58 THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF CANADA 
period of service, they were not to be persuaded, and many of them 1 in 
spite of all remonstrance returned to their homes.! 
Governor Lawrence paid a visit to the settlements on the Basin 
of Minas in 1760. The condition of the damaged dikes, more particularly 
the breach made by the storm at the River Canard, was the object of 
his special attention. All the inhabitants with their cattle and carts 
were called out and with the help of the troops and a few Acadians 
soon effected sufficient repairs to insure the possibility of raising 
sufficient bread corn for the next year. 
Another object that engaged the Governor’s attention was the 
construction of a road from Halifax to the townships on Minas Basin. 
For this purpose he employed all the troops that could be spared from 
duty. By the end of the year the track opened up had become a 
“good horse road.” One of the first persons to make use of it was the 
Rev. Mr. Breynton, of St. Paul’s church in Halifax, who in the autumn 
of 1760, visited East and West Falmouth, Horton and Cornwallis, at 
all of which places he preached to large congregations, and although 
the people were for the most part ‘dissenters from the Established 
church,”? he was much pleased at the heartiness with which they 
welcomed him and at their cordial invitation to revisit them at no 
distant day. He states that his journey going and coming was mostly 
through the woods on horseback and attended with much fatigue and 
exposure. He was the first clergyman to minister to the settlers after 
their arrival in Nova Scotia. A year or two later Rev. Mr. Bennet was 
sent aS a missionary to the townships. 
The first settlers of Falmouth came from Newport, Rhode Island, 
early in May, 1760, in the sloops Sally and Lydia. Their settlement 
was established under the supervision of Isaac Deschamps, Esq.,° 
Government agent and magistrate at Fort Edward. They landed at 
a place, now known as Avondale, on the east side of Piziquid basin. 
1 See ete aan in Nova Scotia Published Archives, pp. 465, 479-482. See 
also Raymond’s History of the River St. John, pp. 258-260. 
? In the first session of the House of Assembly of the Province, in 1758, it was 
enacted that the worship of the Church of England should be considered the fixed 
form of worship in Nova Scotia, but that all dissenters from the Church, Papists 
excepted, should have free liberty of conscience and “might build meeting houses 
for public worship and choose and elect ministers for carrying on Divine Service and 
administering the Sacraments according to their several opinions.” 
# Isaac Deschamps was of Swiss extraction and came to Nova Scotia early in 
life. In 1754 he was at Fort Edward (Piziquid) as clerk to Joshua Mauger. He 
was elected a member of the House of Assembly for West Falmouth in 1761. At 
this time he had a general supervision of the townships of Horton, Cornwallis, Fal- 
mouth and Newport. In 1763 he received £150 for three years’ services in trans- 
acting affairs at the new settlements. There were at that time settled in Horton 
