Section II, 1919 [771 Trans. R.S.C. 



Some Notes on the Minutes of the Town Meetings of the Township 



of Sidney 



By W. S. Herrington, K.C, F.R.S.C. 



(Read May meeting, 1919) 



The Township of Sidney was numbered eight among the first 

 townships laid out upon the Bay of Quinte, although as a matter of 

 fact it was not the eighth upon the list either from the date of survey 

 or settlement. Richmond number ten had acquired some settlers as 

 early as 1785 and was probably surveyed in the latter part of that 

 year. Thurlow number nine was surveyed in 1786 and a few settlers 

 had taken up land the same year, but Sidney was neither surveyed nor 

 settled until 1787.^ At that time it was so remote from the more 

 thickly settled townships at the eastern end of the bay that it was 

 regarded as beyond the bounds of civilization; and the surveyor 

 evidently thought it scarcely worth his while to give his personal 

 attention to the matter, but left it to his less competent assistant 

 with the result that after a few years it was found necessary to direct 

 a new survey to be made. A few straggling settlers followed upon 

 the heels of the surveyors, and quite naturally selected what they 

 deemed to be the choicest locations. The practice adopted in the 

 first settled townships, of entering the names of the locatees upon a 

 map provided for the purpose was not followed in Sidney so we have 

 no reliable record of the locations of the original settlers. The records 

 of the Land Board are not a safe guide as many changes might and 

 no doubt did take place before the certificates of location were issued 

 by that body. 



Unlike the townships on the other side of the bay, Sidney, so 

 named after the Colonial Secretary under George II, did not long 

 retain its numerical appellation. It is not at all unusual, even at the 

 present day, to hear Marysburgh, Sophiasburgh and Ameliasburgh 

 spoken of respectively as the Fifth, Sixth and Seventh Town, but I 

 cannot recall ever having heard the township of Sidney called Eighth 

 Town. 



Although Sidney lags a few years behind its sister townships 

 upon the bay in the matter of survey and settlement it is the banner 

 township in organizing its town meetings and thus providing a means, 

 meagre though it was, for local self government. Adolphustown 



1 Canniff's Settlement of Upper Canada, p. 487. 



