Poole Genealogical - Dorothy May Campbell
HAP: Subject 2-B
Issue Date: 6/8/2007
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Index:
2. The Campbells of Quebec
3. Isabella Prior's Family Tree:
4. The Pryce Brownes.
5. The Fulfords of Fulford,
Devonshire.
6. The Reaves and Christies
of Toronto:-
Poole Genealogical - Dorothy May Campbell
The Fulfords of Fulford, Devonshire.
The Reaves and Christies of Toronto:-
Her own narrative.
wife of Otis M. Poole.
I was born in Yokohama, Japan, May 18/1895. the daughter of William
Wallace Campbell, born August 22/1860 in Quebec, Canada, and Clara
Edwina Rice ("Calla") born September 21/1871, in Hakodate, Japan. My
mother's people had been long resident in the country, her Grandfather,
Colonel Elisha E. Rice, of a long line of New Englanders from early
colonial days, having been the first American Consul in Japan, barring
Townsend Harris. My father's forebears, originally Scottish, were
United Empire Loyalists in Canada, whose genealogy and that of the Rice
Family, is given later on. Rice File
I was born at No.7 Bluff, Yokohama, along the closely built-up hogsback
of land above the Bay and harbour which, with the business district
below had been allocated by the Japanese to the foreign community; - and
there, too, my brother Archibald Kenneth was born October 2/1896. My
maternal grandparents, as well as my identical twin Aunts Mabel, then
unmarried and Lily married to an Englishman, Frank Gillett, with their
child, my cousin Evelyn, were all living in Yokohama at the time. Oddly
- unlike the author of the famous poem, - I do not remember the house
where I was born; only the larger and grander one of my Aunt Lily
Gillett's who lived across the lane, and the quite small bungalow of my
grand-parents. Inside the former, I remember a bewildering Victorian
clutter of intriguing small tables and bric-a-brac, the presence of a
cold and disinterested Uncle, and, in the wide, glassed-in verandah,
enormous blue & white porcelain jars containing tall, fan-leaved palms.
(These seem to have been the regulation fittings for the verandas of
Yokohama even to the time, years later, when I was a bride and had two
such of my own!). But the delights, for a child, of Aunt Lily's home
were all outdoors, where a fascinating, typically Japanese rock-garden
cascaded down one bank of the incredibly steep driveway, to end at the
bottom in a small, square lawn. This was equipped with swings in which
our older cousin Evelyn gave turns to my small brother and me. I also
remember a merry little Japanese girl in a bright kimono who scampered
with us along the winding paths and over the brushwood bridges of the
beautifully constructed endlessly intriguing rock-garden. She was
probably the child of the betto (coachman) who lived in a small cottage
by the gate, - and who then did not wear the drab present-day uniform
of chauffeurs the world over, but the spotless three-quarter length
blue & white patterned Japanese cotton coat. The coats bore the
insignia of his employer, whether a private person or a trading house,
and were worn over immaculate tight fitting, white native trousers,
while a wide, cloth-covered straw hat like an inverted basin, completed
the dashing costume.
All foreigners lived on this winding hogsback high above the blue waters
of the bay, and the nature of the terrain meant that most gardens fell
below the level of the road and were generally charmingly landscaped,
according to the wealth of the owners or of the foreign firms who
maintained residences for their senior employees. My grandparents'
bungalow did not enjoy these advantages, being small and cramped and
hidden behind a high wooden fence, with a short brick walk bordered by
curious little clumps of dusty, blue-berried grasses, which led to an
open veranda, while a thick grove of bamboo hid the servants quarters
behind and the sudden drop into the village below. Here the delights
were all indoors, where a gentle Granny brought down for me a beloved
rag doll with a porcelain head which had been my mother's when she was a
little girl, or a brisk young Aunt whistled to her tame canary in the
dining room.
I remember the drawing room quite clearly, too: - the draped mantel
with the bamboo "what-not" above it. - and in one corner of the room
enchanting square blue & white porcelain buckets suspended by straw rope
from a revolving porcelain wheel. Here too however was another alarming
male, - our fierce, brown-eyed black moustached, heavy-browed American
Grandfather, more frightening to us children, because he asked questions
of us, than was ever Aunt Lily's cold, blue-eyed, blond-bearded English
husband who ignored us.
Two other pictures stand out beside the scattered memories of various
small playmates in Yokohama, - and those are of the great deodars, the
band-stand and the tennis and croquet lawns of the Bluff Gardens, a park
reserved for Europeans, their children, perambulators and Chinese or
Japanese amahs; - and a breath-taking ride by rikishaw along the
steepest part of the Bluff down to a bathing beach at the farthest end.
Little did I know that the precipitous cliff over which I then peeped
from a rikisha on my amah's lap, fascinated by the junks and steamers
far below, would one day hurtle down in the great earthquake of 1923,
leaving a wide, impassable gap where the road had been.
Late in the year of 1897 or early '98, my father was trans-ferred for a
time to Hongkong, an environment so strangely different from that of
Yokohama as to be somewhat intimidating to an overly imaginative child.
Though father's office was in the town on the island of Hongkong, we
lived across the bay on the mainland at Kowloon, in a large brick
building in which we had an apartment. The rooms were so high-ceilinged
and empty in comparison with the cluttered cosiness of the clapboard
houses built by foreigners in Japan, that all I can recollect of them
now is their size - and the huge spiders which my father shot from the
ceiling with an air-gun!
There is an unhappy picture of getting "lost" around the block, - and
an equally distressing one, to small children of meeting a drunken
English Marine and his drunken sailor friend along the road! Chinese
voices were noisy and gabbling, so that even the most peaceable
conversation sounded to us like a fight; -and somehow, quite unfairly,
perhaps, China has always remained for me a disturbing country. The
one jolly picture of Hong-Kong days is of the bathing parties got
together by my parents off the Company launch; and the unforgettable,
awe-inspiring journey by cable-car up the steep sides of the Peak, the
magnificent, winding Bay spread below one with the high-pooped Chinese
ships and foreign steamer like tiny water-beetles among the islands in
the sun. In Kowloon there was a Park, - with a band-stand, glorious
strutting pea-cocks and wide-spreading, fern-like "sensitive trees"
whose fronds promptly closed at the inquisitive touch of childish
fingers. Unforgettable, too, even to a little girl, were the figures
of large, bearded Sikh policemen, as well as those of the dapper, white
uniformed young officers of the Royal Navy and of the British Colonial
Regiments stationed there.
