The Value of a Good Deed

by Mary Ducharme  (October 2012)

In cleaning out the attic, you find a yellowed 1836 deed in the bottom of a trunk. Your impulse is to toss it. But then curiosity stops you. Why is this document here?

The deed is for 103 acres located on Granted Land Lot 143 in the 4th range of Hemmingford Township in the Province of Lower Canada in the district of Beauharnois. Beauharnois was a seigniory and Hemmingford was never part of a seigniory – was it? You wonder what the political divisions at the time were like.

The deed includes a stone house, barn, outbuildings, a saw mill, and it mentions Thomas Stewart on a bordering property. You know that Stewart was a builder of stone houses, including ones along Route 202 east of the village. Is this stone house still standing? Or is there another house on the same site? Where was that saw mill? You remember relatives talking about an old mill and a dam near the Little Montreal River where it crosses Route 202.

The price of the lot is £ 487, 10 s. The seller is Truman Cleaveland and the buyers are brothers Ezra and Asa Wingate. Some dim memory surfaces of your grandfather talking about Wingates related to Cookmans, Wilsies, Mannings. Branches of the Wingate family were wealthy and well-known in the States . Why did they come to Hemmingford? You wish you had listened back then because you might have ancestral connections as well. And at a history lecture you recall hearing the story of Ezra Wingate who fought at the battle of Odelltown Chapel in 1838. This must be the same Ezra!

You have a new respect for this old deed ; it is not a landfill candidate! It is a part of a puzzle. What is the rest of the story? How do you find out?

The Hemmingford Archives is now located in the Hemmingford Elementary School in Room 111. We are dedicated to preserving documents related to local history and we are ready to guide you to resources in the Archives Room and on the internet. You may discover that patient detective work sometimes results in extraordinary surprises.

To make an appointment call 514-778-2845 or 450-247-3193. Or e-mail: hfordarchives@gmail.com