Finding a Black Ancestor Using Circumstantial Evidence Part 4

Upper Canada Land Petition
Jonathan Butler
envelope

You may recall that the goal I started with in my search for Jonathan Butler, a man of colour, was to create a timeline of his whereabouts before 1824 and after 1840.


And thus I come to my timeline and summary of the new documents and clues I have found in my research:

ca 1808 Jonathan arrives in Upper Canada (present day Ontario), possibly coming directly from Pennsylvania (as per his land petition) Whether he came as an adult or a child with parents is not known.

March 1816. Jonathan is found in Etobicoke (just west of the city of Toronto), possibly leasing land from Col. Samuel Smith (as per Character Certificate). Jonathan was almost probably at least 21 years of age at this time, thus a very rough estimate of his year of birth would be 1795 or earlier.

March 1819. Jonathan is a farmer with 50 acres in Toronto Township (as per his land petition). Toronto Township has the Etobicoke River on its eastern boundary. I believe this is possibly land he leased from Col. Smith. 

April 1819. Jonathan is granted 100 acres of land in the Wilberforce Settlement (black settlement area) in Oro Township. (as per Land books) It does not appear he actually settled there (as per Gary French)

ca 1822-1838. 2 sons and 3 daughters are born in this time period. Names are not known (as per Assessment records)

1824. A son Allen is born in Toronto Township to Jonathan and wife Elizabeth Jenkins or Ginkins (as per 1851 adult baptism in Waterloo)

ca 1829 A son Harry aka Henry is born, location unknown

1832. A son George is born in Toronto Township. 

1834, 1837, 1838, 1839, 1840: Jonathan is found with 100 acres in Woolwich Township, Gore District which was part of the Queen's Bush settlement area for blacks. He lives "west of the Grand River" and may be on Lot 88 (as per Assessment Records) 

Miscellaneous Details

I find no trace of Jonathan after 1840. It is not known when his wife Elizabeth died and the only record of her is the mention in the 1851 baptism of their son Allen. 

The only children found in the 1851 census (which is incomplete with many missing areas) are Allen, George and Harry/Henry Butler.  

In the 1839 Assessment they are listed as belonging to "other religion" which may mean they were attending a black church. They are also listed as "unbaptised or not belonging to any denomination"

The 1881 Atlas for Floradale, Woolwich Township, Waterloo Co. provides details of their son George Butler as follows: born 1832 Toronto Township, settled near Floradale in 1835,  residing Concession GCT Lot 120. My research indicates that GCT stands for German Company Tract

1891 Census for George Butler records his mother as Irish

Summary

There is much research still to do and hopefully many more clues and facts to uncover. I urge others facing their own challenging ancestral searches to develop a timeline as I've done. Record your facts and your clues, being careful to note whether something is proven, a theory or supported by circumstantial evidence. 

Then sit back and study and analyze your findings. You will be amazed at what sudden "aha" moments occur! Organizing your findings will more easily guide you to where you might look as your next step in solving the ancestral puzzle.

Finding a Black Ancestor Using Circumstantial Evidence, Part 3

On to Upper Canada Sundries!

Certificate of Character

Still desperately wanting to know where Jonathan's various land lots were located so I could find some exact dates of acquisition and leaving, I decided to next look through the Heir & Devissee Commission records (unindexed but online) and the Upper Canada Sundries (also unindexed but online at Canadiana.org) 

And once more I got lucky. In the Sundries I found a  Certificate of Character for J. Butler, a black man. It was dated March 1816 and noted as in Etobicoke. That was a huge clue! Etobicoke is on the outside western edge of the city of Toronto. I was getting closer to figuring out exactly where Jonathan lived. 

Another clue in this small document is that signer indicated he had known Jonathan for several years. We're slowly narrowing down his immigration from Pennsylvania to Upper Canada *if* this is our man.

This document does not provide a full first name but in 1816 there were very few people in the Toronto township area, and even fewer black men named J. Butler! As well the date of the certificate fits well with Jonathan's petition for land. After the War of 1812 those born in the USA had to either sign an oath or provide a certificate of character and loyalty to the Crown. 


Think Outside the Box

After mulling on this new find I realized that the man who signed the Certificate of Character had to be someone who knew Jonathan fairly well. That meant it was likely to be a neighbour. Therefore if I could read the signature, I could try to find land records for the person signing. That might give me a more precise location for Jonathan in 1816! 

1816 signature

I concluded that the signature was "S Smith".  The first "S" is a very strong straight line S joined to the S in Smith, making it look like a stylized "H" But comparing the signature to the rest of the document leads me to believe it is definitely S. Smith. That meant I was looking for an S Smith in Etobicoke. 

1796 signature

My research found that a Col. Samuel Smith was granted a huge area of land in Etobicoke which he partitioned into smaller sections and leased to early settlers. Etobicoke was right on the border of the exisiting city of Toronto and it seemed very likely that this is where Jonathan had settled after leaving Pennsylvania. 

A check of a map of Toronto Township shows that the Etobicoke River runs along its eastern border. An 1881 map of Toronto Township reveals that Samuel Smith's son or grandson B.S. Smith owns a large tract of land bordering that same river, close to Lake Ontario on the south. The clues are coming together at last! 

Looking for Proof of My Theory

My next step was to prove that the Certificate of Character for Jonathan had indeed been signed by Col. Smith. If it was, it was very strong circumstantial evidence that Jonathan was one of the settlers who leased land from the Col. 

