SECTION II., 1901 [ 63 ] Trans. R.S. C. 
III. Thomas Hutchinson, the last Royal Governor of the Province of 
Massachusetts Bay. 
By the REVEREND W. H. WiruHrow, D. D. 
(Read May 23, 1901.) 
The story of the brave men who continued loyal to Great Britain 
during the revolt of the American colonies is one of grandest heroism. 
In the severe testing of character caused by the war these Abdiels of 
the Revolution, “faithful found among the faithless,” were severely 
tried and were not found wanting. They were exposed to suspicion 
and insult and often to wanton outrage and spoliation. They were 
denounced by the local assemblies as traitors. Their property was con- 
fiscated, their families were ostracized, and not unfrequently their lives 
were menaced. 
The close of the war was followed by the exodus of many thousands 
of these true-hearted men and their households, who for conscience’ sake 
abandoned their homes, often large estates, to return to the old land 
which they so ardently loved either as their own birth land or as the 
land of their fathers, or to encounter the discomforts of new settlements 
or the perils of an unknown wilderness. The number of those who so 
accepted exile rather than forswear their allegiance to their King it has 
been said was relatively as large as the number of Huguenots expa- 
triated from France by the revocation of the Edict of Nantes. 
“We may fairly estimate,” says Sir John Bourinot, the’ Honorary 
Secretary of the Royal Society of Canada, “that between eighty and 
one hundred thousand men, women and children were forced to leave 
and scatter throughout the world.” Of this number between thirty and 
forty thousand people came to the provinces of the present Dominion. 
More than two-thirds of the exiles settled in the provinces of Nova 
Scotia and New Brunswick. The British Parliament voted them an 
allowance of nearly sixteen million dollars, besides considerable annui- 
ties, land grants and the like. 
Sir John Bourinot, in his recent volume, “Canada under British 
Rule,” has paid in eloquent words a due meed of praise to the 
heroic men and women who for their fidelity to their noble ideal of the 
unity of the empire, a conception which is only now being grasped in 
all its significance, received the ever to be honoured name of United 
Empire Loyalists. 
Of the U. E. Loyalists, Lecky remarks : “ They comprised some of 
the best and ablest men America has ever produced, and they were 