In 1901 my father was given home leave and we all traveled via San
Francisco to Quebec where we children first met our venerable white-
bearded grandfather. He was an esteemed barrister and Protho-notary
for the province of Quebec and his able opinions and judgments written
in a fine spencerian hand, are still preserved and consulted in the
Court-house of Quebec. These were proudly shown me years later when my
husband and I visited Canada in 1941. At the time when we children and
our mother first saw my grandfather, he had been a widower for many
years, living still at the old family home, "Thornhill"; and I have a
vivid recollection of that first glimpse as he strolled up from the
barns behind the dormer-windowed gray stone house. After the familiar
Japanese ponies and the small carts we knew, the large haywains and
huge farm horses of "Thornhill" made an indelible impression on us
children; and, though only six or seven, I still have equally vivid
memories of the flower-bordered vegetable garden, the sweet-scented
meadows, the rolling lawns and the big sugar maples and wide-spreading
oaks of this, my father's old boyhood home. And last, but not least,
there was the formidable old Irish housekeeper "Nin" who had been
the family nurse in my Grandmother's day and bewildered Archie and me
by falling on my father's shoulders and declaring between copious tears
that it was the happiest day of her life. Living nearby were also my
father's elder brother Colin and his wife and young daughter; - and at
the Hotel Chateau Frontenac were father's sister Agnes with her French-
Canadian husband, Ernest Hamel. I remember, too, how pretty was this
Aunt and how frail, never having recovered from the loss of her only
child, a beautiful little boy of about four. There were cousins of
father's living by a lake, whom we visited too, whose names I have
sadly forgotten except that the mother was called Grace. A snapshot
names the place "Inverness".
After bidding goodbye to Quebec, we then went to a second cousin of my
mother's, Judge James Burns Wallace, and his round, jolly wife Alice,
on their farm beside Hart's Pond in Canaan, New Hampshire, where again
there were hayfields, immense barns and a big homestead with wide
verandas, for Archie and me to roam in. All a wonderful experience
after cramped Japan.
Finally leaving America on the expiration of father's leave we returned
to Japan, but this time to be posted in the Southern port of Kobe at the
mouth of the Inland Sea, where beautiful hills rose steeply from the
business settlement and provided a delightful golf course and summer
resort, as well as pleasant Sunday walks through wooded groves past
little shrines or up narrow valleys to procure fresh eggs from the
farms. We children never tired of watching the turning of the huge
water wheels beside the mountain streams, and of being taken into the
thatched mills to see the grain being pounded by the busy wooden hammers
activated by slow revolutions of the big wet wheels outside. There was
a pleasing, elusive scent to the floury dust too, which still haunts my
nostrils and brings back, as scents so often do, a special vividness to
those delightful walks. Besides holidays in the Kobe hills, we spent an
occasional Summer on Lake Hakone on the Idzu Peninsula at the foot of
Fujiyama or at Dzushi Beach not far from Yokohama where we watched the
fisher-men, standing at the edge of the water, fling their big round
nets over a tell-tale ripple and draw in a catch of fish. Hakone held
the added excitement of long rides in Japanese "kago" - bamboo and
rattan palanquins - swinging up through heavily wooded hillsides past
ancient temples and sparkling streams, finally arriving at a picturesque
thatched village, with Fuji reflected in the reed bordered mirror of the
Lake. One went up to Rokkosan, the Summer resort of Kobe, in the same
manner, for there were neither automobiles nor funilcular in those
early days almost sixty years ago. We would start from Kobe in a
cavalcade of rikishaws along the foot of the range changing to "kago"
up the mountainside, while the men usually walked beside our palanquins
or rode up on wiry little Japanese ponies On one occasion, lacking
horses, my amusing father once rode up astride an ox.
We lived in Kobe for five years, first in a small bungalow, then in the
usual two-storied clapboard house on the flanks of the hills, our garden
being supported, as were all the others, by a bunding wall fifteen feet
high. Below us was a small temple, and there will always echo in my
memory the deep "bong" of its big bronze bell as the priest struck it
several times a day. The roads in Kobe were very steep and one of my
most distressing memories is of poor over-laden horses struggling up
them, the Japanese having, unfortunately, little understanding of
animals and little sympathy to spare for them, since they themselves,
with ropes hitched around their waists and attached to bands across
their foreheads, hauled heavy loads too. My father was one of the
founders of the S.P.C.A. in Japan, and until he left the islands a sick
man years later was one of the most ardent and faithful workers in that
field, gaining the interest and co-operation of the Japanese Governor
and influential businessmen who together effected great reforms.
Our schooling in Kobe was very haphazard and we were taught in private
homes by whatever earnest matrons our particular Anglo-American group
of parents could procure to tutor their children. The only two
professional schools which Archie and I briefly attended were the
crowded Catholic Convent School, in which there were a number of
Japanese and Eurasian children, and one run by three pleasant English
school-mistresses, - an aunt and her nieces, - who shortly retired and
moved to Kyoto. However, the last two governesses we and our friends
shared, were first an American and then a young English-man who each
had actual degrees in teaching. Between them and the demands of our
international group, our grounding in European, English and American
history was truly cosmopolitan and broad in outlook and has, I think,
unconsciously influenced me all my life.
In 1904, when our mother was absent for some reason, Archie and I were
entrusted to the care of these three kind schoolmistresses in Kyoto.
While there, we were taken one Sunday to a small brick church in which
the Japanese had humanely permitted a Russian priest to hold services
for their prisoners, - it was the time of the Russo-Japanese War, - and
I vividly remember the sight of these huge bedraggled Cossacks, escorted
by diminutive Japanese guards, their rich, deep-toned, unaccompanied
voices filling the little church with sadness and nostalgia. Before
the hymn began, there was no sound other than the sudden "ping" of a
tuning fork, and I recall no prayers being said; perhaps the Japanese
had prohibited these? However, since it was then their earnest aim to
present before the world a picture of civilised adherence to the
international codes of war, it is possible that in this particular my
nine year old memory may have been at fault. When peace was signed after
an astounding Japanese victory, England dispatched Prince Arthur of
Connaught to present a congratulatory Order to the Emperor. He was
wearisomely entertained by both the Japanese and the British contingents
in every port, - and in Kobe by a reception at the British Consulate
where I was one of six little girls to go up two by two and hand him
incongruous bouquets of flowers. All over the country were joyful
victory parades, and in the harbors thrilling displays of fireworks, at
which both the Chinese and Japanese had long been experts.
Besides these particular spectacles connected with the Russo-Japanese
War the most vivid pictures left on our minds were the annual cycle of
national festivals: - the Boys', with gay wind-filled carp of paper or
cloth flying for every man child on bamboo mastheads from each house; -
the Girls', with lovely displays of traditional dolls; - New Year's,
with its emblems of pine, bamboo and plum at every door; besides the
many festivals or "Matsuri", of the various religious sects when
dignified processions of priests were followed by immense carved and
gilded palanquins or shrines lurching and swaying on the shoulders of
rollicking aen. There were also the funerals with priests and mourners
clothed in robes of white: a lovely basket cage on wheels from which a
flock of pigeons would later be released over the grave to symbolise
the ascent of the spirit to Heaven. How beautiful this hopeful
symbolism is in comparison with our European funeral processions
swathed in gloomy black and the cold emphasis on "ashes to ashes"!
We children of the foreign communities were also regaled from time to
time by wonderful parties at the beautiful homes of the well-to-do
Japanese residents, charabancs being sent for us, our mothers and our
devoted Japanese nurses. There were many little Japanese guests too,
all exquisitely dressed in their brightest kimonos, a kaleidoscope of
color on the wide lawns. Professional entertainers were engaged to
fascinate the young with conjuring tricks, - and clever artists to
create before our eyes perfect little models of small animals, or
graceful sprigs of plum-blossom and cherry, all done in a special paste
of rice-flour and water and then daintily colored. There were
delectable cakes, too, and gifts to be taken home; so no one forgot one
of these marvellous parties!
