Readers of this paper who follow my column will recall the name of Keith Barry of Edmonton, whom I’ve mentioned numerous times; especially Barry’s connection with the noted Canard horticulturist and historical writer, the late Ernest L. Eaton.  Mr. Barry created and maintains a website on Eaton with many of the latter’s historical sketches on Kings County.

Recently Barry e-mailed me about the column on Edmond J. Cogswell, sending along information that gives us a better picture of this little known historical writer.

“I read with interest your article and have a few items to mention” Barry wrote, pointing out Cogswell is mentioned several times in Arthur W. H. Eaton’s Kings County history.  On page 31, for example, Eaton quotes from Cogswell’s research on the Acadian settlement in New Minas.  Readers interested in the early day in New Minas and haven’t seen this quote will find it interesting.  (One of my future projects will be to locate the complete paper from which Eaton quoted.)

Getting back to Barry’s letter, he writes that Cogswell graduated from Harvard with a Bachelor of Law degree with the Class of 1868-1869; that while he’s not mentioned in the Nova Scotia Census of 1861, the 1871 Census found him at age 32 living in Centreville with Gideon and Ruth Reid.  In the 1881 Census he is living with his mother and a housekeeper in Centreville.  The 1891 finds him in the same situation. In this Census his first name is incorrectly given as Edward.  As for his religion, Edmond is listed as a Baptist in both 1881 and 1891.

I mentioned in the earlier column that there was confusion about Edmond’s marital status.  An extract from the Berwick Register, dated April 3, 1913, clears this up:  “Cogswell, Mrs. Bessie Randall, d/o Charles D. Randall, wid/o Edmund J. Cogswell, died at Wolfville, 23 March 1913.”

Barry writes that he can find no other record of her death or marriage. A challenge as well, Barry says, is determining when Cogswell married Bessie. “There are several options.  He married early, between 1869 and 1871.  Between any one of the Censuses.  Late in life between 1891 and 1901.  (His mother died 31 March 1894, so possibly after that?)

“In any event,” Barry concludes, “it would have been a brief marriage.”

What is even more puzzling about Cogswell is his lack of recognition as a historical writer.  From what I’ve read of his work he apparently delved deeply into the Acadian settlement in New Minas and did a lot of research.  He had an interest as well into the early road and trails of Kings County and published an article or two on them in the Kentville newspaper that preceded the Advertiser.

I like to think of it as the Irish Project, the search for the Irish of Kings County. The project was started just over a year ago and is an effort by the Community and Family History Committee of the Kings County Museum to trace Irish families.

As mentioned in this column last year, the main focus of the Committee is on tracing families that emigrated from Ireland and settled in Kings County during the 1700s and 1800s. I spoke recently to Committee member Glenda Bishop and she said their efforts to date generated 27 responses. “The project is going well,” Bishop said, “but a lot of research still has to be done.”

I assume that at a future time a database will be created on the Irish families of Kings County. If you have Irish roots, your ancestors settled in Kings County and you have a story to tell, I urge you to contact the museum so you can be included. Nelson Labor is the chair of the Committee and he can be reached via email at genealogy@okcm.ca.

One of the intriguing questions about the Irish that came to Kings County, by the way, is why most of them settled in outlying areas. Were they outcasts and unwelcome? Was religion a factor in why the Irish appear to have been relegated to hardscrabble areas on the North Mountain and far out on the New Ross Road? Is it a fact that most of the good farm land had already been claimed by Planters and Loyalists and as latecomers, there was little left for Irish settlers?

Perhaps some of these questions will be answered after the Community and Family History Committee finishes its Irish project. Glenda Bishops tells me there were many interesting stories in the responses received to date by the Committee. What stands out in these tales is that Irish families usually wound up in unsettled places, never or hardly ever on or even near the prime farmlands of Kings County.

Of course this isn’t true of all the Irish who arrived here. Take Henry Magee, for example. A Loyalist who was chased out of the States when the American Revolution succeeded, Magee became a prominent Kentville businessman. In 1788 Magee built a home, a store and a mill here. In his time, to quote from a Kings County Vignette, Magee was saluted as a “merchants, miller, trader, pawnbroker and friend of the whole community.”

There were few Irishmen like Magee, of course. Most were like my great grandfather, David Coleman, who according to family lore was a rough farmer who scratched out a living on the North Mountain. David was like those other Irish settlers who came here before, during and after the famines in Ireland. Hopefully, once the Irish project of the Community and Family History Committee is completed, the stories of the likes of David Coleman will be recorded for posterity.