It was easy to find signature samples from Col. Smith. He was an important figure in early Ontario history and as such, signed many documents. You can see a sample of his signature from a 1796 document above. My vote is yes they are the same man. The "S" in Saml. is almost identical to the "S" in Jonathan's Certificate. It is a hard straight line sharp pointed S.

Slow and Steady Wins the Race

And there you have it. This is how I have narrowed my search for Jonathan Butler's whereabouts in Ontario before 1837. A lot of what I have found is circumstantial but as this evidence piles up, each piece adds more weight to what I found previously.

My next step is to find a list of the settlers who leased land from Col. Smith. I might get lucky and find an exact location (lot and concession number). I may have to look further, check other records to find this information but I am hopeful it can be found. It just needs patience and creative thinking. Oh, and not jumping on a "fact" without solid proof or a whole lot of circumstantial evidence to support it!

Part 4 (the last of 4) will be posted tomorrow

The Challenge of Finding Our Black Ancestor's Origins

Francis X. Schumacher & Mary Butler

This is a photo of my husband's 2nd great-grand-aunt Mary Schumacher nee Butler (1852-1924) and her husband.

Mary was the sister of my husband's great-great-grandfather Joseph Butler (1856-between 1911-1918).

Mary and Joseph were the grandchildren of Jonathan Butler, a black man living in the Queen's Bush in what was then called Upper Canada (now the province of Ontario)

The lure of free land attracted Black settlers to the Queen's Bush Settlement. The community developed in the Clergy Reserve known as the Queen's Bush, which extended from Waterloo County to Lake Huron.

The majority settled in the southern half of Peel Township in Wellington County but the Queen's Bush Settlement also included the northern half of Wellesley Township and the western portion of Woolwich Township in Waterloo County. This area, eight by twelve miles in size, had a population of approximately 2,500 by 1840. Of these about 1,500 were Black settlers.

A Challenging Black Ancestor

It has been a challenge to research Jonathan Butler and his family.  Early 1800s Ontario records are sparse. What we have managed to find after searching in many old records and having the help of a very kind gentleman in Waterloo Ontario is that Jonathan was born somewhere in the USA circa 1790.  No specific location in the United States is known.

We know he was black. He is listed on various tax, census and assessment records as "Negro" and "African"  We know his wife's name (Elizabeth Ginkins as per the adult baptism of his son Allen, my husband's 3rd great-grandfather) but do not know her origins.

The first record we found for Jonathan is an 1834 Assessment record where he is recorded as "Negro Butler". He owns 100 acres of uncultivated land west of the Grand River in Woolwich Township, Waterloo County. His livestock consisted of 2 cows and 1 horse. Not much to start a farm but by the time of the 1840 assessment he had managed to cultivate 40 acres.

The last record found of Jonathan is this 1840 "Census" which is really a tax and assessment record. He has not been found after that date - no death records, no burial records, no 1851 census record (although many of the 1851 census for Ontario are missing). We have found no record of his wife Elizabeth in any records of any year.

Jonathan Butler's Children

Jonathan's children are found in census records recorded as "African", "Mulatto" and in later years "White". We know from tax records that Jonathan had at least 5 sons and 3 daughters but we only know the names of two with certainty - Allen and George. Both married German women in the Waterloo area.

* George Butler (1832-1902) married Catherine Krump and had 11 children known.

* Allen Butler (1824-1872) married Caroline (Carrie) Weiss and had 8 children known.

* It is believed that Henry (Harry) Butler (ca 1829-between 1861-1871) who married a German woman named Sarah Susannah Foerch is another son

My husband's 3rd great-grandfather Joanes Alexander Alan (called Allen) Butler was baptized into the Catholic Church January 26,1851 at St Agatha, Wilmot Twp, Waterloo Co. He was recorded as the legitimate son of Jonathan Butler and Elizabetha Ginkens. In his marriage record that same year (February 1851) he stated he was born in Toronto. 


Allen's son Joseph, my husband's great-grandfather, is another mystery. He disappears after the 1901 census where he is found with his wife and children living in Seaforth, Huron County Ontario. His estranged wife Caroline (Carrie) left Ontario for Detroit Michigan circa 1909. Family lore said that she left Joseph after some kind of scandal was discovered and that he "went out west". He was never heard from again although our research indicates he may have settled in Manitoba near the border of North Dakota.  If his wife can be believed, he was deceased by May 1918.

The Genealogy Challenges & Unanswered Questions


We have many challenges and puzzles regarding the Butler family and my husband's black heritage. But our two main objectives at this moment are:


1. How do we find our Jonathan Butler's origins in the United States? There are so few records for pre 1851 in Ontario and we have not been able to find what happened to him after that 1840 assessment record or where he was before the 1834 one. So we only have records of him for a six year time frame. We know he was in Toronto circa 1824 when Allen was born. But where was he before 1824 and where was he from 1824 to 1834 when he acquired land in the Queen's Bush? 


2.  We are hoping to find Joseph Butler from 1901 to 1918. Was he in Manitoba? He had a brother Jacob in Pembina North Dakota but we've not found any record of Joseph there. However this brother Jacob lived for several years in Montcalm, Pembina Valley Region, Manitoba. Did Jacob head there after leaving his family (or being kicked out as family lore states)? We are hoping his death record might have information on the birth place of his father Jonathan or mother Elizabeth.

If you have any suggestions or ideas for us in our search, please post them in the Comment section of this blog post. We definitely need advice on where to look next!