In numerous conversations over the years with the late Leon Barron, he often mentioned schooners such as the Fieldwood and the Cape Blomidon. These ships, among many others, were built in the Canning shipyards and were well known in their day.

Many of our local sailing ship buffs are aware that the Fieldwood Heritage Society was named after the schooner. The Society’s website tells me that the Fieldwood was a tern schooner of 435 tons, was built by Lockwood and Fielding and launched in 1920. Apparently it was the last of a distinguished line of sailing ships, some 100 or more, built at the Bigelow shipyard; perhaps for this reason, the Fieldwood was chosen as the namesake of the Society.

The Cape Blomidon, a schooner of 408 tons, was built in 1919 by Harvey MacAloney, whom I believe was a Wolfville entrepreneur and a native of this town. The records indicate the ship was eventually abandoned on the beach at Parrsboro in 1937.

My interest in the Fieldwood and Cape Blomidon was piqued when I came across mention of a 1928 race involving these vessels and an American ship, the Lincoln. Apparently the three ships were loading lumber at Halifax in March and were preparing to sail at the same time for New York. In Sails of the Maritimes by John Parker (published 1960) the author writes that this was a “perfect set up for a race.”

While Parker doesn’t state that a contest was agreed upon, the implication is that when the ships left Halifax on March 2, at the very least bragging rights were at stake. However, it wasn’t much of a race. One day out, the vessels ran into one of those storms that plagued sailors along the Nova Scotia coast during the era of sailing ships. All three ships sought shelter along the coast, the Cape Blomidon in Liverpool, the others in Shelburne.

Four days later the weather moderated and the Fieldwood and Lincoln resumed their voyage. Once again a fierce gale struck and the vessels became separated. A week later both vessels reached the American coast; the Fieldwood apparently won the race since she arrived in New York first. In the meanwhile, the captain of Cape Blomidon played it safe, waiting until the fierce weather abated before setting sail from Liverpool and arriving in New York on March 19^th.

What is interesting about the race is that it was typical of the countless voyages sailing vessels made out of Nova Scotia. Accounts of all those voyages often tell of hardship, storms and shipwrecks. In effect, the story that John Parker told of the Cape Blomidon, Fieldwood and Lincoln is a microcosm of all those voyages.

Two books on construction of the great Wellington Dyke on the Canard River have been published. One was written by Brent Fox in 1985 and published by the Kings Historical Society. In 1997, Marjory Whitelaw wrote the second Wellington Dyke book, co-published by Nimbus Publishing Limited and the Nova Scotia Museum.

Both are excellent books, but my favorite is the work by Brent Fox. Brent’s book oozes with the nitty gritty, hands on work of building a dyke which required a lot of sweat and what Fox said were the “essential (black) rum rations.”

As Fox points out in his book, work on what eventually would be called the Wellington Dyke began decades before it was completed in 1825.

Shortly after the Planters arrived to take up the land of the Acadians, major efforts were made to dyke the Canard River; or actually to repair the dykes along the river that had been left untended between the period the Acadians were removed and the Planters arrived several years later.

1760 is usually given as the year the Planters reached Kings County. In 1759 a major storm, combined with high tides, destroyed a lot of the Canard River dykes the Acadians had built. The dykes had been in general disrepair at the time of the storm anyway, and the high tides and heavy winds made further inroads. As Brent Fox explains, the dykes were “already severely weakened by half a decade of a total lack of essential repair and maintenance (and) the aboiteaux was breached, letting in a large amount of sea water.” Nature had indeed played a cruel trick upon these newcomers, the Planters, Fox observed.

When I was last in the Nova Scotia Archives I accessed several documents regarding problems the Planters faced with broken dykes. On file is a letter from acting Governor Belcher to the Board of Trade referring to the breach “made in that of the River Canard in the Township of Cornwallis.” Belcher notes that attempts to restore the dykes were a combined effort of the “inhabitants with their cattle and carriages, together with those hired from Horton at their own expense,” and “provincial troops and French inhabitants.” The Acadians, Belcher said “were best acquainted with work of this kind.”

