104 THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 



Burch's saw mill and grist mill were erected near the Falls in Town- 

 ship No. 2, and five years later John Donaldson located a saw mill 

 on Muddy Run near the Whirlpool in the same township. In 1787 

 Township No. 3 was provided with both kinds of mills, when Robert 

 Hamilton completed those begun in the previous year by Duncan 

 Murray on Twelve Mile Creek. Another saw mill was added in 

 1789 by Samuel Street and Colonel Butler, the location being on 

 Fifteen Mile Creek. The westward trend of the incoming colonists 

 is shown not only by the location of Butler and Hamilton's mills, 

 but also by the sites selected for five others that were building about 

 the same time. Thus, in 1788 and 1789, the power supplied by Forty 

 Mile Creek in Township No. 6 was utilized by John Green for his two 

 mills and in 1792 by Robert and William Nelles for their saw mill, 

 while in 1790 that of Thirty Mile Creek in Township No. 5 was utilized 

 by William Kitchen for two more. In the following year Philip 

 Stedman, Sr., built a saw mill on Black Creek about 7 miles back of 

 Fort Erie, which was supplemented by a grist mill constructed near 

 the fort in 1792 by William Dunbar and by another in the adjoining 

 township to the westward, near Sugar Loaf Hill, the last being erected 

 by Christian Savitz. The interior townships, like the Head of the 

 Lake, come late in this period of mill building. In 1791 David 

 Secord erected a grist mill in Township No. 10, and the next year 

 both Benjamin Canby and John Decow built saw mills in Township 

 No. 9. Of the 24 mills acquired by the Peninsula during these years, 

 11 were grist mills. At Fort Erie, St. Davids, Grimsby, and Burling- 

 ton the mills became centers of barter and trade, about which small 

 villages soon developed.^ 



NIAGARA DURING SIMCOE's ADMINISTRATION, 1792-1796. 



The movement of the Loyalists and other Americans into Upper 

 Canada resulted in the separation of this region from the Province 

 of Quebec. The bill authorizing this separation was introduced 

 into the House of Commons, March 7, 1791, and became law on 

 the 14th May of following. The gentleman who was appointed 

 lieutenant governor under this act was Colonel John Graves Simcoe, 

 a member of Parliament during the passage of the bill and one who 

 took a prominent part in the discussions which it evoked. Simcoe 

 left England for the field of his new duties late in September, and ar- 

 rived at Quebec, November 11. A week later. Lieutenant Governor 

 Alured Clarke issued a proclamation designating the boundary line 



1 Niagara Hist. Soc, No. 26, 49-51; No. 5, 13, 19; Caniff, Settlement of Upper 

 Canada, 209. 



