Loyalist John Phillips UE - for United Empire Loyalists

More documents

Recommendations

Info

“Muster Roll, Major Robert Drummond's Company, Third Battalion, New Jersey Volunteers, Charlestown, South Carolina, 25 April 1782 to 24 June 1782, 61 days inclusive: 1. Major Robert Drummond (no remark) 2. Lieutenant John Jenkins (no remark) 3. Ensign Lewis Thompson (remark: on command) 4. 3 Sergeants, (no remark) Corporal John Phillips (remark: on command).” By the end of December 1782, it was all over. Charlestown with the NJV sailed back to the British garrison at New York. Finally, the N.J. Volunteers arrived in Parrtown (later St. John) New Brunswick in October of 1783 aboard armed ships of the British fleet. The next service record 14 states: “Muster Roll, Major Robert Drummond's Company, Third Battalion, New Jersey Volunteers, Dutch Kiln's, Long Island, New York, 25 December 1782 to 23 February 1783, 61 days inclusive ...” the entire company there, including Corporal John Phillips. The Company has been evacuated to Long Island, New York. It is estimated that 14,000 Loyalists from many regiments and companies, were resettled in New Brunswick after the war ended in 1783. Just before or after the muster role starting December 25 1782, John Phillips was married to Isabella Phinney. John Philips and Isabella Phinney married 178- -- --” [year, month, and date missing.] 15. Their first child, Archibald Phillips, was born 1783 in New Brunswick. 16 The marriage record, noted in Schenectady, shows that this was the Phillips family cluster to which John was connected, even though his immediate family had been in New Jersey at the outbreak of the war. Isabella Phinney (1763 – 1849), wife of John Phillips UE, is probably the daughter of Peter Phinney UE (1737 – 1824). Peter Phinney UE appears on “The Old United Empire Loyalist List” 17 , as follows: “Eastern District, Soldier Royal Regiment of New York, Muster Roll. P.L.N.J. 1786”, with his son George Phinney. However, Peter Phinney appears to have recanted and returned to the U.S.A. after 1786. John Phillips named his third son Peter, born in 1786, and his youngest son George, born in 1812, perhaps in honour of his Phinney in-laws. In June 1787, John Phillip's lands in New Jersey were confiscated: “A list of the names of all those Persons whose property was Confiscated in the Several Counties of the State of New Jersey, for joining the Army of the King of Great Britain &c. as returned to the Auditors Office, previous to the first day of May 1787 ... Cumberland
County NJ .... John PHILIPS... others... Extract from the publick books in my office given under my hand this first day of June, One Thousand seven hundred and Eighty seven.” 18 The second son of John Phillips UE, also named John Phillips, says at the time of the 1871 Census, that he was born in 1784 “at sea” 19 . The intervening years provide an illusive trail of gypsy-like family movement, which is still under research, where more children were born, until, sixteen years later, he files the petition cited above at Woodhouse in 1801. After that date, five more children were born, the youngest born when Isabella (Phinney) Phillips was age 50. There were at least twelve known children. One would think that this substantial family would lead to a large number of land petitions by his children, as children of UE Loyalists, but there are none. Although it was recommended that John Phillips UE and other Woodhouse veterans who landed in New Brunswick, be placed on the UEL list and thus made eligible for land grants as children of Loyalists, the names don't seem to have been placed on that list. “25 Oct 1806 (W8/34) John is signer of a general petition of Loyalist officers and soldiers resident in the London District who came from New Brunswick to Upper Canada, requesting a grant of lands and their names on the U.E. List. (Woodhouse, Norfolk County).” 20 There is no reply to this petition in the Norfolk archives. This seems to be a clerical or administrative glitch which did not serve well, these early Canadian heroes. Two of John Phillips' sons, John Jr. and Peter, fought in the War of 1812, with the Oxford Militia, under Thomas Talbot, Colonel Commanding Militia, London District, Upper Canada. 21 John Phillips UE died on 29 July 1844, and his wife, Isabella, died on 13 October 1849. 22 They were buried on their family farm in Ekfrid Township, Middlesex County, about fifteen miles south of Glencoe, Ontario. Many of the children moved on, in the 1850s, to Camden Township in Kent County, and the family farm changed hands. About forty years ago, their grave markers were found by a descendant, resting against a tree. The man who owned the farm requested that the stones be taken away as they meant nothing to his family who had owned the property for many years. They had never heard of John Phillips UE. The vigilant descendant, Harold Carruthers of Glencoe, picked up the stones and they are now cemented in the Willy Cairn, a few miles away. Here is a Loyalist who served his family traditions and his King and was one of the early pioneers and founders who shaped modern Canada. He was not well rewarded for this service but he did not pause to complain. He simply moved forward through the paths and opportunities which life afforded. One wonders what he thought, or what he might have done differently, in that fateful week of 14 September 1780, when he saw his commanding officer outwitted and
Page 1 and 2: Loyalist John Phillips UE My Loyali
Page 3: In August 1778, John Phillips was i

Loyalist John Phillips UE - for United Empire Loyalists

Create successful ePaper yourself

Delete template?

Save as template?