A first Christmas in the bush - Glimpses of the Past with Karen Webster

December 10, 1854
Wawanosh – Upper Canada
Dearest Mother and Father,
Tonight, as I sit by the light of the fireplace to write this letter, it is a poor substitute for being with you as we were last Christmas. Robert has finished reading the Bible to the children and they are tucked warmly in their little cots. We have a small supply of candles, but we are only using them sparingly. The big fireplace cooks our food, keeps us warm and sheds light. When we use deadfall wood, the heat is good but when we use green wood, the heat is less and the smoke more dense.
Our home is a cabin made from logs harvested from our own property. It is small, but we are sheltered from most of the cold of the snow and winds. The cedar logs were notched and fit together nicely. We had to fill in the spaces between the logs with mud and moss.  Robbie is almost seven now and was a great help with this task. 

 

Not many of the lots around here have been taken up, so there are few neighbours. There is an occasional visit from a horseback preacher. We have no school, so I am teaching the children to read our Bible and to do some arithmetic, but they would much rather be outside. This summer, they became quite tanned running around in their bare feet. We now have a dog that keeps them amused and we have a cow, Reddy, who provides us with milk. She forages for her feed in the bush. There is a tall plant in the bush called cow cabbage that she particularly likes to eat. She is quite tame and comes when called for milking times. Robert hopes to get her bred to a neighbour’s bull this spring and then we can have some beef to eat when we butcher her calf.

 

We are fortunate to have a neighbour, William Watson, who is a cooper. He had brought a whole chest of tools from Scotland and has kindly lent them to Robert at times and also has advised him about construction. Likely because William came from a family of fishermen, he did not choose his property wisely and has mostly swampy land. He thinks he can harvest peat from it some day.

 

We arrived in early June, in time to plant some potatoes and a little bit of wheat. The trees here are immense, reaching up to the very sky, it would seem. Robert has started to cut down some of the trees. The only way to clear the land for planting is to burn the felled trees. The smell of smoke is always present in the summertime. From the ashes created, we can earn a bit of income selling them for potash. As well, I have learned to make our own soap from the lye that we extract from the ashes. One benefit of so much smoke is that it keeps the mosquitoes at bay.

 

The woods also provide us with some food. There are plenty of beech trees that produce nuts and we have gathered a supply for the winter. In the summer, there were many different kinds of berries to be picked. Little Mary, who is now four, loved to help me find the patches that are scattered here and there. Our neighbours gave us a supply of maple sugar and have promised to teach us how to make our own in March. I boiled the berries with the maple sugar to preserve them for the winter. We have had a little meat from venison and rabbits, but mostly our diet consists of potatoes and wheat. Our harvest was light mainly because the ground is still full of tree roots. It will take many years to make this a productive farm. Robert used some of our dwindling savings to buy some supplies for the winter. He walked to Goderich, where there is a grist mill, and purchased 50 pounds of flour. He carried the sack on his back through the woodland trails for the 55-mile round trip. When he had not returned by dark, I was concerned that a wolf had attacked him. It was close to midnight before he arrived and was I ever glad to see him.

 

Our big news is that I am again with child. The one I was carrying when we sailed for Canada was stillborn after a violent storm midway across the Atlantic. We named the little angel Matilda after Robert’s mother and, after wrapping her in a tiny shroud, buried her at sea. Part of our hearts sank in the water with her. We hope to have another girl who we will call Matilda to honour the little one we lost. 

 

We are fortunate that there is a midwife living near Manchester called Mrs. Davidson. She assisted Mary Ann when the little Watson girls, Lovie and Annie, were born. 

 

We do miss you so much but feel that there is a better future for our family in this land. It is tough surviving here at the present time but we have hopes for the future. One day there will be passable roads and villages where we can buy the goods we need. There will be schools and churches too. Perhaps you can come to visit us when we get more settled in?
Your loving daughter, 
Nancy.