1. The "Upper Canada District," as a
laborer in which [William] Case was now appointed,[*] extended
nominally from the River Detroit in the West (although the
Thames country was vacant for the present) to Ottawa River,
the settlements on both sides of which were included in the
Circuit of that name, and, as we have conjectured, Montreal,
which returned twenty members to the Conference at the
session at which our hero [Case] was appointed to Canada, as
it was probably the residence and special charge of the
Presiding Elder, the Rev. Samual Coate, embracing the
continuous frontier of the whole country. The preachers, no
doubt, extended their labors also into the interior as far
as any considerable settlements had been made. The River
Thames was settled upon, which runs parallel to Lake Erie at
something like the breadth of a township, at various
intervals, as far up as Delaware, not far from where the
City of London now stands. Also the shore of Lake Erie,
parallel to these River Settlements. West and East Oxford
were settled, and Burford, as also there were white settlers
on the Indians lands through the vicinity of what we now
call Brantford and the Township of Ancaster, along what was
called the "Mohawk Road." The "Governor's Road," which
starts at "Coat's Paradise," near Dundas, and runs between
the Townships of Flamoro' West, on the one side, and
Beverley and Ancaster on the other, westward on to London
was opened the very years of Mr. Case's arrival (1805) and
doubtless began to be settled on at once. There had been
settlers along the Grand River in the Townships of Dumfries
(South and North) and Waterloo since 1800; and they were re-inforced
this very year by several other families who came and
settled in the township of Waterloo. These were of Dutch, or
German extraction from Pennsylvania. As they spoke or
understood the English language but indifferently, and were
mostly of the Menonist [Mennonite] persuasion, we are of
opinion that no Methodist preacher had yet visited them. We
suspect that the Copetown settlement, in Beverley, was as
far north as they had then penetrated in that direction.
Yonge Street had been opened, as a military road, as early
as 1792, or 1793, and was peopled as far north as the
"Quaker Settlement," for it gave name to one of the
Circuits, and Bangs had labored there three years before our
present era [1802]. The Rideau River, we have seen, was
settled on some years before; and there were settlers on the
North side of the Ottawa River, above where the city of that
name now stands, before even the Rideau settlement was
planted, for some of the first Rideau settlers went in by
that route.
* William Case was first appointed to
the Bay of Quinte circuit with Henry Ryan in 1805. Bangs
collaborated with Case and Ryan at the Hay Bay camp-meeting
in September 1805 at Daniel Pickett and Sylvanus Keeler were
also present.