In another document in the Archives there’s a request by Belcher for financial aid to obtain at least 100 Acadians from different parts of the province to repair the dykes and instruct the settlers on dyke work. But even with the help of the Acadians there were other setbacks. Late in 1760, work on repairing the dykes was stalled once again by natural forces, and had to be put off until the following spring. Also, the provincial governing body was balking at granting funds to repair the dykes. In effect, they reminded settlers that despite damaged dykes, nearly 3000 acres of land were already available for farming.

In past columns (column 1, column 2) I’ve mentioned various houses that may have had “Acadian connections,” that is, these houses or sections of them may have existed around the time of the expulsion in 1755.

Some of us are skeptical that any house built here in the middle of the 18^th century would be sturdy enough to remain standing today. However, in Wolfville there’s the so-called Kent Lodge, said to have been built a few years after the expulsion of the Acadians. According to B. C. Silver and Dr. Watson Kirkconnell in the book, Wolfville’s Historic Homes (published 1967) here is some doubt about when the house was actually built; a plaque on the old home dates it from 1761.

Apparently the Planters began constructing permanent homes a few years after their arrival. For a time, some Planters occupied houses left standing after the Acadians were removed. While all of the Acadian homes in what is now Kings County were destroyed during the expulsion period, some were left standing in what is now West Hants and in Falmouth in particular.

Historian tells us that for over a year, many of the Planters lived in tents. It’s a matter of record, however, that some Acadian homes were left standing in West Hants and the settlers arriving after the expulsion took full advantage of them. “Although practically all the Acadian houses and buildings had been destroyed at Horton and Cornwallis during the time of the expulsion,” writes James Martell in a thesis on pre-loyalist settlement in Kings and Hants County, “many of them remained standing in Pisiquid, in West Falmouth and Fort Edward districts.”

Martell goes onto say that the West Falmouth Settlers took “full advantage of their opportunities” and an “equable division” of the remaining Acadian houses was made. Apparently there was what today we call a lottery or draw to determine who among the settlers would occupy the houses and use the outbuildings of the Acadians.

Martell quotes Henry Yould Hind who wrote about the division of land in his history of Windsor and its old burial ground (published 1899). I went directly to Hind’s book to see what he had to say. On June 23, 1760, at a West Falmouth township meeting, the settlers “voted that the buildings and all the boards and timber that is now in Falmouth …. shall be numbered and prized as equally as possible.” A draw was held seven days later and there were “28 awards.”

Martell makes two interesting comments regarding this division of Acadian property. “One of those strange twists of fortune is apparent in this apportionment of what remained of Acadian civilization at Falmouth, while the former owners looked on from across the river Pisiquid – military prisoners of the garrison at Fort Edward.”

A few years later, Martell says, the Falmouth settlers conveniently forgot they had divided up Acadian property. In a joint petition with other townships (asking for assistance apparently) the good settlers of Falmouth declared that on their arrival, they found “all dykes destroyed and fences and houses universally demolished.” Their petition can be found in the Public Archives of Nova Scotia.

“The exaggerated stories which are being told of the smallpox raging in Kentville would be amusing, if such stories were not told with the purpose of injuring the business of the town,” wrote The Advertiser’s editor in a September, 1901, issue.

“Travellers at different places have been told the town was under strict quarantine, and that if they came to this town they would not be able to leave,” the editor further wrote. This wasn’t the case, the editor said, and only two buildings in town were quarantined due to smallpox. Kentville was wide open and “people come and go at pleasure as long as they do not come in contact with …. the two buildings quarantined.”

As mentioned, the paper broadly hinted that, in effect, rumors were started so that “other places” (stores in nearby towns and villages, I assume) would have a business advantage if Kentville was closed. Kentville was the first place to report smallpox, The Advertiser’s editorialist said, plaintively noting that it was “brought in from other places and is as liable to be brought into any other place as well.” Earlier in the year, The Advertiser reported that a sailor who arrived in a barque in Kingsport had brought smallpox to the county.

