Post 8: New Governor, New Rules

March 8, 1792

I have a big piece of news! There is a new governor here in Upper Canada, and his name is John Graves Simcoe. He arrived in Newark a few days ago, and thanks to some of my friends, I was able to find out quite a bit about him. He had led a loyalist unit by the name of "The Queen's Rangers" during the war against the Crazy Rebels, but was injured in 1781 and had to return to England. When he came here, he still had mental scars from the Crazy Rebels, so he happened to be very concerned of future wars between them. He thought that our capital, Newark, wasn't a good one because it was too close to the border between us and the Crazy Rebels. I have to say that I totally agree. Those Rebels are NOT to be trusted. They are bound to attack again sometime soon for another stupid reason. Maybe this time it will be because we accidentally looked at their cows funny or something. Well THEY threw all of their tea into the harbour. HOW COULD THEY!!! THE TEA!!!! I STILL can never forgive them for doing such a thing! Oh, back to Simcoe. In any case, I also heard that he wants to build a city called London to be our capital, but first, we need a military base. According to other people, he wants the new base to be in York, because it is further than Newark is from the border. I haven't heard much about York, so I am going to do some studying on it. I will write again soon.


August 4, 1793

I am so horrible at keeping up with my Journal, but I have done much studying about York and the recent events. It seems York used to be a very important part of the Natives transportation routes, and a small French fort was built there in 1620. In 1787, we bought it from the Natives. It doesn't seem like much to me, but I guess Simcoe thinks other wise. Speaking of Simcoe, he travelled to York five days ago to make sure that the fort was built right. He also had some town plans made because he was going to live there I guess. I also heard that Sir Guy Carleton (You remember him right?) doesn't like Simcoes choice, so he isn't supporting him. I couldn't believe that when I heard it. We are all part of the same proud country are we not? Why couldn't he put his preferences aside and think of what is best for the country instead? Because if this, Simcoe has to convince other governors to live in York, which is basically the wilderness right now. I wish him luck in that. However, protecting the city was easy because Simcoe has The Queen's Rangers. They also help build some of the buildings and roads. I also heard that he needs people to come and live at his settlement, but due to a war going on in Europe, no one from there is moving here. So even though he doesn't trust the Rebels, he is trying to get them here with tempts of more land. I think this is a horrible idea, but oh well. He is also trying to create an upper class, like in England, by giving some people more land than others. I rather liked it here without an upper class, and trying to add one isn't such a good idea in my opinion. One thing that I actually liked from his plans was that he is continuing to let "Late Loyalists" in and giving them land. At least that was a good idea! That is all that is available to me right now, I will try to write again soon, but I can't make any promises.