For the foreign children of Kobe, there were also regular bathing
expeditions to the Yacht Club down the bay, which we reached in company
by means of hired lighters towed by a launch; - and for Archie and me,
sailing in our father's succession of boats, yachting being his passion.
There were, too, interesting public occasions among the foreigners, when
each national group celebrated its own special holidays:- for the
British, the Queen's Birthday; the Americans, Independence Day; the
French, the Fall of the Bastille, and so on, with games and races for
the children on the Recreation Grounds. Jolliest of all, for our
parents was the St Andrew's Ball, given by the Scots, when tartans
whirled and everyone with a Scottish name wore, if not kilts, at least a
sash and a sprig of heather. These did not come my way for many years
but I can well remember the enthusiasm with which my dainty little
mother, as a Campbell wife, practiced the reels.
In 1907, when I was 12 and my brother 10 1/2, Archie and I were taken
by our parents to England via America, visiting once again my mother's
cousins in New Hampshire. Grandfather Campbell having died the previous
year, we did not go this time to Canada, my parents objective being to
find suitable schools for us in Britain before the end of father's leave
and his obligatory return to Japan, though mother would be remaining
with us for the better part of a year. These hard separations were the
inevitable lot of most foreign families in the Far East, particularly
among the British whose tradition of an eminent boarding school for
their sons was compelling. My parents, however chose to settle Archie
and me in Guernsey, in spite of our having widowed Aunts in England,
partly because of the fine climate of the Channel Islands and partly
because lifelong friends from Japan, the Valdemar Blads (he a Dane and
she English) had retired there and would keep a constant and
affectionate eye upon us. Our every Sunday was spent at their home,
"Beau Sejour", where I became a great tomboy among my brother and their
five sons, the two eldest being our exact contemporaries, and one my
particular chum all through my girlhood. With them I climbed the great
trees on their extensive grounds and enthusiastically joined in games of
football, hockey, tennis and cricket. There was an older sister, Helga,
but she was mostly in England with her grandmother. My brother went, as
a boarder, to the same school the Blad boys attended, Elizabeth
College, founded in the great Queen's day;- and I to the excellent
"Ladies' College" patterned after the famous girl's school in
Cheltenham, whence our Headmistress and most of our teachers came.
Among my fellow-boarders were the daughters of Tea Planters in Ceylon,
civil servants and retired military men from India and merchants from
Jamaica, South Africa and elsewhere in the Colonies, several bearing the
old French island names.
The Channel Islands are superlatively lovely, gorse-covered cliffs,
with guardian Norman Martello towers and wave-filled caverns marking
the Southern coast, tree-arched water-lanes with their running streams
leading down past the towers to enticing coves and bays and sparkling
beaches. The central table-land is given over to dairy farming and the
growing of tomatoes, grapes, flowers and vegetables for mainland
markets, the acres of greenhouses making an unromantic adjunct to the
old stone farm-houses. To the North the land flattens into sand-dunes
where an occasional dolmen or cromlech has been uncovered by time; but
here treacherous finger of submerged rock run out into the sea and
account for many a tragic wreck. The islands were at one time part of
the fiefdom of Normandy, indeed not islands at all but joined to it.
French is used in all proclamations and in the courts; and a patois is
still spoken among the fishermen and farmers. In my day a Guernsey
penny of less value than the English was minted, and with the use of a
silver 50-centime piece added confusion worse confounded to our English
currency.
My school days were particularly happy in this Idyllic spot, though
Archie, being a bit frail and not athletic did not fare as well in the
rough and tumble of his boys' boarding school.
We spent our first summer holidays with mother on the smaller island
of Sark, immortalized in Victor Hugo's "Toilers of the Sea", but after
her return to Japan our holidays were varied and when not arranged for
among teachers or others who would have us, we went most often to
London to our father's older widowed sister: "Haddie" who, during the
long absences of my mother in the Far East, virtually took her place
and exercised a great influence upon me. One Summer, she took us to
Germany where she "drank the waters" at Bad Nauhein, Homburg and
Wiesbaden, including in our return to England a trip down the Rhine by
excursion steamer from Bonn to Rotterdam. Wherever we were, Aunt
Haddie took us to neighboring points of interest; and while in Bad
Nauheim, we saw the arrival of the Czar and Czarina of Russia and their
children at the nearby palace of Alexandria's parents the Grand Duke
and Duchess of Hesse Darmstadt, whom they were visiting incognito.
Aunt Haddie was also responsible for getting us leave from our
Guernsey schools to see, from the vantage point of a friend's house
overlooking St.James' Park, the magnificent Coronation procession on
June 22nd, 1911, of King George and Queen Mary. It was particularly
interesting in retrospect for the other still-reigning monarchs of
Europe, as well as jewelled Indian Princes and Potentates from all over
the Empire, rode in resplendent uniforms behind the great gilded coach,
the lines of marching soldiery continuing for hours, a memorable sight.
Among the guests of Aunt Haddie's friend in Carlton House Terrace on
this occasion was the young grandson of the Duke of Argyll, a few years
younger then Archie, to whom we were introduced as "fellow-Campbells"
though I doubt if this impressed any one of us children.
Aunt Haddie was a beautiful and accomplished woman who had traveled
widely in Europe with her husband Capt. Alfred Jephson, R.N. and during
his lifetime led a fascinating life. In 1891, he was appointed Honorary
Secretary of the first Royal Naval Exhibition given in London that
year, in the success of which King Edward, then Prince of Wales, was
keenly interested; and was afterwards knighted by Queen Victoria for
his outstanding part in the undertaking. Before this when stationed on
the Isle of Wight, Alfred had several times sailed aboard the Royal
Yacht "Britannic" and he and Aunt Haddie were often guests at Osborne
House where they met the Royal Family informally and earned the
particular respect and liking of the Prince of Wales who when Sir
Alfred died on September 12/1900, wrote Aunt Haddie the kindest possible
letter in his own hand. Queen Victoria also dictated a personal note of
condolence, as did her widowed daughter-in-law, the Duchess of Albany,
and her grandson the Duke of York (afterwards George the Fifth) who
referred to Alfred as "his friend". During Lady Jephson's widowhood,
Edward saw to it that a brace of partridges or grouse was delivered to
her from time to time from his "shoots", as well as tickets for Ascot
and Ranelagh. Besides these interesting royal contacts, the Jephsons
met many of the well-known writers and painters of the day: - the du
Mauriers, Browning, Oscar Wilde, Lecky and George Russell ("A,E,")
among the writers; - with Whistler (who lived opposite them), Sargent,
Leighton, Alma-Tadema, Millais and George Boughton among the artists.
The last-named encouraged Aunt Haddei in her own painting and she
subsequently had pictures hung in the Grafton and other galleries of
London, as well as several private exhibitions, one graced by Princess
Beatrice.
After her husband's death Aunt Haddie was very lonely but having both
beauty and wit never lacked for friends, wrote three or four books of
travel and reminiscence and, until her health failed worked hard for
several charities and the Primrose League; and continued to follow much
of her previous round, -the London season, the Races, the Riviera, the
German Spas and so on. Hers was a fascinating personality and Archie
and I were fortunate that, having no children of her own, she lavished
her warm, if somewhat exacting, affection on us. With her we saw, and
learned the history of, the historical landmarks of London, went to the
galleries, attended a service in the Chapel Royal, and visited the
country homes of several of her charming friends. Though we young
people were occasionally bored by all this, I cannot thank her enough
in retrospect.