But for the fact that it was a deadly disease the paper was writing about, this report would have been humorous. Less than a year later, however, The Advertiser reported something that was amusing. A prisoner of the town jail, which was quarantined due to smallpox, caused panic in the county when he simply walked out of the jailyard and disappeared. Recaptured later and taken back to jail, he explained that since his time was up and he was almost recovered from smallpox, he decided to go home.

Apparently around 1900 and 1901 there were isolated cases of smallpox in Kings County. By 1907, however, an epidemic was raging province-wide. In February, 1908, the provincial health officer reported that 1,860 cases of smallpox were treated in the previous year. While in most cases the disease was said to be mild, five deaths were reported.

The 1907 epidemic is believed to have been one of the worst outbreaks of smallpox in the province. If you look back, however, you’ll find that almost from the day the Planters arrived here, cases of smallpox kept on popping up all over Kings County, and around the province.

In the Public Archives, for example, is a document from 1778 that refers to a smallpox epidemic in the county. Also in the Archives are four letters from the same year, petitioning the government to be excused from jury duty due to the epidemic. In 1800, Simeon Perkins recorded in his famous diary that smallpox had killed nearly 200 people in Halifax and the disease was prevalent along the South Shore.

“The burnt land:” To me, there’s a hint of the dark and sinister in these words; but all they really are is a description of land from which trees have been felled and removed, and the brush or debris burned. The piece of land thus cleared – the “burnt land” – was then farmed or used as a pasture.

Creating burnt land and using it to plant various crops or to pasture cattle was a common, long ago farming practice in this area. It’s unheard of today. However, as recently as two or three generations ago, if a farm lot was forested – on the heavily treed slopes of the North or South Mountain here in Kings County for example, out of necessity you had to create pieces of burnt land.

“Everybody had a piece of burnt land,” says John Griffith, Canaan, of farming in the early days. “After the trees were removed, the brush was spread out over the cut piece and burned.” Griffith says there was a particular way the brush was spread – “in humps with the brush ends pointing downwards.” The brush usually was burned in the fall. The following spring the piece of burnt land was put to use.

Griffith recalls that turnips, carrots and oats were often grown on the burnt land. Turnips grown on burnt land were especially relished, he says. “They got a premium (on the farm market) for burnt land turnips, mostly because they’d be worm free.”

I first heard of burnt land farming when I was talking with Griffith many years ago. I had never heard the term before, and it caught my imagination. Most of today’s younger generations probably never heard of burnt land farming either.

In his privately published book My White Rock, Bert Young describes in detail how a piece of burnt land was created when he was a boy. When trees were removed, he writes, the brush was burned where it lay and the stumps left to rot. The soil between the stumps was tilled and planted.

In her book on farm life in the early days on the Forest Hill Road (privately published and distributed to family members) the late Lexie Davidson also describes burnt land farming. She writes about her father removing trees from a lot and “afterward he would burn over the area …. When planting time came around (he would) plant cucumbers or squash around the stumps in the burntland. He had a special burntland harrow to use for this type of terrain.”

Griffith and Davidson note that for a few years at least, the soil in the burnt land was highly productive and produced prime vegetable crops, probably because the burning process fertilized and nourished the land.

A “French military fort” is said to have once stood in New Minas, overlooking the Cornwallis River; folklore has it that the fort was located at the western edge of the village.

Regard this folklore with skepticism. Possibly the French once had a fort in what is now New Minas. But from a military point of view, the Acadian settlement here probably was never important enough to require fortifications, or even a French military presence.

There may be a simple explanation for this folklore. There was a military fort in this area around the time of the expulsion, but it wasn’t of French origin. The fort had an unusual, French sounding name, which perhaps may account for the folklore. The fort was called Vieux Logis, so named say historians for the Acadian locale where it was built. Vieux Logis may have been an Acadian place name.