Clarke’s history of the railway, written by a Kentville train conductor and published circa 1920 is difficult to find today. The Dominion Atlantic Railway’s website notes that the book was printed in a limited run “on inexpensive acidic paper,” meaning I suppose that time eroded and destroyed most of the copies.

I’ve only seen one copy of Clarke’s work and it occupies a special place in my bookshelf. I was told by a long-time railroader, whose father worked with Clarke, that 200 to 300 copies were printed, some of which were given to friends and fellow employees. While produced inexpensively and not made to last, surely more than a few of those books are extant, most likely in stored away belongings of old railroad families.

Beside my copy of Clarke’s work, another can be found in the book collection at the Kings County Museum. Don Foster, a railway collector in Grafton, has two copies, one autographed by Mr. Clarke. This makes the book rare indeed. As for the dollar value of the book, it would depend on what a railroad buff/collector would be willing to pay for it.

Above, I mentioned the circa 1920 publishing date. The late Leon Barron, an avid collector or railway artefacts in his day, told me the book may have been printed in Windsor in 1925, by the printing company that published the Hants Journal. Based on employee lists published in the book, Don Foster believes that 1925 was the year of publication.

William W. Clarke was an employee of the Dominion Atlantic Railway and the Windsor & Annapolis Railway, where he started as a water boy. On his demise in Kentville at age 64 he had been a railway employee for about 50 years. He was hailed as an “outstanding figure in railway history” by The Advertiser when his death notice was published in 1929.

While I have many details on the life of William W. Clarke (thanks to the scrapbook collection at the Kings County Museum) I can’t say the same about the author of another rare historical book.

At sometime in the 1930s W. C. Milner published a collection of historical sketches in Wolfville. The Basin of Minas and its Early Settlers is the title of his collection. Like Clarke’s book, I’ve quoted from Milner’s work many times in this column. Also like Clarke’s work, Milner’s book is difficult to find. I’m aware of the existence of only four copies. One is in the rare book collection at Acadia University; another copy is in the collection of Wolfville historian Ivan Smith, the creator and caretaker of the Nova Scotia History Index; a third copy is in my bookcase and the forth in the hands of a book collector in Truro.

Milner was the head archivist for the province of Nova Scotia, having at his fingertips sources some historians would kill to access. In his book are some 70 short historical essays in 132 pages, many of them about towns, villages and historical events in the Annapolis Valley. The essays apparently were first published as a series in Wolfville’s weekly newspaper, the Acadian, and then put together and published as a book.

What’s the Wolfville connection with Milner? Apparently Dr. Milner retired to this town, possibly in the 1920s. John Whidden, who recently published a book on the older homes of Wolfville, tells me he found a reference to Milner in his research. Whidden say that in 1926, L. Fairn designed and E. S. Langille built a house for Dr. Milner at 147 Main Street in Wolfville.

We can speculate that after retiring to Wolfville, Milner wrote his series of historical essays in his new home. Exactly when the book was published is anyone’s guess but I believe it was in the early 1930s. As I said, the book is rare, extremely rare. And costly as well compared to Clarke’s book. One of those four copies I mentioned sold for $125 over a decade ago when it was offered for sale by an Ottawa bookdealer.

In 1887, in Prince Edward Island, Charles Dalton began raising foxes commercially. In yet another little-known Maritime first, Dalton and other farmers in P.E.I. laid the foundation for successful fox farming, creating and pioneering techniques eventually used world-wide.

The success Dalton and others enjoyed apparently created an interest in fur farming here in Kings County. The folklore about long ago attempts to set up a fox farm on Boot Island in Grand Pre mention a Prince Edward Island connection, suggesting P.E.I. farmers and stock were involved.

In its heyday, when clothing markets world-wide were clamouring for wild animal pelts, the success of fox farming in places like P.E.I. led to serious attempts to commercially raise mink and other furbearers. A 1945 report on miscellaneous fur farms in Canada indicates besides mink and fox, Canadians attempted to commercially breed raccoon, marten, fisher, coyote, badger, fitch, beaver and lastly, the muskrat. In 1927 alone there were 172 muskrat farms in Canada. By 1938, according to Dominion Bureau of Statistics reports, most had folded.