My mother's widowed twin sisters and our cousin Evelyn were also in
London in our school years living quietly in Hampstead; and Archie and
I enjoyed the relaxed and familiar atmosphere of their pretty flat
filled with Oriental things, where nothing in particular was asked of
us and we were completely at ease. But we saw nothing, when with them,
outside the family circle.
Others who influenced us were my father's gentle spinster cousins,
May, Rosie and Heyland Pryce-Browne the youngest sister deeply wrapped
up in a devout Anglo-Catholicism which later drew Archie in to that
orbit and determined his high church clerical career. Their only
brother Bertie Pryce-Browme, a Captain in the Royal Marines, was killed
in Belgium early in the first World War, leaving Archie and me with no
male relative in England, a lack which was particularly unfortunate for
him.
In 1912, when I had just turned seventeen, my parents came home on
leave; and after another Summer together on the small island of Sark,
they returned to Japan, seeing me off first from London with a Guernsey
school-mate Esmee Le Feuvre and four others from England and Scotland
for a year's schooling in Germany. This was a wonderfully broadening
experience for the classmates who joined us in Dresden came from Norway,
Sweden, Finland, Holland and Java, Canada, Germany itself and even from
Russia and Romania, whereas our three teachers were German, English and
French. In such a polyglot group, one common language was imperative
and we soon all learned to speak fluent German.
Dresden since devastated in a second World War, was then filled with
beautiful cathedrals, palaces, galleries and parks, having also a fine
theatre and opera house. We were taken as well on delightful expeditions
into the mountains around us or by excursion steamer up the gorges of
the Elbe, returning sometimes by moonlight while everyone on deck joined
in singing old German folk-songs.
Our school was housed in a handsome building not far from the Crown
Prince's palace and had once been the Chinese embassy. There were
parquet floors in our bedrooms, a marble entrance hall, and great
porcelain stoves everywhere, a pleasant recollection of "gemutlicheit"
to offset the horrors of the war soon to follow.
After Germany, just prior to my eighteenth birthday, my parents called
ue back to Japan, refusing to allow us to be presented at Court as Aunt
Haddie begged, feeling that it would play no part in my future life. I
left London in the early Spring of l913 for Berlin and the Trans
Siberian Railway in the charge of a dear friend from Yokohama, "Uncle"
Leonard Healing. It was an unforgettable journey of two weeks across
such a vast territory as to include every variety of scenery and
climate; dark forests and deep snow, dry steppes and choking dust which
managed somehow to penetrate the tightly closed double windows; then
snow again and a break-down on the edge of Lake Baikal, the wind
wheeling the flakes about us; and at the far end of the lake, just
visible, the chimneys of the sad political prison. The small wayside
stations all along the line were desolation itself, with peasants
huddled for warmth around the big iron stoves inside; and just a few
rough log homesteads scattered about. There were, I think, only one
train East and one West a week and these met quite ceremoniously at a
half-way crossing point, all the passengers excitedly piling out to
exchange the news of the day. I particularly remember two Chinese
students among them, whose home dialects were so dissimilar as to find
it easier to talk to one another in English The trans-Siberian trains
were most comfortable, except that water was so jealously hoarded that
the much advertised baths were never used, except as a depository for
empty bottles. The carriages were solidly built and rolled along
smoothly on the widest gauge roadbed in the world, but even so it was a
relief finally to reach Vladivostock and the hoped-for but still
elusive tub! Having been delayed at Lake Baikal for repairs, we missed
the connecting boat to Japan, so had to spend one night in a
Vladivostock hotel, where once more we were told that baths were
unfortunately not available! Next morning, when we got aboard the
Japanese steamer, an amusing line of passengers immediately formed,
armed with towels and sponges, waiting eagerly for their first real
wash in a fortnight; and never did hot soak feel more delicious!
The charm and daintiness of Japan, with its green paddyfields pretty
thatched cottages, blossoming trees and the first glimpse of Fujyama,
were most refreshing after our sombre journey, a prelude to three
years of the jolly life awaiting any debutante of the foreign community
in Yokohama or Kobe. I was particularly happy, through those
chaperoned days in having zestfu1, sympathetic parents whose sunny
natures endeared them to young and old. There were tennis and dancing,
amateur theatricals and concerts (in all of which my mother excelled)
picnics and sailing with my father in his graceful yacht "Daimyo", as
well as parties aboard the occasional warships in port, (German among
them to begin with) all made the more exciting for us since men
conveniently outnumbered the girls in all the Treaty-ports and romance
abounded!
My most determined beau was an American, Chester Poole (Otis
Manchester, in full) whom I married in 1916, - and from that moment on
my story ceases as an individual narrative and merges with his. Our
parents had long been friends and it is odd that his mother should have
given me, when I was only twelve and bound to boarding school, a gold
brooch of her own in the form of a lover's knot, having enamelled
forget-me-nots entwined in it. Little did she think that I should one
day grow up to be her daughter-in-law. Perhaps this graceful emblem had
something to do with our happy marriage, - who knows?
Dorothy Campbell Poole's Paternal Ancestry
Her own Narrative of:
Note 10/2001: alternative origins of the Saxton family at the end of this paper.
A history assembled from family books letters and papers; from
inscriptions on tombstones in the Saxton plot in Mt Hermon Cemetery
Quebec; from Court Records; and above all from the invaluable family
trees compiled by my cousin Myrtle Campbell Fender through years of
patient research. Without the generous loan of these and her constant
help, for which I am most grateful, it would have been impossible to
contrive this narrative. Nor would it ever have attained its
genealogical sequence without my husband's constructive arrangement and
useful elaborations D.C.P. 1964.
My Campbell ancestors were Scottish settlers in Colonial America, the
first of our line, according to my Aunt Harriet Campbell, having left
Scotland on retiring from the Army and settled in Virginia, just where
we do not know. Perhaps, as another family legend has it, he came to
Maryland. Uncertainty also exists as to whether he stemmed from the
Campbells of Argyle or those of Breadalbane. The latter belief was
accepted by Aunt Harriet (later Lady Jephson) in her book "Notes of a
Nomad", and was shared by my father and his second cousin Ernest
Rankin, a barrister of Montreal, all three equally great-grand-children
of the first Archibald Campbell of Quebec. However, Lady Noble, who as
Margery Durham Campbell was the granddaughter of that same Archibald
and therefore a generation closer, says in her biography "A Long Life"
that her father believed the family to have come from Argyle which was
also the firm conviction of my father's younger brother Lt.Col. Kenneth
Campbell. His daughter, my cousin Myrtle Fender, tells how Kenneth
often recounted an event of his boyhood when he and his two brothers
Colin and Willie stood with their father at a crossroads near their
Quebec home "Thornhill" , resplendent in their Argyle tartan to wave a
welcome to Princess Louise and her husband the Duke of Argyle, when the
latter arrived in Canada as the new Governor General; and their pride
when the Duke, on spying them, stopped his carriage "to greet his
kinsmen".
