[siebert] loyalists AND SIX NATION INDIANS 95 



THE PERIOD OF ACTIVE SETTLEMENT IN THE PENINSULA. 



Butler's men were disbanded in June, 1784, but up to the end of 

 the month not more than 100 had signed the list of those desiring 

 lots. The reasons are not far to seek: many wished to bring their 

 families from the States, and there was no one at Niagara who felt 

 authorized to give them permission; besides, the surveys had not 

 yet been made, and, last but not least, the tenure was unsatisfactory. 

 The result was that on the night of June 27th, 70 of the non-signers 

 departed without leave and with the purpose of never returning, 

 while 30 others took passage about the same time to obtain Haldi- 

 mand's consent to their going into the States for their families. The 

 Governor readily gave them his permission, and wrote DePeyster 

 to extend the same indulgence to any others asking it. During the 

 month of July the prospects of the Loyalist settlement across the 

 Niagara greatly improved, for 258 officers and men agreed to take up 

 lands, making with their families a body of 620 persons. Of these, 99 

 were women, and 263 children. The new list of signers included not 

 only many of Butler's Rangers, but also other Loyalists, including 

 some of Brant's Volunteers. Within a year these persons and some 

 others found their places in the settlement, as indicated by a census 

 covering the period of six months ending with June 25, 1785. This 

 census gives the number of settlers as 770, 321 being men, 117 

 women, and 332 children. Most of these persons entered the Niagara 

 Peninsula at the foot of King Street in the town now known as Niagara- 

 on-the-Lake. 



At the close of March, 1784, Haldimand wrote Colonel De Peyster, 

 directing that the surveyor was to lay out the settlement in such a 

 manner as to reserve the high ground above Navy Hall and westward 

 to Four Mile Creek for the use of the Crown, in order that part of it 

 might be fortified whenever necessary; and in December following, 

 Philip Rockwell Frey, formerly a lieutenant in Butler's Rangers, 

 was appointed deputy surveyor for Niagara and Detroit, Samuel 

 Holland, the surveyor general, notifying Frey in January that he was 

 much needed at Niagara to survey lots. Apparently, Lieutenant 

 Frey did not go to the scene of his new duties until some time in the 

 summer of 1786, or later, for Major A. Campbell, who was now com- 

 mandant, wrote him early in July of this year expressing the hope 

 that he would come and make a regular survey of the whole settlement, 

 on account of "the irregularity allowed among the first settlers" 

 near Niagara, as well as on account of "the number of people daily 



^ Niagara Hist. Soc, No. 17, 16, 17; Cruikshank, Butler's Rangers, 113; Haldi- 

 mand Papers, B. 64, 51, 52; B. 168, 38-41. 

 - Niagara Hist. Soc, No. 4, 3. 



