The Langtons Arrive in Upper Canada

[Black and white sketch of a nineteenth century family around a table]

In the 1830s, John Langton who was Anne Langton’s younger brother came out to have a farm, create a farm, and settle in the Kawartha Lakes, on Sturgeon Lake; and he called his farm Blythe.  And about 1834, he writes to his family back in England, to his father, Thomas Langton, and his mother and his aunt, and to his sister Anne, that he is ready to receive them if they want to come out, and emigrate.

And of course he says, “No-one at your time of life Father, should think about coming to the backwoods of Canada, but they have made the suggestion that they would like to come and join him.  He says, “I am ready to receive you.”

So three years later [laughs] the family departs from Liverpool and it is Anne, and her father and mother, and her aunt (her maiden aunt).  And they arrive in August of 1837, and they make their way on steam packets, and railways, and coaches and carriages, all they way up… They land in New York and come up the Albany River to Lewiston and so on.  They eventually get to Port Hope where John Langton is waiting for them.

When they arrive in the country, Anne’s letters say she is amazed at the roughness of everything, the buildings, and the gardens and especially the stumps, which she says, “Gives everything a rubbish appearance.”  But she says that they are all very hopeful that they will have a healthy and happy life here.

And of course, when they have arrived, John in saying that he is ready for them, simply means that he has got somewhere to shelter them because the main house which he is trying to build for them, is no where near ready, and they have to camp out in his little shanty.

So she does say at one point that “My father has a hammock that is strung up every evening, for him; and that she and her aunt have a cornered off little area.  John sleeps on a mat on the floor.” So it is very, very primitive.  There is no stove in the house; presumably there is no toilet in the house either.  So they have to cook all their meals outside under a little shed and so on.  She does describe the stove as being two feet, seven inches each way, and it is under a little shed.  Everything is cooked on that little stove.

After this time at John’s house and the main house finally gets towards being finished, she goes on to talk about how difficult it is to keep the wind out of the house, in the winter time, because of course, a log house and the warping and shrinking of the wood always creates lots of drafts.  At one point she is talking about that she and aunt Alice are pasting up the wind holes, and of course her mother who is extremely, stiff upper lip, says “It is ridiculous for anyone to come out to Canada and not be able to bear a breath of air.” [Laughter] They are all very, very stoical and strong willed about the fact that they are going to endure no matter what.

And endure is what they do because unlike many of Anne Langton’s contemporaries like Susanna Moody, Anna Brownell Jameson, Catharine Parr Traill, the Langtons, Anne in particular, stayed in the backwoods of Canada for ten years, nearly ten years.  Most of those other ladies, left after two or three.  They just couldn’t take it.  And in fact, in her journals, Anne Langton talks about people, the ladies who are accustomed to semi-civilized state of the towns, are absolutely horrified by the solitude of the backwoods and they just can’t stand it.  So if a gentleman marries, he takes a great risk, because his wife will not suit the backwoods.

Anne Langton was actually thirty-four when she came out to Canada, and her parents were seventy.  Her father didn’t last, he was ill when they came.  He died, I think, within about a year of being here.  But her mother and her aunt lived on, for the ten years that they were in the bush.  I think she would of stayed here longer except the area was visited by a terrible plague of ague, who knows what it was – a form of Malaria maybe, or a terrible flu, and it did in fact cause the death of both Anne’s mother and her aunt.

So at that point, she decided that it was probably wise for her to leave Blythe and go to Peterborough, where John had married and moved on and he was now a Member of Parliament, whatever.  I think he was the accountant for Peterborough Council.

Anyway, she decided to go and live with John after ten years.  With such fortitude and such dedication to creating a community in this small area of Fenelon Falls, Bobcaygeon and along Sturgeon Lake.

[Black and white sketch of falls in Fenelon Falls]