Peter and Hortense then moved to Springhill Mines (Cumberland County) and boarded briefly in temporary accommodation “until a company house was ready for us.” In the meantime, Peter’s entrepreneurial talents had led him into property speculation and moneylending. Having bought land “at between £100 to £200 per acre,” he sold it “as small building plots at £800 to £900 per acre.” He claimed that he “accumulated property fast and there were not wanting those who envied my prosperity.”92 Possibly it was envy that triggered off his swift downfall. He became embroiled in a legal battle that resulted in the loss of all his property and a spell in prison. Claiming that he had been defrauded, Peter felt bitter that he had ended up “a pauper (thanks to Nova Scotians).” After working hard for twentyseven years and “having been nearly 12 years in North America,”93 he and his family returned to Cornwall with no money except what Peter had borrowed from his brother-in-law to finance their crossing.
Few men would have experienced Peter Barrett’s rapid rise and downfall. Most English immigrants were like the Yorkshire-born Adam Bousfield, who found work at the mines in Stellarton and later moved on to the Sydney mines as job opportunities presented themselves.94 Thomas Dixon, born in Exeter, ended up in South Harbour, Cape Breton, after becoming shipwrecked near the entrance of Cape North Harbour in 1834. After marrying Martha Fitzgerald, a local girl, he turned his hand to fishing, and together they “left many descendents [sic].”95 In fact, Cape Breton had a fair sprinkling of English inhabitants who struggled to make a living as fishermen. A plaintive request was sent in 1819 to the London Missionary Society96 by householders living at Ship Harbour, near Port Hawkesbury, who claimed they were “destitute of every means of religion.” Their community, “spread over 30 miles,” was increasing, “amounting to 1,000 souls.”97 Described as “extremely poor” fishermen living along the coast, they could not support a minister themselves, and hoped that the London Missionary Society would be able to provide financial help.98
The London Missionary Society also provided funding in 1815 for the Reverend John Mitchell, who was based at River John (Pictou County) but served the people in nearby Tatamagouche, as well. Intriguingly, he described the inhabitants as being “almost entirely French, but [they] always call themselves Protestant,” possibly indicating that many had Channel Island ancestry. The Reverend Mitchell had a gruelling life: “The place where I preach in Tatamagouche every fortnight is 13 miles from my house on River John … [each year] I travel upwards of 600 miles on very bad roads.” 99
By 1823 there were sufficient Anglicans in the town of Pictou for it to have its first Anglican church, which was completed in 1827 with funds provided by the Society for the Propagation of the Gospel and by Samuel Cunard, the local shipbuilder. But it was not until 1851 that the first Anglican church was built at Albion Mines.100 The Reverend Joseph Forsythe had “much difficulty” in dealing with newly arrived immigrants from Britain: “They have not been accustomed to religious or even moral habits.” As far as he was concerned they were “worthless demoralisers” who were “sunk in poverty.”101
The Reverend William Elder, the Anglican missionary based at Sydney Mines a decade earlier, reported that there were forty-six families (about three hundred people), living at or near the mines, who supported the Church of England.102 However, his successor, the Reverend Robert Arnold, found that few of the new arrivals “professed themselves to be of the Church of England” and felt that “the paucity of the clergy was a barrier to conversion.”103 He presumably agreed with the Reverend Forsythe!
Meanwhile, the Reverend William Young Porter, based at St. George’s Anglican Church in Sydney, had a more positive outlook but had to endure a staggering work schedule, as he travelled far and wide in Cape Breton County.104 His preaching commitments brought him to Sydney Mines, Baddeck, Northwest Arm, Coxheath, Glace Bay, Bridgeport, Cow Bay, Main-a-Dieu, Louisburg, Gabarus, Catalone, Mira, and the Forks of Sydney River. His claim that “members of other denominations seldom attended services” suggests that he mainly attracted people with English ancestry, who were clearly scattered along these coastal communities.105 The fisheries and coal mines were probably their principal sources of employment.106
Apart from mining industries, the province had little to attract immigrants, since most of the good farming land had long been settled by the earlier arrivals. About 174 immigrants arrived from Britain in 1850 and only about half that number the year before. The United Kingdom Commissioners of Land and Emigration concluded that “it did not seem that the people of Nova Scotia wanted any emigration.”107 The reality was worse than that, since not only was the province failing to attract immigrants, but much of its population was draining away to Upper Canada and the United States. The issue of prime concern to the province’s administrators was how to direct the outflow to Upper Canada rather than have people lost to the United States. Rising to the challenge, the Canada Company108 issued advertisements urging people “who may contemplate leaving Nova Scotia” to go to Upper Canada
rather than that they should proceed to the United States…. In Upper Canada they will find a most healthy climate, the soil very fertile, and abundance of excellent land to be obtained on easy terms from the Government and Canada Company. The great success which has attended settlers in Upper Canada, is abundantly evidenced by the prosperous condition of the farmers throughout the Country, and also shown by the success of many natives of New Brunswick and Nova Scotia who have settled in many townships of the country.109
Anxious to attract further immigrants, the provincial government organized an assisted emigration scheme in 1857 for some 350 Germans who arrived at Halifax in the Golconda: “During the afternoon crowds of these strangers could be seen on the streets…. There are many fine athletic fellows among them who bid fair to make good settlers.”110 The group, which included many tradesmen, had been recruited to work either in the Acadian Charcoal Iron Company’s iron mines at Nictaux Falls (Annapolis County), “which are now in active operation,” and at the smelter in Londonderry (Colchester County). But the initiative prompted an irate response from a Halifax resident, who criticized the government for being overly concerned about the needs of industry while neglecting the agricultural development of the province, since large areas of the interior still remained unsettled.111
Around seventy immigrants, mostly single miners, labourers, and domestic servants, arrived at Halifax from Liverpool in 1862,112 while more couples and families came in 1864, when seventy-eight English immigrants landed113 (see Table 1). Two years later nearly seven hundred assisted English immigrants arrived at Halifax from Liverpool expecting to find work in the mines and the Pictou Railway.114 The 260 or so Cornish miners included in the group headed chiefly for the gold-mining districts,115 while the other miners went to the coal mines at Cape Breton, Pictou, and New Glasgow.116 However, a sudden downturn in the province’s coal trade with the United States depressed employment prospects, and, feeling disappointed, most of the newly arrived coal miners either moved to the United States or returned home. But some of the Cornish men did well from contracts “for work in sinking shafts in the gold districts.”117
Table 1 Passenger Lists for Crossings from Liverpool to Halifax, 1862 and 1864
1. British Queen, Aylward master, April 1, 1862 [NSARM RG1 Vol. 272 Doc. 142]
| Name | Age | Occupation/Other |
|
|