But let’s go back to the year 1749 when Governor Edward Cornwallis founded Halifax. At the time Nova Scotia was a contested land and the French, along with their Mi’kmaq allies and some Acadians were waging an undeclared guerilla war against the British. As a result of the unsettled situation in Nova Scotia, Cornwallis ordered the building of a fort in the Minas region. Some references place Fort Vieux Logis in what is now Grand Pre, but most likely it was located near the Gaspereau River, possibly near the old wharf at Horton Landing.

In the history of Kings County, Arthur W. H. Eaton has four references to Fort Vieux Logis. Briefly, the fort was established by Cornwallis late in 1749 and abandoned in 1753 with the establishment of Fort Edward in Windsor. Eaton tells us the fort was attacked in 1749 by a “company of Micmac and Maliseet Indians.” While the fort was held after several attempts to take it, a British officer and 18 of his men were captured and taken to Chignecto where they were held for ransom.

While the troops stationed at Vieux Logis were removed to Fort Edward, the old fort still remained. Vieux Logis served the people of Horton Township long after arrival of the Planters. One of the prerequisites of settlement was the erection of palisaded forts in the various townships. Eaton says that the fort established in Horton was “probably …. Vieux Logis restored.”

Neither Eaton nor any other sources I’ve looked at on the history on this area tell us what became of Fort Vieux Logis. In fact, little has been written about the fort. Vieux Logis was occupied by English speaking troops, around a hundred in all, who lived among the Acadians for over four years; there must be a story there that needs telling.

Like other forts built in Kings County after the Planters arrived, Vieux Logis undoubtedly was torn down or eventually destroyed by the elements. No trace of it remains today, but archeologists believe they have pinpointed the area where it once stood.

As I’ve mentioned in this column previously, after the expulsion of the Acadians some of their homes and outbuildings were left standing, despite a concerted effort by the military to destroy them. Most of the Acadian homesteads in Kings County were burned to the ground. In his history of Kings County, Arthur W. H. Eaton writes that “two hundred and six houses and two hundred and thirty-seven barns were burned at Canard, Habitant and Pereau, and forty-nine houses and thirty-nine barns at Gaspereau. Burned at the same time were eleven mills and at Grand Pre, the Acadian church.

The destruction of Acadian homesteads in Kings County may have been complete; but around the Windsor area a number of Acadian homesteads were left standing. L. S. Loomer, in his history of Windsor, writes that while Acadian building in what are now the townships of Horton and Cornwallis were destroyed, “those at Pesegitk and Ste. Croix valleys were not burned.”

It is also believed that Acadian buildings outside the main settlement area in Kings County were still standing after the expulsion. In previous columns I wrote about two houses that according to folklore can be traced back to the Acadians. One is the Dimock House in Pereau, which in 1988 was subject to an archaeological survey to determine its origin. While the Dimock House is indeed ancient, no definite conclusions were reached on its Acadian origin.

Another building believed to have Acadian roots is the so called Falmouth House, which once stood by the Baptist Church in Falmouth. This house may have been constructed around 1766 by Acadians held prisoner at Fort Edward. However, historical writer Regis Brun of Moncton told me via e-mail that the building is possibly “the house of an Acadian tenant in Falmouth, (and was) built around 1766-68.

If the Falmouth House still stood today it would be one of the oldest buildings in this area. In 1970 the building was hauled to Grand Pre, apparently by Parks Canada, and it stood for a few years in the park by the blacksmith shop. Brun tells me it was studied by “so called experts” and deemed “not Acadian and not relevant.” The house was taken apart and burned in 1974.

Parks Canada apparently had determined that the Falmouth House was built no earlier than the first quarter of the 19^th century; between 1800 and 1825, in other words. Mr. Brun suggests otherwise, as I mentioned above, and folklore agrees with him.

There’s no doubt Parks Canada acted hastily when it came to the Falmouth House, and it should have been preserved. Perhaps with a thorough and less hasty examination, an Acadian connection with Falmouth House would have been established.