The fact that our grandmother Isabella Prior Campbell was on the
distaff side descended from distinguished Campbells of Breadalbane, and
very proud of it, may have given rise to later confusion, particularly
since her constant practice of dressing the children in the Breadalbane
tartan is one of her daughter Harriet's early girlhood memories and
possibly influenced her thinking. In an old letter written from
"Thornhill" in 1872, Isabella confesses that her husband Archibald
twitted her on her fervent predilection for her Breadalbane forbears;
and his amused tolerance seems to suggest that he, on the contrary,
held himself to be an Argyle. Be that as it may, Cousin Myrtle and I
feel that the tradition of the Argyle origin of our first Colonial
ancestor is probably the correct one. Beyond these slender and
conflicting clues, we have nothing positive to go upon and our factual
history begins with his son:-
Archibald Campbell, born 1753 (we do not know where) died 1818 in
Quebec. During the American Revolution, he married in Old Trinity
Church, New York City, Charlotte Saxton (1762-1830) younger daughter of
of John Quelch Saxton (l733-l809) late Captain in the Grenadier Guards
and brother of Capt. Sir Charles Saxton, R.N., Bart of Circourt and
Caldecot House, Abingdon, Berkshire. The British Army being then in
occupation of New York City (1776-l783) they were married by the
Military Chaplain probably about 1780 when Charlotte would have been 18
and Archibald 27. The record is said to be in the Register of the
Horse Guards in London. Since the Saxtons are equally our ancestors, I
give here what we know of them:-
Clement Saxton, married Joan Justice and died 1736.
Their son was:-
Edward Saxton, Merchant, of White Friars, London who married
Elisabeth, daughter, of Thomas Bush. They had six children:-
1. Sir Charles Saxton, 1st Baronet, Captain Royal Navy 1762; commanded
H.M.S."Invincible" with Hood at St.Kitts, Jan. 1782; Commissioner of
the Royal Dockyard at Plymouth l789; died 1808 and buried in Gloucester
Cathedral. He acted as Second to the Duke of Richmond in his famous
duel with H.R.H.the Duke of York. Married in 1771 Mary, daughter of
Jonathan Bush of Burcot, County Wexford, Ireland.
They had two children:
1. Charles, 2nd Bart, 1773-1838, who died without issue and the
Baronetcy became extinct
2. Mary, married Admiral Robert Dudley Oliver.
They had several children. Their eldest surviving son John Oliver, born
1809, inherited Circourt and was a J.P. and D.L. for Berks. He married
1st in 1837 Matilda, only daughter of Col. Morgan of Llandough Castle,
County Glamorgan. She died the following year and he married 2nd in
1849 Lucy Diana, daughter of Col. Thos. P. Mannsell of Thorpe Malsor,
County Northampton; and had one son, Robert Dudley Mannsell, born 1853.
2. John Quelch Saxton, (1733-1809) Captain, Grenadier Guards. We do not
know whom he married but they had two daughters:
1. Harriet, who never married.
2. Charlotte Saxton, (1762-1830) who married c.1780, our ancestor
Archibald Campbell.
3. Clement Saxton, died 1810, Colonel Berkshire Militia.
4. Anne Saxton.
5. Mary Saxton, married John Brome.
6. Elizabeth Saxton married a Mr.Prince of Abington and had two
children, Norman and Elizabeth.
At the time of his daughter's marriage to Archibald Campbell, Capt.
John Quelch Saxton possessed extensive lands on the Delaware River in
Pennsylvania which, according to tradition included most of the ground
on which Philadelphia now stands. On the outbreak of the Revolution, he
was offered a Generalship in the American Army which he refused,
remaining loyal to the Crown. Archibald Campbell likewise adhered to
his allegiance to Britain whereas a brother espoused the Colonial cause
and became a Captain in the American Navy. Unfortunately, we do not
know his name. When the war ended, the property of those who had
supported the Crown was declared forfeit and over 100,000 Loyalists
either returned to Europe or migrated to Canada. Capt. Saxton and
Archibald, having both lost their possessions, determined to move to
Canada and like many other United Empire Loyalists sailed with their
families to Shelburne in Nova Scotia, later making their way to Quebec
City. There they established their new hose on St.Foy Road, calling it
"Saxvilla". This road originates in the heart of the city as St.Jeans
Road under which name it runs out Westward for a mile beyond the old
wall before it becomes St.Foy Rd. which in turn develops into the
highway to Montreal along the North bank of the St.Lawrence. In those
days, St.Foy Rd would have been well out in the country above the
Battlefield and the Plains of Abraham and both farms and residences
were surrounded by many acres of land. There is no clue as to where
"Saxvilla" stood but in the years that followed, it was often referred
to as "The Big House". Apparently the Saxtons and Campbells lived
together as both Capt.Saxton and Archibald died there, the former in
l809 and the latter on July 20, 1818. In no family chronicles is
Mrs.Saxton mentioned by name and it is possible that Capt.Saxton had
long been a widower and looked after by his daughters. This, however,
is mere conjecture. We know little of the lives of Archibald and
Charlotte, or the Saxtons, after their arrival in Quebec; but in spite
of the loss of their possessions in America, they seem to have lived in
comfort and brought up their children with the traditional graces and a
good education. As to Archibald's occupation, a possible clue is
afforded by a very fine portrait of him in the possession of a
descendant of his granddaughter Charlotte, George Mellis Douglas of
Lakeside, Ontario, an explorer of North Western Canada and author, who
describes the painting as of "a very handsome old gentleman, some of
whose features are strongly reproduced in many of his descendants. The
portrait has an open window in the background through which the sea and
a ship are depicted.
I have a hazy recollection of having heard my father say that he was in
some way connected with the shipping business." It may be that
Archibald founded a shipyard in Quebec as his eldest son John Saxton
Campbell is known to have been connected with the firm of Campbell &
Black, shipbuilders of Quebec. More on this subject appears in John's
life.
Charlotte's spinster sister Harriet struck out for herself by
establishing a Ladies' School in Montreal on St.Paul's St which was
still flourishing at the time of her father's death in l809. In her old
age, during the 1830s Harriet lived with her niece Henrietta Sheppard
in "Woodfield", the Sheppard home in Quebec.
After Archibald's death in 1818, his widow Charlotte continued to live
in "Saxvilla" with her two young daughters for some years but the place
was probably sold on her death in 1830
Archibald and Charlotte Campbell had 3 sons and two daughters:-
1. John Saxton b. 1782 d. 1855
2. Archibald 1863
3. Charles 1792 1872
4. Henrietta
5. Louise Sophia 1800 1885
In telling of their lives, I shall, for convenience, deal with Charles
(my great grandfather) last.
is believed to
have been born in New York before the family moved to Canada, presumably about
1782, and died in l855. He married Mary Vivian, born -, died 1877. They had no
children. To quote his niece Margery Durham Campbell (Lady Noble) "He
was not only tall and well built but very strong, calm and collected and of a
very different character from my father Archibald who was lively active and too
good-natured Uncle John had large timber or lumber coves and I think must have
been associated with his brother-in-law, our Uncle Sheppard, as they both had
to do with large rafts and timber coves. The wood used to be brought down the
river from the forests to the city in enormous rafts and I have often watched
them, - huts in the center for the raftsmen to sleep in and flags on poles
stuck about. Ships would be loaded by stevedores with cargoes of great logs for
England from these rafts."
