| Notes |
- A great deal of documents exist for John Willson, Esq., of which a selection are printed here.
New Brunswick, Canada: John Wilson, Esq. Settled 1784 May, 8 in Family, 2 acres improved and house.
John Willson & Family landed in New Brunswick, Canada in 1783 and was granted land on the Miramachi River, in Northumberland County. Gov. Thomas Carlton made a Magistrate & Justice of the Peace. The salary for a magistrate in New Brunswick was £300 a year. His adventures there in this wild land would be enough for one lifetime, to speak nothing of what preceded the Miramichi or what would come after. Please see the separate tree on Roots: Richard Lawrence, John Willson & John Brown Lawrence of New Jersey & Ontario. P J Ahlberg A book of the same title may be found at the North York Central Library & the Richmond Hill Public Library.
. . WHY HE LEFT NEW BRUNSWICK:
Mr. Wilson further says, that when he left the Miramichi Settlements in the NB, he did it because the lands are not valuable for farmers & not worth clearing from the severity of the climate, that one of his sons-in-laws had already left the Settlement. Mr. Wilson says that a due care to provide for his family was the sole reason of this quitting Miramichi. He is his own person being better off there then he would possibly be elsewhere living almost without labour upon offices he possessed in that Country. A true statement, Signed, E B Littlehales, 16 July, 1794, Niagara.
. UPPER CANADA LAND PETITION & Revolutionary Muster:
To John Graves Simcoe, Lieut. John Willson, Jur. He suffered much by this Rebel party (at the point of the bayonet) before the British Army Landed on Staten island, the making several attempts to join them but always hindered till when the British Army was Advancing from the White Plains (NY) to the Jersey. I then joined them at Woodbridge [New Jersey ] & went with them to Brunswick (NJ).
I then entered into James Christies' employ [i.e.. the Quartermaster] as a Forage master & ran Many risks of my Life, being twice taken Prisoner & confined but maid my escape & returned to my service again, till when the army returned from the Jerseys to Staten Island, & embarked for the Head of Elk [River flowing towards Philadelphia] were my health would not admit of my going on board to retrieved with my family on said Island where I continued till the commencement of the peace.
I then with my family embarked with my family for Nova Scotia (since New Brunswick), where I drew 270 acres in Northumberland where I served in Sivil Commission & offices under Governor Carleton till July the 19th, 1793. There I set out with sixty men, women & children (Including my own family) for Niagara where we arrived on the 7th of next October.
... He wants Lots 4 & 5 on the River Humber & Lot 30 on west side of Yonge Street. March 25th, 1796, John Willson .
. The Kings Mill on the Humber ( The Old Mill, Etobicoke, Ontario) & Gov. Simcoe gave a License to John Willson & to John Brown Lawrence to build & operate the Kings Mill on the Humber River. Both Willson & Lawrence were lawyers who had done legal business together on occasion back in Burlington, NJ. As well both were friends of Gov. Simcoe.
. In your letter of the 24th ult., 1829 you asked about one John Willson who died at Hope (Sharon, ON) about . This old man was called Squire Willson. He was David Willson's stepfather, my father's stepmother's second husband (Katherine Kuhn). Her first husband, also called John Willson, died about 1788 in Duchess County, New York). She soon after married Squire Willson who was a man highly respected. He came, I believe form NS in Gov. Simcoe's time & was by the Governor much thought of. He had a large family by a former wife, but none by this one. There are a number of great grandchildren, living in the Twps. of York & Scarborough. There was a grandson of his, John Willson by name, in the service of the Canada Company at the time of the settling of Goderich & neighborhood. When these old people became helpless, David Willson took them home & kept them until they died. They died poor but honest. They once had property which his children spent for them.
Ref: Extracted from a letter of 5 December, 1869, Holland Landing Richard Titus Willson.
An extensive biography of John Willson, UE. may be found on the Rootsweb.com &
in a book in North York Central Library, Toronto under John Willson, U.E., by P. J. Ahlberg, U.E. - - -
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1739 - 1829 (90 years)