HISTORIC PLAQUES OF ONTARIO

Born in New London, Connecticut, Butler settled in the Mohawk Valley, New York, in 1742. Commissioned in the British Indian Department in 1755, he served in the Seven Years War. At the outbreak of the American Revolution , he was compelled to leave his estates and was ordered to Fort Niagara. In 1777 he organized the Loyalist Corps known as Butler's Rangers. By the end of war, this Unit with British Regulars and Indian Allies, had effectively contributed to the establishment of British control south of the Great Lakes. The Rangers were disbanded in 1784, and led by their former commander, many settled in the Niagara Peninsula. Butler remained active in Indian Affairs until his death at Newark (Niagara-on-the-Lake).

On the 8th of July, 1813, an outpost of the invading force, encamped near Fort George, was defeated by a band of Six Nations and Western Indians led by Chiefs John Norton and Blackbird and interpreters Michel Brisebois, Louis Langlade and Barnet Lyons. Lieutenant Samuel Eldridge and 22 soldiers of the 13th United States Infantry were killed and 12 taken prisoners.

On the 25th May, 1813, the American Fleet and the Batteries at Fort Niagara across the river began a devastating two-day bombardment of Fort George. On the 27th a large American force was landed and after a brief engagement in which his outnumbered garrison sustained heavy casualties, Brigadier-General John Vincent made an orderly withdrawl towards Burlington. The capture of Fort George left the Americans in control of the Niagara Frontier, but Vincent's troops a week later won a decisive victory at Stoney Creek, preventing the Americans from gaining the whole peninsula.

Following the introduction of English Civil Law into this province in 1792, legislation was passed in 1797 authorizing the establishment of the "Law Society of Upper Canada". A founding meeting was held in "Wilson's Hotel" in this community on July 17th, 1797. It was attended by ten practitioners, including the Attorney General, the Hon. John White who was appointed treasurer, the Society's principal Officer. One of its major functions was the regulation of admission to the province's legal profession and later it became responsible for the training of lawyers. In 1832 the Society moved into its newly-constructed quarters "Osgoode Hall" at York (Toronto), where the Society continues to regulate and control Ontario's legal profession.

Known at various times as Butlersburg, West Niagara and Newark its first permanent settlers including Butler's Rangers and other loyalists arived about 1780. The first five sessions of Upper Canada's Legislature met here under Lieutenant-Governor Simcoe between September 17th, 1792, and June 3rd, 1796. The town was captured by American forces May 27th, 1813. It was the administrative and judicial center of the Niagara District and Lincoln County until 1866.

Constructed by order of Lieutenant-Governor Simcoe 1796-99, Fort George served as the headquarters for Major-General Brock in 1812. In May, 1813, it was bombarded and captured by the Americans who constructed fortifications of their own on the site. These in turn were retaken by the British in December 1813. In 1815 Fort George was described as "tumbling into ruins" and ordered abandoned. The present works are a reconstruction done in 1937-40, and represents the fort as it was in 1799-1813. Only the magazine of the original fort remains.

In the early morning of December 19th, 1813, a force under Colonel John Murray, consisting of detachments of the 100th and 41st Regiments. Royal Scots, Royal Artillery and Canadian Militia embarked in bateaux at the foot of this ravine. Crossing silently to a point above Youngstown, New York, they attacked Fort Niagara killing or capturing its American garrison.

Soldier, politician, diplomatist and colonizer, de Puisaye was born at Mortagne-en-Perche, France, about 1755 and enlisted in the French Army at 18. Elected to the States General in 1789, he supported reform but, alarmed by the course of the Revolution, later organized resistance on behalf of the Royalists. Outlawed, he sought refuge in England and in 1795, as Lieutenant-General, led an ill-fated expedition to Quiberon, Brittany. Three years later, with some fourty other emigres, he arrived in Upper Canada and established a short-lived settlement in the Markham-Vaughan region. In 1799 he purchased a farm here on which he lived until he moved to England in 1802. There he died in 1827.

Manned by Captain Samuel Hatt's 5th Lincoln (Militia) Regiment and a small party of the Lincoln Militia Artillery under Lieutenant John Ball, and consisting of one 24-pounder cannon mounted within a crescent-shaped earthwork, this Battery was engaged in the Battle of Queenston Heights on the 13th of October, 1812. Commanding the Niagara river, its continuous fire harassed the Americans crossing from Lewiston, provided cover for the British when they were first repulsed from the heights, and supported later attempts to regain them.