In 1835 John purchased from the estate of Andrew Lachlan Fraser the ancient
Seigneurie of L'Islet du Portage, Pointe Seche, near St. Andre de Kamouraska on
the lower St. Lawrence. Founded in 1672 the Seigneurie, after many
vicissitudes, passed out of French into Scottish hands in 1764, and in 1777 was
bought by Capt. Malcolm Fraser in whose family it remained for three
generations. Extending 6 miles along the St. Lawrence with a depth of 8 miles,
it embraced 30,000 acres of virgin forests and small farms. Set back on a
bluff fringing the river stood the manor house, ruggedly built of staunch
timbers by ships' carpenters in the French Colonial manner, while fringing the
shore below were strung granaries, a mill, warehouses, a school, wharves and a
shipyard. Here the Frasers had built several schooners and a square-rigged ship.
The manor house itself dates from their last years. Our family lore has it
that timbers from the Seigneurie were ferried across the St. Lawrence to the
shipyard of John Sexton Campbell for the construction of the "Royal
William", the first ship to cross the Atlantic solely under steam, in
1832. This dovetails with the historical fact that the "Royal
William" was built in the yards of Campbell & Black, ship-builders of
Quebec and identifies John Sexton Campbell or his father Archibald, as the
Campbell of that partnership. Another anecdote linking John with ship-building
comes from Lady Noble who recounts that "My Uncle John had prodigious
physical strength and it is told of him that when a schooner being launched
stuck on the ways, he put his shoulder to her and the vessel moved off."
It was three years after the building of the "Royal William" that
John Saxton Campbell bought the Seigneurie at Pointe Seche, no doubt a sequel
to the lumber transactions with the Frasers. John and his wife Mary Vivian spent
their Summers at Pointe Seche from 1835 to 1841 but it seems that after that
the house was seldom occupied and left in charge of a caretaker who lived in
the cottage. John died at Penzance, Cornwall, April 2 1855, his widow living
on till Nov.17/1877. Having no children, he bequeathed Pointe Seche after his
widow's use, to all his nephews and nieces who included my grandfather
Archibald; and he being a lawyer, administered the estate for his Aunt Mary
until her death. It was during these years 1855/1877 that my father William Wallace
Campbell and his brothers and sisters spent so many childhood Summers at the
Seigneurie of which they all held treasured memories. On the widow's death, one
of the nieces, Sophia's daughter Louise Wurtele Rankine, bought out the shares
of all the others and took over the Seigneurie which she eventually bequeathed
to her two youngest sons Capt. Alan and Ernest Rankin, who came into their
inheritance on her death in 1936.
In 1941, when my husband Chester and I were motoring in Canada we found Pointe
Seche after a diligent search, about 100 miles down river from Quebec. Imagine
our delight, on struggling up the stony path, to be met by one of these now
elderly sons, Ernest, who happened to be there with yet another brother to make
certain readjustments necessitated by the Canadian Government's annulment of
ancient Seigneural rights effective that very week. He most kindly showed us
all over the quaint, weather-bleached and now almost empty house, regaling us
with curious legends. The echoing house stood high off the ground, an unusually
wide veranda encircling the main floor, to which a flight of broad wooden steps
gave access. From the main entrance in the last gable, an airy hallway ran
straight through to the West end where similar steps led down to the garden.
Spacious living rooms opened into the main salon reaching up two stories with a
gallery along one side. The bedrooms upstairs, divided by a central hall, were
quite simple. One had been securely boarded up "because of the
ghost." In another an austere iron bed had given repose to Lord Wolseley
during the Red River Insurrection in 1870. A decrepit grand piano still stood in
one corner of the drawing room and a few oil portraits on the denuded and
weather-stained walls looked forlorn and reproachful in the musty atmosphere of
disuse. A gaunt old French retainer, whose mother had been housekeeper in my
grandparents day, gallantly insisted in his broad patois that I closely
resembled one of those feminine ancestors whom he claimed to remember clearly
as a visitor to the Seigneurie during his childhood. He even recollected what
an exceptionally strong swimmer my grandfather had been. What has become of
this old Seigneurie since then we have never heard; but its dreamy atmosphere
of timelessness lingers with one nostalgically[i].[ii]
born circa 1788, died July 16/1863 in Quebec. He married April 8/1817,
Agnes Durham George, also of Quebec, whose ancestors were the
Strathmores of Glamis Castle. "She was a girl of great refinement and
had a remarkable taste in poetry." She outlived her husband 18 years,
dying in 1880.
Archibald was His Majesty's Notary for Lower Canada and one of the
duties of his office was to administer the oaths to the Governor
General on his arrival from England. He also had his law office.
Speaking of her childhood his wife (Lady Noble) says: "Our house faced
the Citadel, where the Governor General lived, and the Union Jack
flying told us the way the wind blew. In the moonlight, the shadows of
the grand old poplar trees in the Governor's garden fell along our
street. Opposite us was another garden where stood the obelisk, the
monument to Wolfe and Montcalm." This latter Square, now called
"The Governor's Garden", lies between the Citadel and Chateau
Frontenac, a commanding site at the tip of Quebec over-looking the
river. Lady Noble continues: " I remember walks with my father and
mother when we went through the Gate St. Louis to get into the Country.
The gloom of the Gate and the darkness of the sally-port half
frightened us children." (The St. Louis Gate was demolished in 1871.)
"Father was not only himself musical, playing the flute from boyhood
but a patron of music all his life. By nature lively, active too good-
natured he perhaps wasted money on promoting music. Naturally his
children were also musically gifted, possessing fine voices and playing
various instruments. We owned the Seignuerie of Ste. Cecile de Bic,
which brought him no profit. On it, he built a cottage from the veranda
of which one could look across the St. Lawrence to the far shore; and
our family spent the Summers there."
Archibald and Agnes had eight children:-
1/1. Sophia Georgina Campbell, born about 1818 died in childhood when 5
or 6 years old.
1/2. A daughter who died at six months.
1/3. Charlotte Saxton Campbell, 1820-1852. Was clever and musical.
She had an exquisite soprano, early developed and sang a solo in the
cathedral at the age of 15. She married at 18 or 19 George Douglas,
Quarantine Officer for Quebec. They lived in Summer on the lovely
island "Grosse Isle" where later on over 5,000 fugitives from the
Irish potato famine of 1847 were buried. They had 4 sons and 1
daughter.
2/1. Campbell Mellis Douglas, an Army Surgeon, Colonel, who was
awarded the Victoria Cross for rescuing 17 soldiers from
rebellious prisoners on the Andaman Islands and getting them
safely to a ship under heavy fire. He married the young widow of
Surgeon Valentine Munbee McMaster, 78th Highlanders, also a V.C.,
won at Lucknow in the Sepoy Mutiny who died leaving a year old
son Bryce McMaster. (1934 Bryce was living at 15 Park Crescent
Oxford.) Campbell M Douglas' own sons were:-
3/1. George Mellis Douglas, born circa 1870, an explorer by
canoe of the remote Canadian Northwest and a well-known
author. (His adventures are told in "Lands Forlorn" published
by
the Knickerbocker Press, Putnams N.Y. 1914.) In 1937 he was
living at Lakeside, Ontario and a snapshot taken 5 years
earlier shows him, lean and bronzed, with white hair, standing
beside his canoe "Alcyone" and strongly resembling my father
and his brother Kenneth.