No statue of him exists anywhere, and as far as I know, no plaque honoring him and his accomplishments exists anywhere either. Until the Internet came along, you had to dig into relatively obscure corners – the publications of the Nova Scotia Historical Society, for example – to find any mention of this gentleman.

Even today when information flows freely, little is known of the man who in the 19^th produced a groundbreaking series of maps of the counties of Nova Scotia. Ambrose Finson Church is virtually unknown, and he still remains a man of mystery; yet his masterpieces, the “Church maps,” are hailed as genealogical treasures and are unequaled as a genealogy tool.

In this area, for example, one of the first things most people consult when searching for their roots is the topographical map Church prepared of Kings County. There’s no better place to start actually. The Kings County map indicates the heads of households in each community, indicates approximately where households were situated along county roads, and as a bonus, lists tradesmen and prominent citizens.

Between 1865 and 1888, Church produced a series of county maps for the province, 18 in all. Church produced his first map, of Halifax County, in 1865; his last map, of Queens County, was made in 1888. Somewhere in between these dates the map of Kings County was produced; while this map is dated 1864, the Department of Natural Resources records indicate it was published in 1872. When Church actually surveyed householders and drew up the map of Kings County isn’t known but it must have been between 1865 and 1872.

As popular as the Church maps are with genealogists, professional and amateur alike, Church, as I said, is a relatively mysterious figure; he was an American citizen and may have been a deserter from the army. Around 1969, the provincial archivist Charles Bruce Fergusson made a determined effort to write the story of Ambrose Church and his maps. “Justice to his memory and a proper appreciation of his work seem to warrant at least a biographical sketch,” Fergusson wrote.

However, Fergusson quickly discovered that writing the biography would be difficult. “I was amazed at how little information was generally available,” he wrote after checking a variety of records. Extending his search to America and as far as Rio de Janeiro, Fergusson eventually determined that Church arrived in Nova Scotia in 1865. In the States he had been employed with a mapmaker, Jacob Chace Jr., who in 1862 had been dickering with the Nova Scotia government regarding the creation of county maps and had already surveyed portions of the province.

On the death of Chace in 1864, Church offered to furnish the maps that Chace proposed. As mentioned, Church produced the maps between 1865 and 1888, but only a few false starts and lengthy negotiations with the government, which Fergusson chronicles in detail.

As for the biographical sketch, the best Fergusson could come up with was a general description of Church – “a bearded, short, rather stout sort of man who always wore a beaver hat” – some general information on his immediate family, and the fact that while he was a “respected resident of Nova Scotia for many years,” he never relinquished his American citizenship. In the 1970 paper on Church in the publications of the Nova Scotia Historical Society, Fergusson writes that in addition to the county maps, Church produced a map of the Dominion of Canada in 1867 and in 1889, a mineral map of Nova Scotia.

Church left Nova Scotia for Rio de Janeiro around 1914; he died there of a stroke in 1920. Fergusson concluded his sketch of Church with the statement that “his maps, particularly his County Maps of Nova Scotia, are his memorial.” Copies of the Church county maps are available from the Department of Natural Resources.

“Perhaps it was 200 years ago the Acadians spied the advantage of the land, settled there, made some clearings and planted their orchards,” Dr. Benjamin Rand wrote in the 19^th century. Rand is quoted by provincial archivist W. C. Milner in his book, The Basin of Minas and Its Early Settlers. Published circa 1930 in Wolfville, the book contains some 70 historical articles, many on the early villages around the Minas Basin.

Dr. Rand is referring to the Acadian site that eventually would become the village of Canning. However, the Mi’kmaq were there first. Rand notes that it was the Mi’kmaq who found the location a “natural one, owing to the head of the river,” and established an encampment there well before the Acadians arrived. When the Acadians settled here, they, like the Mi’kmaq, “spied the advantage of the land …. made some clearings and planted their orchards.”

In Acadian times, Rand says, “apple trees grew down to the tideway of Canning and the shipping of the port consisted of shad boats that going out in the ebb, returned in the flood with their fares.” The Acadians remained at this site “until the ‘Grande Derangement’ of 1755, when harried and beaten they fled.”

