[siebert] SETTLEMENTS ON THE GASPÉ PENINSULA 401 



The favorable character of this report led the Governor" General 

 to encourage Loyalists to settle on the Bay of Chaleurs, among the 

 various districts that were then being opened to their occupation. 

 Accordingly, towards the close of February, 1784, and again early 

 in May, information was published in Quebec and sent to the several 

 localities where the refugees were quartered that those desiring to 

 take up lands in the region indicated should hand in their names and 

 prepare to embark on the shortest notice. Word of the time and 

 place of departure was to be announced later. The official corre- 

 spondence of the period shows that the first embarkation was to 

 take place at Quebec about May 24, although it did not actually 

 occur until June 9. The response on the part of the refugees was 

 ludicrously disproportionate to the extensive area mapped out for 

 colonization in Sherwood's report. On the date named only three 

 hundred and fifteen persons sailed in the brigs St. Peter, and Polly, 

 the snow Liberty, the hoy St. Johns, and the four whale boats that 

 completed the convoy. Of the passengers one hundred and twenty- 

 nine were men, fifty-two, women, and one hundred and thirty-two, 

 children. They went provisioned from the first of June to the last of 

 August. On July 11 thirty-one men of the late 84th Regiment 

 departed for the same destination, for the purpose of establishing a 

 fishing settlement; on July 31 thirty-six persons followed with stores 

 and provisions; on September 10, three men, and on November 8, 

 twenty-one persons, with stores and provisions. According to this 

 enumeration of the settlers going to the District of Gaspé, the total 

 was only four hundred and six. 1 



The business of assigning lands to these settlers was entrusted to 

 Nicholas Cox, lieutenant governor of the District. On June 18 Cox 

 was at Percé, where he met the brig St. Peter and her passengers, 

 evidently the first to arrive. At the end of the week the Loyalists 

 proceeded to Paspebiac, where they were sent ashore to view the 

 land, but — according to the Lieutenant Governor — "could agree to 

 nothing." On Cox's recommendation Bonaventure was next visited, 

 because it afforded a convenient landing-place, a quantity of supplies, 

 and a shelter for the women and children. Attracted by the improve- 

 ments of the Acadian inhabitants of the neighborhood, the Loyalists 

 were not above proposing to deprive these people of their homesteads 

 in order to satisfy at a stroke their own needs; but when this was 

 declared impossible, they decided to return to Little Paspebiac, 

 which the Lieutenant Governor considered the best site for a town. 

 Matters now went forward rapidly: the early days of July found 



1 Haldimand, Papers B. 222, pp. 83, 84; B. 63, pp. 263, 285, 289, 294; B. 168, 

 pp. 30-35; B. 64, pp. 41, 238. 



Sec. I and II, 1914—27 