3/2. Lionel Douglas, who in 1934 was the Captain of the "Empress
of Japan", the ship in which Chester and I and our 3 boys came
from Japan to British Columbia in 1925. I do not recall of he
was our Captain then.
2/2. Archibald Douglas, Admiral, K.C.B., K.C.Vo., who had four
children:-
3/1. Archibald Douglas, Commander R.N. Killed in action 1915.
3/2. John Charles Edward Douglas, Major 10th Yorkshire Regiment.
Killed in action 1915.
3/3. David William Shafto Douglas, b.1883, married 1914 the
daughter of Charles Stevenson of Edinburgh. He was Lieut
Commander of the "Black Prince" and was killed in action in
1915.
3/4. A daughter.
2/3. Justin Douglas, a well-known doctor of Bournemouth.
2/4. Charles Stuart Douglas, killed in an accident on the
Pennsylvania Railroad in 1882.
2/5. Agnes Douglas, went to school in England and married Reginald
Cadman of the Yorkshire Cadmans. Her only son:-
3/1. William Cadman, a Commander in the Royal Navy, was killed in
action in 1917.
1/4. Georgina Campbell, born about 1822 and died at 14. A sweet girl.
1/5. Saxton Campbell, (1826-1850). Was a violinist and a fine tenor;
good looking and a strong swimmer. From early boyhood he had a
premonition that he would be drowned; and at the age of 24 he was,
off a small yacht shared with a friend, while crossing the
St. Lawrence to "Points Seche".
1/6. Margery Campbell, born at Easter 1828, died in 1930 at 102 years
of age. She was not only beautiful but an excellent pianist.
Married in 1854 Capt. Andrew Noble of the Royal Artillery who soon
afterwards was ordered to South Africa only returning to Woolwich in
1858 where Margery rejoined him with their daughter Lilias (Lily)
who had been born in Quebec after he left. In 1860 Andrew was
invited to
join Sir William Armstrong, the great ordnance manufacturer of
Elswick, and ere long became Sir Andrew Noble K.C.B. of Jesmond Dene
House, Newcastle on Tyne. In the course of years they occupied or
acquired some beautiful old homes in Northumberland besides
maintaining a flat in London and constantly entertained interesting
notables including the brother of the Japanese Emperor and Admiral
Togo, the Naval victor in the Russo-Japanese war. In 1914 they
celebrated their diamond wedding anniversary and a year later Sir
Andrew died, she living on till 1930. Her book, appropriately
entitled "A Long Life" is historically interesting, especially
in relation to the Campbell family. She and Sir Andrew had
six children:-
2/1. Lilias Hilda Geils Noble, (called "Lily") born about 1856 in
Canada. There is no mention of her marrying but she was always
active and much interested in the Primrose League.
2/2. George Noble, born in England before 1861 and was in the 13th
Hussars in the Boer War. He married in 1898 and his daughter was
born March 3/1900, the day before he embarked for South Africa.
He later became Sir George Noble, Bart.
2/3. Saxton William Armstrong Noble, born about 1863, married Celia
Brunel James in 1891. They lived in Kent House, Knightsbridge.
2/4. John Noble. Born in the late 1860's. Created Baronet 1923.
2/5. Philip Noble. Also born in late l860's, married 1899 Mabel
Westmacott. Became High Sheriff of Newcastle.
2/6. Ethel Noble, born in the '60's. Married in 1895, Alfred
Cochrane. Further particulars of the descendants of the Noble
family are given in Burke.
1/7. William Darling Campbell, (1830-1885) Was a fine cellist and would
have followed a musical career but when his brother Saxton was
drowned, had to take his place in his father's law office. He
visited his sister Margery in England in 1858 and there married
Capt. Andrew Noble's younger sister, Isabella, taking her back to
Quebec. They had 2 sons and 2 daughters:-
2/1. William Noble Campbell, (l858-1924) who married Gertrude Elise
Wilson. Apparently no children.
2/2. Harold Benjamin Darling Campbell, born l869, died 1940 in
Quebec. Married Blanche ? Their only son:-
3/1. William Campbell, born l908, was accidentally killed in 19Z6
at Kingston Military Academy when a cadet of 18. Lily Noble,
his father's first cousin, said of this tragedy "alas, an end
to the male representatives of my grandfather - (the Archibald
Campbell who married Agnes Durham George.)
2/3. Lucy Darling Campbell, born in the early 1860's, died in the
l940's. Married in 1885 Edmund Gustave Jolie de Lotbiniere,
Seigneur of Point Platon, Quebec. He was a descendant of Michel
Chartier, Marquis de Lotbiniere, (l728-1799), Engineer in Chief
of New France, Seigneur of Lotbiniere Vaudreuil, Rigaud. Built
the forts of Carillon (Ticonderoga) and Isle au Noix. It was
upon his advice that Montcalm attacked Fort William Henry on Lake
George (1757) and waited for Abercrombie at Ticonderoga (1758).
He was allied to the Vaudreuil family and his portrait hangs in
the museum of Chateau de Ramsay in Montreal. My father, William
Wallace Campbell visited Sir Henri Jolie de Lotbiniere then
Governor of British Columbia, when en route to California as a
young man in his twenties. I believe, but am not certain, that
Sir Henri was Lucy's father-in-law. Another son of Sir Henri was
Major General Alain Chartier Joly de Lotbiniere who built the
Cauvery power development in India and was member of the
Legislative Council of Bengal. I have no information about Lucy
and Edward's descendants but they are prominent in Canada today.
2/4. Grace Darling Campbell, married Edwin Alan Jones. Their only
son:
3/1. Marvin Campbell Alan Jones left McGill University to
volunteer in World War I and was killed in action when only
19.
1/8. Hilda Campbell, 1832-l918, Had a mellow soprano voice and unusual
skill at the piano. She married Lieut. (later General) Charles
Brackenbury of the Royal Artillery, who died in 1893. Their
children were:
2/1. Herevard Brackembury. Married Winifred Browne, daughter of Sir
Benjamin Browne.
2/2. A daughter, who married ? Dyer.
Refer to Burke for further information.
called "Harriet". Though the dates of her birth and death are
unrecorded, they may be assumed to have been circa 1796-1870. She
married the Honorable William Sheppard, an eminent naturalist, who was
also believed to have been associated with his brother-in-law John
Saxton Campbell in a logging business. Lady Noble recalls that in her
childhood (the l830's) the Sheppards owned a beautiful place
"Woodfield" just beyond "Spencerwood" (the Lieut. Governor's
residence) on St.Louis Road. It had a lovely
garden overlooking the river; and indoors was an aviary full of lively,
well cared-for birds. Our family chronicles do not give the names of
any Sheppard children but my cousin Myrtle has a note that there was a
daughter, and George Mellis Douglas mentions having received a letter
in 1930 from a Maxfield Sheppard asking for genealogical information
about the Douglas family "with whom he was connected through the
Campbells". It appears therefore that the Sheppard line did continue.
