V.        Canada, 1805 - 1853 

             James: Generation Five, Pennsylvania to Canada  


            Born in 1773 (or 1775) in the Catawissa area of Pennsylvania, James 
Hughes married Martha Penrose at the Friends Meeting in Roaring Creek in 
1799.  Quaker records show the Penroses as having lived in the Exeter area in 
prior decades, so the Hughes and Penrose families had probably long been 
acquainted.  Martha, of course, was a member of the Society of Friends.  The
 Roaring Creek Meeting had met for many years at her parents' home until a 
Meeting House was completed in 1796.  James died in 1867 after living into 
his 90s, and is buried at Pickering, Ontario, Canada.  Martha had died in 1856.

            In 1805, James, his pregnant wife Martha, and their two children, 
Rebecca and George, (ages three and one) set out for Canada with other 
Catawissa and Roaring Creek Quaker families.  They traveled on a newly 
completed road, known as the "Williamson Road," that ran north to Painted 
Post, Bath, and Geneseo in New York before swinging west to Fort Erie. (21) 
 From there, they rounded the western shore of Lake Ontario and continued 
north and east to the Uxbridge and Pickering areas.  (See map.)  I estimate 
that the trip totaled roughly 300 miles. 

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 Lewis and Clark made their famous journey across the continent, up the 
Missouri River and down the Columbia River and back, at the behest of 
President Thomas Jefferson during 1804-1806.
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            Their perception that it would soon be too crowded in the Catawissa area 
apparently was in part behind their decision to move.  (They should see it 
now!)  A new road completed in 1795 running south from Catawissa over the 
mountains to Reading had given easier access to markets.  However, it had 
also opened the way for many more settlers, and the Catawissa Quaker 
community came to feel that good, unsettled land for their own sons and 
daughters soon would not be available.

            Probably more important in their decision to move, however, was the 
success of an effort by the British Provincial authorities in Canada to attract 
settlers.  Britain, for example, began granting land in what is now the Toronto 
area of Ontario to colonists who had remained loyal to the crown during the 
Revolutionary War.  These were known as "Crown Grants."  In addition, the 
Ontario governor, a man named Simcoe, issued a proclamation in 1792 that 
offered free land to all who would cultivate it and sign an oath of loyalty to 
the king.  Farms were to be granted in 200 acre lots with the only charges 
being various clerks' fees.  After being smuggled into the western frontier 
of the United States, this proclamation attracted thousands of American-born 
settlers northward.

            The Quakers, being neither Loyalists nor Revolutionaries, either 
purchased their land from Loyalist grantees or were lucky enough to acquire 
and qualify for the 200 acre lots under Simcoe's proclamation.  The Quakers 
were unique in that they actually settled and lived on the land in contrast to 
many of the grantees, who owned the land largely for speculative purposes.  
Far more land at the time was held by Loyalists, British military landholders, 
and self-seeking officials than by settlers.

 James Hughes "patented" his lot on October 11, 1805.  The hand-written 
entry in the Canadian "Township of Uxbridge" records reads:



Lot No. 22 in the 5th Concession; Instrument, Patent; Its Date, Oct 11 1805; 
Grantee, Hughes, James; Quantity of Land, 200 Acres. 



            I believe that James arrived early enough that he acquired his land as 
one of Simcoe's grants, as indicated in the language of the Uxbridge records, 
rather than having to purchase it from a grantee.  One authoritative source (22) 
says that after James Hughes and others had patented lots around the Uxbridge-
Quaker Hill area of the fifth and sixth concessions, "....so quickly were the 
lands taken up by 'official' patentees that other Quaker settlers .... were forced 
to purchase their lands from non-resident patentees."

            The Uxbridge settlement was one corner of a triangle of three Quaker 
settlements in Ontario.  The others were "Yonge Street" in neighboring York 
county and the Pickering Quaker settlement in Ontario county.  Many of the 
original Uxbridge Quaker settlers, including the James Hughes family, did 
not stay there.  Some moved back to the U.S., but James and others went just 
a few miles south to Pickering.  James probably made that move in 1833 when 
Uxbridge records show that he sold his land, and as I mentioned on page four 
above, he is buried with Martha in the Pickering Orthodox Meeting Burial 
Ground. 

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 Charles Darwin's around-the-world voyage on the H.M.S. Beagle took 
place during 1831-1836, providing the basis for the development of his theory 
of natural selection.
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            Pictures of the headstones of James and Martha at Pickering.

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            The Role of the Rogers Family:  That Quakers from the Catawissa area 
of Pennsylvania were a significant group among the Uxbridge and Yonge 
Street settlers appears to be due in some measure to the efforts of a man named 
Timothy Rogers. (23)  Timothy Rogers was a Quaker either from Vermont or 
Connecticut, and hoped to increase the size of the Yonge Street Quaker 
community, to which he had moved.  To that end he had earlier -- around 
1800 or 1801 -- acquired 40 farms of 200 acres each with the promise that he 
would attract 40 families to settle on them.  How successful he was in 
attracting the 40 families is a bit murky, the only evidence being that he wrote 
in 1804 that there were "now" daily, monthly, and half-year Friends Meetings 
where he lived.  Timothy Rogers and his neighboring Quaker settlers in the 
Yonge Street area may have influenced James Hughes and his Catawissa 
neighbors when they moved in 1805. 

            One must read Timothy Roger's journal, in his own inimitable spelling 
and grammar, to understand why this part is murky. The evidence begins on 
page 178 of the printed journal, where he writes,


"And by a grate deal of hard travil got to York in this provans and then 
went 30 or 40 mils bac, and following my consarn maid way to apply to 
Garner Giminl Hontor (Governor General Hunter) and John Elsley, chefe 
justis became my frende and all the land was vuid by a company before me.  
I got bac and got a grant for 40 farms of 200 acors each by minding the 
felings on the Good Spirit in my hart .... etc."  (24)


            The courtship, if that's what it can be called, by Timothy Rogers' 
son, Wing Rogers, of James and Martha Hughes's daughter, Rebecca, is 
also worth reading, beginning on page 191 of the copy.
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        21  This is roughly the path of present day U.S. Route 15, except that 
U.S. 15 continues north to Rochester, New York.
        22  Johnson, Leo, A., History of the County of Ontario, 1973, The 
Corporation of the County of Ontario, pg. 46.
        23  Timothy Rogers was Kathy Miklovich's four-greats grandfather, if I 
have that right, and was related to our ancestors because his son, Wing Rogers,
married James Hughes' oldest daughter, Rebecca.
        24  The whole journal tells a lively story, especially of Timothy's 
childhood, when he was "...put out I livd among other pepil till I was 
about six years old and as they told me I was yoused very hard ...etc." and 
about his schooling, "I desir that all parens or gardeens will try to give ther 
childorn larning."  I would love to have heard him speak to hear the accent.