Diary of Adolphus Gaetz, The

Full text: INTRODUCTION Arrangements for founding the township of Lunenburg were completed in the spring of 1753. Late in April, Captain Charles Morris, the Surveyor- General, made a brief inspection of the area. On May 28th Governor Hopson appointed Colonel Charles Lawrence to take charge of the troops and the settlers to be embarked for the purpose of settling Lunenburg. It was decided that the settlers would be transported to the site by two separate voyages of the little flotilla of New England vessels chartered for the pur- pose. On Thursday, June 7th, the fleet, under convoy of H.M. Sloop Albany, Captain John Rous; the armed sloop Ulysses, Captain Jeremiah Rogers, and the armed sloop Yorlc, Sylvanus Cobb, sailed from Halifax with 642 persons. The next morning—June 8th—the fleet reached Me'rligash, the troops and settlers landed, and Colonel Lawrence and the Surveyor- General chose the site for the town and the places for its blockhouses. When Captains Rogers and Cobb returned to Halifax, they reported (Halifax Gazette, June 16,1753) "that they met with no Obstruction at all; that it is a fine open country, the Soil exceeding good, the Grass almost as high as a Man's Knees, the Fruit Trees all in Bloom, &c. . . ." The remainder of the settlers sailed from Halifax in the transports on June 15th and reached Lunenburg on June 17th. For a number of years the town made slow progress. Personal rivalry, misunderstanding, and petty grievances resulted in a minor insurrection late in 1753. The hostility of the Indians hampered development. The town was pillaged by privateers during the American Revolution. Trade was again affected during the War of 1812, when privateers infested the coast. There was great alarm when two men-of-war were seen chasing an armed vessel into Mahone Bay in June 1813, for the people of Lunenburg did not know whether the pursuing ships were British or American. But the Teaser was an American privateer, one of whose officers had previously deserted from a ship of the Royal Navy which was now one of those ships in her pursuit. Realizing the fate that awaited him, if captured, and fail- ing in his efforts to rouse the crew to desperate resistance, he set fire to the magazine and blew up the vessel, only six persons on board surviving the explosion. After the first few years, however, a steady progress was apparent. If, as Charles Morris reported, the population had rather diminished than increased by 1761, the census of 1791 disclosed a considerable increase. According to Morris, the founders of the town had comprised about four hundred families and proprietors consisting of about 1500 persons. In 1791 the township of Lunenburg had 388 families, with a total of 2213 persons, while Chester had 110 families or 591 persons and New Dublin had 85 families or 443 persons. The total population for the whole County was therefore 3,247 in 1791. Between 1791 and 1817 the population of Lunenburg County nearly doubled—the total being 6,428 or 6,628 in the latter year. During the next decade it again increased by about 3,000, rising to 9,405, with 5,038 in the township of Lunenburg, 2,092 in the town- I