[raymond] THE FIRST GOVERNOR OF NEW BRUNSWICK 433 



Winslow, it may be observed in passing, was a nephew of General 

 John Winslow who was actively employed under Shirley and Lawrence 

 in the deportation of the Acadians of Grand Pré. He was in no way 

 responsible for the part played by his relative in the expulsion. He 

 was a man of kindly nature, friendly to the Acadians, and when he 

 filled the office of President and Commander in Chief of the province 

 in 1808 treated them with consideration. 



Lord Dorchester, writing to his brother on January 3, 1787, sent 

 a conciliatory message to the Acadians, having heard that they had 

 "not only been driven off their lands, but in other ways ill treated." 

 He recommended that, in order to prevent a misfortune of the kind 

 in future, grants should be made out for them in the customary form. 

 The Governor had already taken steps to this end of which we shall 

 presently speak more particularly. 



When Edward Kavanagh and John G. Deane visited the Mada- 

 waska region in 1831 they were told by the settlers of the troubles 

 the founders of their settlement had experienced at the hands of the 

 disbanded troops. Kavanagh endeavored to make use of the infor- 

 mation in the interests of the United States in connection with the 

 north-eastern boundary dispute, which had then entered upon an 

 acute stage. He states that the Acadians who repaired to Saint 

 Anne after the treaty of 1763 desired to remain unknown. He adds: 



"They gathered on that spot some of the remnants of their race and com- 

 menced cultivating the soil, acknowledging no allegiance to any power on earth 

 and most certainly disinclined to court the attention of British barbarity. 

 In 1784 they were discovered and their lands were granted to a disbanded regi- 

 ment of Refugees, commanded by one Colonel Lee (of Massachusetts) it is said. 

 The first notice which these simple people had of the fact was the appearance 

 of British surveyors in their peaceful region. They remonstrated, and as a 

 matter of special favor they were told that each might retain his dwellings 

 house and 200 feet of land about it." 1 



Kavanagh's remarks are not by any means accurate. The 

 authorities of Nova Scotia did not first learn of the existence of the 

 Acadian settlement near St. Anne in 1783, they knew of it almost 

 from the beginning. Letters were addressed to the commanding 

 officer at Fort Frederick concerning the Acadians there as early as 

 1763. The missionary Bailly went to them in 1767 with the approval 

 of the Nova Scotia government. The resident magistrates on the 

 river received instructions in 1768 to limit the number of settlers 

 to those approved by Father Bailly. During the Revolutionary 

 war Major Studholme employed the brothers Mercure and Martin 

 as couriers. James Simonds, James White and William Hazen, 

 who were magistrates appointed by the government of Nova Scotia, 

 1 Collections New Brunswick Historical Society No. 9, 1914, p. 484. 

 Sec. I and II, 1914—29 



