provincial soldiers13 who had served in regiments raised in North America, including the New Jersey Volunteers, King’s American Regiment, Queen’s Rangers, Loyal American Regiment, Royal North Carolina Regiment, King’s Carolina Rangers, and the Loyal Nova Scotia Volunteers. Men from the provincial corps were known as the “Provincials” to distinguish them from civilian refugees, although the difference was not always clear since many civilians had also served during the war, in regiments.14 Most civilians went to Nova Scotia while the Provincials were mainly sent to New Brunswick. In addition to being provided with free land, Loyalists could also claim provisions and other help from the government. Former soldiers were granted land according to their rank, with the usual amount ranging from one thousand acres for officers to one hundred acres for privates. Civilians normally received one hundred acres for each head of family and fifty additional acres for every person belonging to the family.
The origins of those who made their way to Nova Scotia and New Brunswick were roughly similar, with the majority coming from New York and New Jersey. Just over 60 percent of New Brunswick Loyalists originated from these two colonies, but they represented only a slim majority in Nova Scotia. New Brunswick had a higher proportion of Loyalists from Connecticut (13 percent), but Nova Scotia had more southerners (about 25 percent), who came principally from North and South Carolina.15 A full 10 percent of Nova Scotia Loyalists were Blacks who fared badly in spite of the varied skills that they brought with them.16
Loyalists began to pour into the Maritimes throughout the summer and fall of 1783, but their first year was marked by hardship and uncertainty. As winter approached, many lacked proper shelters and, because of difficulties in transporting provisions to them, they suffered severe food shortages. Civilian refugees in Halifax were said to be living in deplorable conditions, while, according to the Anglican clergyman Jacob Bailey, there were 1,500 distressed people in the Annapolis Valley who were “fatigued with a long stormy passage, sickly and destitute of shelter from the advances of winter. Several hundred are starved in our Church and larger numbers are still unprovided for.”17
Men from the 38th and 40th Regiments were accommodated in huts during their first winter, the Duke of Cumberland’s Regiment in tents in the woods outside Halifax, while men from the 60th Regiment were accommodated in a ship off Falmouth until severe weather forced them to come ashore.18 They were all British regulars who had been disbanded in the province, and were entitled to the same land and provisions as exiled Americans.
Loyalists were widely dispersed in the southwestern peninsula of Nova Scotia,19 but in New Brunswick they were mainly concentrated along the St. John River valley and its tributaries (see Map 4).20 By 1785, Halifax, Nova Scotia’s capital, had acquired about 1,200 Loyalists. Another two thousand were settled in the Annapolis Valley, especially in Annapolis, Clements, Granville, Wilmot, and Aylesford, and another thousand were scattered about the fertile Minas Basin, especially at Parrsboro in Kings County (now Cumberland County). Around 1,300 went to Digby, while Shelburne (formerly Port Roseway) suddenly gained ten thousand Loyalists, making it the fourth largest town in North America, after Philadelphia, New York, and Boston. There were further Loyalist population clusters to the southeast of Truro in Hants County21 and on the east side of the province, especially at Pictou,22 Merigomish, Guysborough (formerly New Manchester) on Chedabucto Bay, and Country Harbour. Men from the Duke of Cumberland’s Regiment settled at Guysborough, while men from the disbanded South Carolina Regiment, King’s Carolina Rangers, and North Carolina Volunteers were allocated land at Country Harbour, but a good many drifted away from the area.23 After the American war ended, the Antigonish area acquired disbanded soldiers from the Nova Scotia Volunteers,24 who founded a settlement at Town Point (renamed Dorchester) and gradually moved upriver to the present site of Antigonish.25
Uniform of the 60th Regiment of Foot Guards, 1756–95, watercolour by Frederick M. Milner (1889–1939).
Most of the Loyalists who settled in New Brunswick were directed to the fertile land to be found along the St. John River valley. Military Loyalists were allocated land above Fredericton, and some along the Nashwaak River,26 while civilians were sent mainly to the lower St. John.27 However, this separation was never fully realized, since many ex-soldiers rejected their allocations and moved downriver to join the civilian refugees in the lower St. John Valley.28 Meanwhile, another large group of displaced Loyalists from the Penobscot region of Maine29 settled mainly in St. Andrews and along the St. Croix River (Charlotte County) in the Passamaquoddy Bay area, at the southwestern corner of New Brunswick.30 They were joined by men from the Argyll Highlanders (74th), who were given lots on both sides of the Digdeguash River, and the Royal Fencible Americans, who were allocated land in the parish of St. George on Passamaquoddy Bay.31
The uniform of the Cumberland Regiment of Foot (34th) in 1844. Detail is taken from a pencil drawing by Lloyd Scott (1911–68).
Courtesy of Library and Archives Canada, Acc. No. 1973-8-814. From Miss Lulu Dodds, Lakeview Manor, Beaverton, Ontario, through Munroe Scott, Manotick, Ontario. Reproduced by permission of Munroe Scott, Peterborough, Ontario.
With its excellent harbour at the mouth of the St. John River and an extensive fertile valley as its hinterland, it was inevitable that the future city of Saint John would experience a rapid rise in its fortunes. The neighbouring towns of Parr and Carleton were incorporated as the City of Saint John in 1785, and three years later the city was said to have “near 2,000 houses.” According to Edward Winslow, a prominent Loyalist leader, it was “one of the best cities in the New World.”32 And unlike Shelburne, which quickly went into a downward spiral, Saint John prospered and became the largest urban centre in New Brunswick.33
Memorial Stone to the United Empire Loyalists at the gate of the Old Burial Ground in St. Anne’s (later Fredericton). Being the highest point on the St. John River that was navigable for large vessels, Fredericton was chosen as the capital of the province in 1785. It was named after Prince Frederick, the third son of King George III.
Shelburne’s rapid demise seems difficult to comprehend. Jacob Bailey thought its harbour in 1786 was “not being exceeded by any one in America,” having three thousand houses and thirteen thousand people. He observed the “greatly improved lands” and the “great number of shipping belonging to the merchants, nearly equalling that of Halifax … several of which are employed in the whale fishery, a still greater number in the West Indies and the rest in the cod fishery along the banks.”34 Sawmills had been erected and large quantities of cut timber were being exported to the West Indies. Shelburne appeared to be on its way to becoming a major commercial centre, and yet 120 men and their families took one look at the place and left for Prince Edward Island soon after their arrival. Claiming that they had been enticed by offers of good land on the island by an agent of Governor Patterson, they relocated themselves in the summer of 1784. After much delay in securing their grants, they settled at Bedeque Harbour.35 But why did they leave Shelburne?
It seems that Shelburne had acquired the wrong balance of people. They were mainly New Yorkers, too many of whom were carpenters, tailors, and other types of craftsmen, and too few were farm workers and fishermen. People suited to a city life lacked the hardiness and practical skills needed to tame a wilderness. Moreover, Shelburne’s
