The Province of New Brunswick was created by the British Parliament
On May 18th/1785, it was divided into counties On that same date, May 18/1785, the parishes of two counties were created. York county came up with Kingsclear, Prince William, Queensbury, Northampton, St Mary's. Woodstock and Fredericton. Sunbury was divided into the following parishes (note that only New Brunswick and Louisiana call them parishes, all others call them "townships") Lincoln, Burton, Maugerville and Sheffield .. On Oct. 8/1783, the first settlers arrived at Fredericton NB, they were of Dutch origin and try as they may, their efforts to build some shelters were not enough to help most of them pass the hard cold winter.. and many were buried along that river.. In the spring of '84, the Loyalists sailed up the St John River from Parrtown (Fredericton) and built a row of log houses along the bank..from Mill Creek to the present University Ave. The York co. records show not one property was transacted above the University ave. line for at least a period of two years. It is beleived this was because a piece of land of 180 acres belonging to an early settler by name of Philip Weade was laid across the main interval of Ste Anne's Point...and most of it was reserved for the building of the city... Ste Anne's Point was a French Village established near or at where Fredericton is today. It began around 1732 , although (my ancestors ) the Bellefontaine (Godin) family lived there during the "reign" of Governor De Villebon, then leader of all Indian war parties which ravaged New England, and Governor of Acadia.. As early as 1693, the historian Cadillac wrote of the beauties of the River St John.. we must also remember that before the so-called white people came to this area, the Maliseet Indians were found living here.. They were called "Etchemins" by the French settlers and they were a branch of the Abenaqui tribe of New England. When the Maliseets came to the St John River area, the Micmac race was here and they were slowly crowded out, up the river and up to Northern NB.. Sieur de Villebon wrote: "There are three sorts of savages native to Acadia, the Canibas, Malisites and the Micmacs which have three different languages..... the Micmacs occupy the land from -- up the Quebec river --- and extend to all the coast to Cape Sable.. The Malisites commence at the River St John and have the interior of the country as far as River Du Loup and along the sea-coast occupying Pasmenquadis (Passamaquoddy) and all the rivers along the coast.. The Canabas are those who have settled on the Kinibiquy (Kennabec) river from which they take their name.." The Maliseets and the Micmacs were common foe to the Mohawks who came from the St Laurence. The Mohawks sided in with and became alies of the Protestants and English. Miss Eva Dedham of Devon, York co. daughter of a micmac father and a maliseet mother in 1935 gave the York Sunbury Historical Society a description of the last raid of the Mohawks.. Her story tells of the Mohawks exterminating a whole Micmac village on the Bay of Chaleur, all except a young man who escaped by diving in the river.. In revenge , the young man spent the summer getting all the Micmacs he could along the Acadian villages along the river. the Micmacs in force wiped out the whole Mohawk village and they never returned. In 1686 a mission at Medoctic, a Maliseet village about 45 miles above Frederiton, was established following the visit of bishop St Vallier of Quebec. In 1717 King Louis of France helped the Maliseets build the first church there.. with Father Jean Loyard being in charge. In 1733 St Anne's Village was made up of 82 people. in 1749 it had 20 families. And it is said that these people had been neglected so badly they had become near savages. The Marquis de la Garconniere Gov. of Canada writes to the minister in France that he has sent Lieutenant Boishebert with about 20 or so men to defend the inhabitants against Gorham. They reached St Anne's in 1749 and a militia was organized and Joseph Bellefontaine (Godin) (my ancestor) and his son Michel were put in command of the militia. In 1759 however the city of St Anne was completely destroyed by fire. here is a quote from "Parkers' New York Gazette or Weekly Post-Boy" of April 2nd 1759.. "Extract from a letter from Fort Frederick, St John's (via Boston) The fifth of March, Lieutenant Hazen of the Rangers came in from a scout of fifteen days with a party of Sixteen Rangers, up the river of St John's, he brought in with him six French scalps and six prisoners. Lieutenant Hazen reports that he had been up to St Anne's which is 140 miles up this river from Fort Frederick, where it was expected he would have found a strong garrison of the enemy but on his arrival he found the town evacuated which he set fire to, burnt a large Mass house with a bell of about 300 pounds, a large store-house, and many valuable buildings amounting in the whole to 147, together with a large quantity of hay, wheat, peas, oats, etc,. ,, killing 21 horses, about 56 heards of cattle and a large number of hogs etc. and that he took prisoners and scalps with eleven of his party on his return near Grimross and that the inhabitants of St Anne's are chiefly gone to Canada." The six people scalped and killed were (A)Nastasie, daughter of Joseph Bellefontaine (Godin) and wife of Eustache Pare, her three children and the wife and child of Michel Bellefontaine son of Joseph senior. Joseph Bellefontaine junior was one of the captives.
These bits of history were noted by me quite a few years ago while researching some history
on the Godin family. Some was taken from a book called "The History of Central New Brunswick"
by L.M.B. Maxwell and was written in 1937. This book was re-published in 1984 by the York-Sunbury
Historical Society as a Bicentennial project I beleive.
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