| Title: | Stewart, Frances to Parr Traill, Catharine, 1823 |
|---|---|
| ID | 4732 |
| Collection | Revisiting Our Forest Home, The immigrant letters of Frances Stewart [J. L. Aoki] |
| File | stewart/14 |
| Year | 1823 |
| Sender | Stewart, Frances |
| Sender Gender | female |
| Sender Occupation | housewife |
| Sender Religion | unknown |
| Origin | Douro Township, Newcsatle District, Upper Canada |
| Destination | unknown |
| Recipient | Parr Traill, Catharine |
| Recipient Gender | female |
| Relationship | friends |
| Source | |
| Archive | |
| Doc. No. | |
| Date | |
| Partial Date | |
| Doc. Type | |
| Log | unknown |
| Word Count | 673 |
| Genre | decease |
| Note | |
| Transcript | [1823] "Extracts from Canadian Letters" Douro, 1823 "In the autumn of our first year in Douro our youngest little girl of not quite two years old was [ ] with Dysentery. I was quite ignorant of the disease & there was no Doctor within reach, the nearest being a good many miles distant. We had as yet no canoes on the river & were often depending on chance visits from the Indians for a passage to the other side. One of our hired men, a faithful Highlander, seeing how very ill our darling was, volunteered to swim across the rapid stream & walk through the woods to the Doctor, promising that if I wrote the particulars, he would bring the necessary medicines. He started early in the morning of a cold October day & returned about midnight with some powders & a message that the Doctor would come up the following day. But no improvement & the day passed in great anxiety for the Doctor did not come. On the third day he came having left at the promised time, but lost his way in the woods & hence the delay. The next day she appeared more lively, but refused to take the Arrow root & sage which I offered her. She asked for bread & of this alas we had none of it to give her, having for some time been unable to procure good flour. It was a bitter trial not to have what she seemed to crave for. The next day she fell into a stupor & towards midnight her angel spirit passed away to the immortal land." 20th October 1823. On the 27th of October, there assembled together the whole of the settlement including the six Highlanders employed in clearing the land, in all numbering twenty seven souls, the only Christian inhabitants in that vast forest stretching for thousands of miles unbroken east & north of the Otonabee & the little Lake to follow to the grave the youngest & most endearing of the little band of Pilgrims, who had arrived on the shores of the Otonabee the previous year. The spot settled as the last resting place lay midway between Mr. Stewarts clearing & that of Mr. Rieds on a sloping ground known as "Hemlock Bray," beneath four [ ] hemlock pines, whose interwoven & spreading branches found a perfect canopy, & whose huge tough dark gray trunks & stems with their spiral tops towered far above carrying ones heart & eyes far away in the clear vault of heaven. No human architect could equal in design the somber grandeur of the [ ] [ ] under whose somber shade this sorrowing group were gathered together in mournful silence. Strong & hardy men stood there breathless beholding the scene which lay before them rendered the more sublime by the knowledge they were assembled there alone in the midst of the noble works of God untouched by the hand of man. The generous & stalworth Donald who had risked his life so lately in procuring remedies to relieve the little sufferer, whose remains were now in the midst of this solemn scene being consigned to the earth, was powerless to restrain the outpouring of his swelling heart. Deep & lasting the memory of that day sank into the hearts of all who joined in the beautiful & touching burial service of the Church of England heard for the first time in the midst of the little band of Pioneers who founded the settlement in that vast wilderness. No hallowed spot was ever dedicated with more heartfelt prayer than that where little Bessie was laid beneath those noble "Hemlock trees." |