This is one of the earliest glimpses we have of Canning, thanks to Milner who as provincial archivist, had access to many unpublished historical papers and compiled them in a book. Of course we owe a debt to Rand, as well. In his time he was a noted historian and genealogist. Rand is mentioned several times in Eaton’s Kings County history, and some of his research on Canning is included in this work.

Many of the villages W. C. Milner profiled in his book were in Kings County, and many of his historical sketches centered around the County as well. Also, the fact that he published his entire book in installments in the Wolfville Acadian leads me to believe he favored this area and had a Kings County connection. This may have been through marriage since there’s no record of a Milner family in the Wolfville history, Mud Creek.

By the way, here’s an aside from the Milner book. Port Williams, says Milner, was almost named Bestville, apparently because most of the land in the village was once owned by Elisha Best. “But patriotic sentiment prevailed,” Milner writes, to call it Port Williams “to perpetuate the name of General Williams who came from Halifax to inspect the little garrison at Town Plot.”

The story of the War of 1812 has been told and retold by historians from almost every possible viewpoint and it’s beyond the scope of this column to rehash this conflict.

However, if you’re one of the countless walkers who enjoy the hiking path that begins on Cornwallis Street in Kentville and runs eastward towards New Minas, you have to pass the north side of Oak Grove Cemetery. In doing so, you have strolled near a Kentville connection with the War of 1812. Obviously, the connection must be something in the cemetery. But before I tell you more about this, let’s look at some early Kentville history and the story of Oak Grove Cemetery.

The cemetery officially came in to existence in 1817 and was part of the farm of Benjamin Peck Jr., a second generation Planter. Three writers on Kentville’s early days, Mabel G. Nichols, E. J. Cogswell and Leslie Eugene Dennison, mention that the half acre of hill that became Oak Grove

Cemetery was used as a burial ground before 1817; Cogswell refers to it as “the old oak burial ground,” Dennison says it was called “The Oaks,” and Nichols says it was once known as Oakhill Cemetery and some headstones there date from 1774.

It’s recorded in Eaton’s Kings County history that when Benjamin Peck Jr. sold his farm in 1817, his parents and several other persons were buried there. It was the half acre, a knoll where his parents were buried, that Peck reserved as a public burial ground when the farm was sold.

Now we come to the gentleman who purchased the farm and the connection with the War of 1812. He was none other than one of the most famous privateers in Nova Scotia history, Capt. Joseph Barss Jr. of Liverpool. Barss was one of many Nova Scotia privateers that harassed American shipping on the Atlantic during the war and he was one of the most successful. Commanding the schooner Liverpool Packet, in one year Barss captured 33 American vessels, becoming famous – and rich – in the process.

Barss’ luck as a privateer ran out on June 11, 1812, when he was forced to surrender the Liverpool Packet to a much larger and better armed schooner out of New Hampshire. Barss was imprisoned along with his crew; he was set free, says one source, during a prisoner exchange. Another source, a Queens County website, says Barss was set free on condition that he not return to privateering.

Several years after being released, in 1817, Barss and his family moved to Kentville and purchased the farm of Benjamin Peck Jr. Why Kentville? you may ask. This may be explained by Barss’ marriage in 1804 to Olivia DeWolf. In a way, the move to Kentville was a homecoming for Olivia. She was the daughter of one of Wolfville’s most prestigious natives, Judge Elisha DeWolf. Mud Creek, the Wolfville history, notes that DeWolf held public office for 53 years; he served as High Sheriff of Kings County, as a postmaster, excise collector, Justice of the Peace and was elected to the provincial legislature on three occasions.

Barss raised a large family after he settled on his farm in Kentville, says one source, but his stay would be a short one. Less than a decade after buying the Peck farm, in 1824, Barss died; he was in his 49^th year. Barss was buried in Oak Grove Cemetery, and his headstone still stands there.

Now you know about Kentville’s War of 1812 connection and the famous privateer buried in the town.