There was a little known attempt here in Kings County to commercially raise muskrats. Muskrat farming was tried in Lower Canard in the late 1930s or early 1940s. The farm failed for various reasons and all that remains of it today are a few memories and a sign marking the ranch site. I discovered the site over 50 years ago. Puzzled by what seemed to be large pieces of sheet metal in a swamp off the Canard River, I asked around and was told I had found the fencing of a muskrat farm.

Information about the ranch has been hard to come by. Local talk has it the ranch failed in short order, leaving says local folklore a few embarrassed Kings County farmers in its wake. I have the names of people supposedly involved in the ranch but have been unable to confirm they were involved or how far along the enterprise got before it shut down.

Besides the folklore – call it folksy country gossip if you wish – and the sign marking the site near Jawbone Corner, the only concrete evidence of the muskrat farm’s existence I have is a letter dated November 23, 1944. I discovered the letter tucked in a book I was thumbing through at a yard sale; the letter was a reply from the Department of Lands and Forests to an inquiry about the legality of pelting muskrats kept in captivity.

From the letter’s content it was obvious a muskrat farm was being contemplated here. The letter was addressed to a Kings County farmer, a man local talk says was involved in the muskrat farm and was a major investor. That same local folklore says the farm failed soon after being established, the muskrats being excellent tunnelers quickly fleeing the ranch site despite the sheet metal fencing.

I’m still digging into the history of the muskrat farm and would like to hear from anyone familiar with it. I can be reached by email at edwingcoleman@gmail.com.

This sign in Lower Canard marks the site of an early attempt to set up a muskrat farm in Kings County. (E. Coleman)

The Cogswell family of Kings County has always “ranked among the county’s foremost families,” writes Arthur W. H. Eaton.  Eaton’s Kings County history gives one Hezekiah Cogswell as the founder of the family here.  Hezekiah was a Cornwallis grantee; when he arrived here in 1761, writes Eaton, he received a land grant of one and a half shares, the equivalent of about 1000 acres.

I mention Hezekiah since one of his descendants, as well as being a prominent Kentville citizen, was also a historical writer and researcher.  For the most part, Edmond John Cogswell’s historical research and writing has gone unrecognised.  Much of his work was printed in the newspapers of the time, in particular the Kentville based Western Chronicle, but nothing was published in book form except for a genealogy of the Cogswells.*

In addition to numerous newspaper articles on the history of Kings County, Cogswell also wrote a short history of Kentville.  The history was published in 1895 in the Western Chronicle.  Later, some unknown and enterprising soul copied this history from the newspaper and made several copies of it, at the same time including an invaluable index.

Most of Cogswell’s historical writing can be found at the archives in Halifax.  However, a few years ago Kings County Museum curator Bria Stokesbury visited the archives and photocopied many of Cogswell’s articles.  These are on file at the Museum; Thanks to Stokesbury, I have a number of them and these have been my source, along with the Kentville history, when I quoted Cogswell in this column. At least one of his historical essays is reproduced in a 1930s book, W. C. Milner’s The Basin of Minas and its Early Settlers.

In his Kings County history, Eaton includes a sketch of the Cogswell family line, beginning as I said with Hezekiah Cogswell.  But Eaton only follows Hezekiah’s line for a few generations, and I was unable to discover from this work how Edmond J. is descended from him.  However, the Cogswell file at the Kings County Museum was helpful.  According to the file, Edmond’s father was Gideon; Gideon’s father was Mason, a son of Hezekiah.  Mason was around 11 years old when he arrived here in 1761 along with his brothers and sisters.

Edmond John Cogswell was born on May 25, 1838, apparently in Cornwallis, Kings County, since the records indicate his parents resided there.  I’ve been unable to find anything on his early years but two sources indicate he obtained a law degree from the University of Halifax (Dalhousie?) and a similar law degree from Harvard.  Apparently he practiced in Kentville where he was a probate court judge from 1887 until the time of his death.  Edmond died in 1901 (another source says the year of his death was 1900) and is buried in the Billtown Cemetery.

There appears to be confusion about his marital status.  I have a letter from an American relative of Cogswell who writes that a genealogy on the family, compiled in 1998, indicates Edmond was unmarried since no spouse or children are listed.  On Google, however, is a Cogswell blog where Edmond’s name comes up.  Mentioned there is discovery of a death notice for his widow.  Some sources spell Edmond’s name as Edmund but I believe my usage is the correct one.

*Cogswell’s book, titled The Cogswell Family Genealogical Material, 1881-1882, was published in the early 1880s.