3 Chapter 2

BUILDING COMMUNITY

The promise of a better life was, however, not without its disappointments. Clearing the forests away to make farm land was a long, onerous task. Most settlers had to

, remain tenants, as landlords preferred to rent rather than ' sell their land. The class system maintained a select group j of British upper-class men in power. Many tenants and workers, and all women, were denied the right to vote. _: Disease and poor crop-yields brought some people to near ruin. A writer in 1847 claimed that three-quarters of the Island’s tenant farmers were unable to pay their land rents and faced eviction; adding: “Several respectable settlers affirm that the hardships they endured in the mother coun- ; try, . .were not to be compared with the sufferings and . privations they had frequently experienced In the wilds of , EAmerica”1 : Some of the effects of these problems can be appreciated Eby examining an economic profile of Township 27 In Table 513:2 1; this profile includes Kinkora, Middleton, Maple Plains ; and Shamrock, which in 1841 made up 41. 5% of the g households and 37. 5 070 of the population in the township. While the population of the township tripled over the E Efifteen years from 1833 to 1848, only about half the 3: available land was occupied, and only about one— —third of i that was being cultivated. The number of households % almost doubled between 1833 and 1841, but only thirty— four householders were added in the following seven years. ' Moreover, the average size of a farm decreased from 110

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acres in 1833 to 83.5 acres in 1848. These facts confirm the tenants’ complaints of landlords being reluctant to sell, and the heavy burden of land rents,

The statistics also show increases, sometimes substan- tial ones, in all crop production, and in the number of animals owned between 1833 and 1841; but these successes

Table 2:1, Economic Profile of Township 27, 1833-482

1833 1841 1848 No. of households 65 118 152 Total population 376 760 1031 Acres of land occupied 7158 10,597 12,698 Acres of arable land 1437 2209 4063

Crops (in bushels)

Wheat 1423 2625 2549 Barley 342 1258 1102 Oats 1913 11,479 12,594 Potatoes 11,830 33,480 7155 Turnips (in pounds) —— — 2238 Clover seed (in pounds) — —— 92 Hay (in tons) — — 783 N0. of Animals Owned:

Horses 52 154 210 Oxen 76 * * Cattle 249 632 774 Sheep 481 1143 1535 Pigs 302 581 265 No. of Churches — 1 3 No. of Schools 1 3 6

No. of Saw Mills 1 2 1 No. of Threshing Machines — — 3

* Oxen and cattle were counted together