It is interesting to note that the side road which bordered "Woodfield"
is still called "Sheppard Road" on present day maps. Another of Lady
Noble's recollections is that Harriet's spinster Aunt Harriet Saxton
lived with the Sheppards in her old age, - probably after her sister
Charlotte's death in l830. She was clever with her hands and
constructed a miniature farm scene with rivers, bridges, village and
livestock which stood in a hallway in a long glass case and fascinated
the children. Harriet Sheppard was herself a botanist and wrote a
book on Canadian birds, sharing her husband's interest in them.
called "Sophia", l800-1885, married in 1824 Jonathan Wurtele, Seigneur
of Riviere David and an Officer in the Quebec Cavalry in the War of
1812. His father, Josias Wurtele, came to Canada in 1782 from
Stumpelbach, near Stuttgart, in Wurtemberg, Germany, where their
ancestors are recorded back to 1559. (It is interesting to note that
from l781 to 1783 there was quartered near Quebec awaiting repatriation
a surviving contingent of German mercenaries - Brunswickians - who,
under General Baron von Riedesel, had fought for the British in the
American Revolution and many of whom had been prisoners of war from
l779-1780 in Charlottesville Virginia, on Barracks Rd. The Baron and
Baroness were well-liked in Charlottesville and cordially entertained
by Thomas Jefferson and others. It must have been heartening to Josias
Wurtele to find so many compatriots in Quebec when he first arrived in
l782.)
Louisa and Jonathan Wurtele had six sons and two daughters:-
1/1. Jonathan, a Judge. 1/2. Arthur, a Civil Engineer.
1/3. Edward. 1/4. Louis, a clergyman.
1/5. Vivian. 1/6. Louisa.
1/7. Harriet, 1/8. Charles, a lawyer.
Of this large family, we have further knowledge of only two, Jonathan
and Louisa:-
1/1. Jonathan Saxton Campbell Wurtele, (1828-1903) Barrister and
Judge of the Court of Kings Bench; Queen's Counsellor 1873,
Professor of Commercial Law at McGill University; created Officer of
the Legion of Honor, France, 1882; Member and in 1888 Speaker of the
Legislative Assembly. He married 1st, 1854, Julia Nelson, daughter.
of Dr. Nelson, second cousin of the great Admiral Horatio. He
married 2nd, in l876 Sarah Braniff of New York. Jonathan and
Julia's son:
2/1. Ernest Wurtele (Later Lt.Col. Sir Ernest Wurtele, died in 1936.
He was always close to our family and was one of the witnesses to
my grandfather Archibald Campbell's death certificate in l906. He
was a contemporary of my father and his brothers and as a boy
visited them at "Thornhill".
(9/2003: from internet reply by Bill Longley, EW was an active
stamp collector and was president of the Dominion Philatelic
Association in Canada in 1901, and lived in Quebec
1/6. Louisa Wurtele, born 1838, died Jan.3l/1936 in her 99th year.
Married in 1861 James Rankine (1825-1908) representative in Montreal
of J.& P.Coats, the thread manufacturers of Paisley Scotland. They
had 8 children.
Louisa, who married John Fair; James;
Archibald; John;
Norman; Alan Coats;
Arthur Glen Ernest; and Isobel.
Of these,
2/6. Alan Coates Rankin became a Colonel and Assistant Director of
Medical Services of the Canadian Army, residing in Ottawa.
2/7. Arthur Glen Ernest Rankin became a barrister and in 1941 had
his office at 276 St. James St. Montreal. He and his brother Alan
together inherited from their mother Louisa on her death in 1936
the Seigneurie of L'Islet du Portage at Pointe Seche previously
owned by her Uncle John Saxton Campbell, as has already been told
in his history.
This completes the histories of my great grandfather' 5 brothers and
sisters and brings me now to our own line, starting with himself.
(1792-1872), my great grandfather, was the youngest of the first
Archibald Campbell's three sons. He was a Lieut. Colonel of the 99th
Foot and fought in the wars of 1812-1825. While a Young Lieutenant of
26 and quartered in Montreal he met and on only a week's acquaintance
married November 27/1818, Harriet Doxey (l799-1832), youngest daughter
of an Irish Captain (also a United Empire Loyalist) who happened to be
travelling with his family to Kingston, Ontario. (I, D.C.P., have seen
the record of their marriage in the Montreal Court House.) Shortly
after their marriage. Charles' regiment was ordered to the front and
his mother Charlotte, widowed only four months earlier, sent a friend
to bring the young bride back to Quebec - an arduous 3 day journey -
where she and Charles' two youngest sisters (Henrietta and Louisa
Sophia) took her to their hearts in "the Big House", - "Saxvilla". Two
years passed before the young couple saw each other again. Charles and
Harriet then acquired a house of their own; and his first son Archibald
(1823-1906) writing in the year 1900 says: "My boyhood was passed at
"Battlefield" within a stone's throw of the Plains of Abraham. I gather
that "Battlefield" was the name given to their house and that it faced
the scene of the historic battle between Wolfe and Montcalm.
Charles' wife Harriet died circa 1833 when only 34 years old, leaving
him with five children. It seems likely that her younger sister Fanny
Doxey (1808-1897) then came to look after the children; and she and
Charles were married August 26/1839. More about the children later.
For his loyal services in the wars of 1812-1825, Charles
was granted by the Crown a 500 acre tract of land on the twin lakes
of William and George in Megantic Province, near the present village
of St. Ferdinand where he built himself a comfortable yet picturesque
home which he called "Bampcell" (transposing the "C" and "B" in
Campbell). There he retired to on leaving the army, followed by many
of his N.C.O.'s and men who settled around him, marrying French-
Canadian girls, whose descendants are still there and, in spite of good
Scots' names, now speak only French. Charles established a well-
ordered farm on his property and apparently lived there the year round.
One can only guess that this would been around 1845-1850. My Aunt
Haddie, born 1854, tells how, as children, she, my father and the
others used to love visiting their old grandfather at "Bampcell"
romping in the garden glades and eagerly watching the farm activities.
On rainy days, a well stocked library in his study was to them a
treasure-trove.
(In 1941, when my husband and I visited our second cousin, Richard,
then American Vice-Consul in Montreal, we detoured from our drive to
Quebec to find our way cross-country to this delightful old homestead
beside Lake William. An avenue of elms led from the road to a densely
arbored garden set like an oasis in the wheat fields, in the heart of
which a Swiss Chalet type of house looked down a steep-succession of
well kept terraces to the lake a hundred feet below. We were made most
welcome by a charming Irish family, the Dillons and their young couple,
the Napier Smiths, who had bought the estate 15 years earlier from the
last Campbell descendant Mrs. Williams, re-naming it "Roscommon
Lodge". They were all having tea on the front veranda commanding a
superb view over the lake, and insisted on our joining them, later
taking us over the house to show its historic features, - delicate
wrought-iron balustrades, hand-made bronze fittings to the doors,
French windows in all rooms, etc. - all so reminiscent of my
grandfather's day. We could hardly tear ourselves away; and an orange
sun was setting behind a church-steeple as we drove off through
lavender shadows on the road to Quebec.)
Charles ended his days at "Bampcell" in 1872 at the age of 80. It is
told that on his deathbed he sent for his son Archibald and said "Well,
Archie, here's. for the great leapt!" and passed away. His second
wife Fanny also died there 25 years later, in 1897.