12-30-06

Hi,
I think your last statement that the US "never did return confiscated British real estate to its pre-war owners" could be incorrect. I know that there were instances where people either had property returned to them or that they were allowed to keep it. Justice Patrick Smythe, a loyalist of Charlotte County, NY, later renamed Washington County in 1784, kept property which he later sold in the 1790s. Ironically, one of the pieces was not his own home, which also served as Charlotte County's courthouse, when the county was newly formed in 1772. (That first came into possession of one of General Washington's field surgeons.) Nonetheless, Smythe was well enough enough regarded that I think local affection allowed this to be. It seems that, in this region at least, purely Loyalist sympathies were not necessarily enough to cook a person's goose. As with any civil war, bloodlines and friendships could overcome politics. (Or exacerbate them, of course.)

The Jones Family is an example of what you wrote about. After the war's end, they were so hated in this region that when one of their descendants (a grandson) came to claim property in the 1830s, locals threatened to kill him. The Joneses had joined a Loyalist regiment. One of the Jones brothers, David, had been betrothed to Jane McCrea, who had been murdered July 27, 1777 during the Burgoyne Campaign. (McCrea had been of a patriot family and her brother John, was in the Charlotte County militia.) In spite of her obvious Loyalist sentiments (or, at the very least, her willingness to overlook politics enough to marry a Loyalist), she was used successfully by Horatio Gates in a propaganda campaign against Burgoyne. Her July death was being reported in newspapers as far south as Virginia by September of 1777 and was announced in parliament in December. Moreover, by the mid-19th century, Jane McCrea had become a regional Revolutionary icon, in spite of her essentially being a Loyalist.  Still, the hero worship of her wrung no sympathy from anyone as far as any Jones or Jones descendants.

To your last point, a substantial number of Loyalist black freeman and slaves had ended up in Nova Scotia by 1783 and some from the Province of New York. In recent decades, their descendants and others in Nova Scotia had begun a historical society and museum, which, tragically, was burned recently in a racially motivated arson. Many original documents and artifacts were lost. I've written many people about this. It seems to me that, as some of the original Black Loyalists were from New York, we all could search to see what could be found among New York State archival holdings and be duplicated for their museum. I have found a CBC article that gives more information:  http://www.cbc.ca/canada/nova-scotia/story/2006/04/21/ns-birchtown20060421.html

Joe
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Joseph A. Cutshall-King
PO Box 154
Cossayuna, NY 12823

Tel: 518-692-9505
email: [log in to unmask]


----- Original Message -----


David Roberts wrote:
Rolland is correct. Although the Treaty of Paris of 1783 said that Britain would evacuate all posts w/in the new United States, they did not. Scattered posts from present-day Vermont to present-day Michigan remained in British hands until Jay's Treaty of 1795. Niagara was one of these British held forts on U. S. soil.
 
Not all points in the 1783 Treaty were honored. We were slow in allowing British debts to be collected & never did return confiscated British real estate to its pre-war owners. Neither did the British ever return captured & run-away slaves to their pre-war masters.
 
David
 
David Roberts
Hollywood, MD
 
----- Original Message -----
From: [log in to unmask]" href="mailto:[log in to unmask]">NWDB2000
To: [log in to unmask]" href="mailto:[log in to unmask]">[log in to unmask]
Sent: Monday, November 27, 2006 12:57 PM
Subject: Re: [NYHIST-L] Tomorrow is the 223rd Anniversary of Evacuation Day

"Britain gained control of Fort Niagara in 1759, during the French & Indian War, after a nineteen-day siege. The British held the post throughout the American Revolution but were forced, by treaty, to yield it to the United States in 1796. "  https://oldfortniagara.org/history/
 
Would seem to exceed the Evacuation of New York date quoted below:
 
"On November 25, 1783, the British Army boarded their naval vessels and
Evacuated New York City (then only coterminous with New York County), their wartime
Headquarters and their last military position in the United States during the
Revolutionary War."
 
Rolland Miner
Fogg of War, Book II - Assault on Carillon 1758
An Historical Novel of the F&I War